Law & grace are diagnosis & cure: Finding Messiah in the Torah (Leviticus 26–27)

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In Torah reading Bechukotai, we are reminded of the profound blessings that await those who faithfully walk with God and uphold His Torah. However, we see in the book of Jeremiah, how God had to punish the children of Israel when they failed to follow the Torah and instead co-opted and integrated the disgusting practices of the people including child sacrifice into their religious and national culture.

“If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments so as to carry them out…”
Leviticus 26:3 NASB

In the Ancient Near East (ANE), when there were contracts or treaties between an emperor and a vassal king. The scholarly term for these treaties is suzerain-vassal treaty. A suzerain- vassal treaty usually included both the blessings that come when both sides fulfill their ends of the contract and the curses that come when the parties do not fulfill their agreements. Leviticus 26 is the suzerain-vassal treaty between God and the people of Israel that was given to the first generation and the ending chapters of Deuteronomy provides us the suzerain- vassal treaty that was given to the second generation of Israel as they were preparing to enter the Promised Land.

The book of Jeremiah records what happened to the children of Israel when they failed to follow through on their side of the suzerain- vassal treaty with God.

Jeremiah warned that God’s coming judgement will be very harsh. In the ANE, sieges of major cities were common and the first step was to cut off food and water supplies to the city. Hezekiah’s tunnel was an important feat of civic engineering built to guarantee water in Jerusalem, even during a siege. You can survive a month without food but only 3 days without water so water was a crucial resource in any city to keep the people alive. Jeremiah warns the people of Judah that in the coming siege by the Babylonians, things will get so bad that the people of Jerusalem with descend into cannibalism if they do not repent and surrender to the Babylonians because there will be no other food.

Archaeological discoveries prove these weren’t just made up later. In December 2019, archaeologists found a small 2.5 cm folded lead curse tablet carved on Mt. Ebal in Israel. The small tablet included quotes written in Paleo-Hebrew from Deuteronomy 27 and Joshua 8, which is dated to 1400-1200 BC. The tablet says, Curse, cursed, cursed, cursed by the God YHWH. You will die cursed. Cursed you will surely die, cursed by YHWH. Cursed, cursed, cursed.”

Both Deuteronomy and Jeremiah bring up what are the blessings and the curses. Jeremiah called out the hypocrisy of the people of Israel who were going through the motions of worshiping God but also worshipping the gods of the Canaanites they were supposed to wipe out.

God wants us to enter His rest, not just go through the motions

The blessings and curses in Leviticus 27 mirror those in Deuteronomy 28. They were important to the first generation who left the house of bondage and for the second generation who were preparing to enter His rest. The first generation, who God was speaking to in Leviticus, were not confident int heir ability to enter the promised land or in their ability to hold it. They sent 12 spies into the land and 10 gave back a “bad report” saying that walls of the Canaanite cities are too high, the people are too big. They’re too well equipped, etc.

The spies with their faithless report highlighted not only their lack of faith in their own abilities but also their lack of faith in God’s strength. They didn’t see that the God who brought them out of Egypt, who gave them water and manna in the wilderness would be the one who would take the land for them and would hold the land for them as well. Deuteronomy speaks to the second generation.

We are not well equipped on our own to break the back of Egypt, we were not able to defeat Amalek, but God is the one who broke Egypt’s back, God is the one who crushed Amalek, making good on all of His oaths and vows to His people bring them from bondage to freedom, from harsh labor to rest.

Strong families and communities come from strong values

The leadership of a nation contributes greatly to the direction of the people towards God or away from Him. Jeremiah called out the corruption of the monarchy, aristocracy and the priestly classes of Judah as they lead the common people away from God and towards the false gods of Canaan. Every Shabbat we pray the Shema, that we are to live and teach the Torah when we wake up, when we go to sleep and as we go about our daily lives. We are to live the Torah authentically, not as hypocrites putting on a pantomime.

We can’t ignore politics because politics is downstream from culture and culture is downstream from the family. A city is collection of families. If the general morality of the family is rotten, the city will become rotten, too. Cities with neighborhoods that are populated by stable families that promote life, will be orderly and well run but neighborhoods that are populated by unstable families that love death more than life will not be orderly or well run, even if they have access to a lot of taxpayer money.

Wealthy people who live in unstable cities like San Francisco or Los Angeles can build their small bunkers, with high fences, security cameras and well trained security guards They can create little islands of safety and order but the city around them is still falling apart. Just like we read in the book of Jeremiah, when you peel away the outer layers and look inside, you realize the outside may look great. The temple is in operation they’re presenting the offering just like they should and on schedule but when you look deeper, you see their hearts are weak and sick and they are not in what they are doing.

Don’t judge by appearances. Check the fruit!

Political leaders and civic leaders are often referred to as “shepherds” by the prophets, largely as a reflection of the leadership in homes, and social groups, namely congregation of believers.

We should always be very careful in evaluating our shepherds that we don’t look for and be snowed by the externals. The externals, are they tall? Do they speak with a big booming voice? Do they have a great presentation? Do they speak eloquently? What happens when they teach one way, but behave in a different way? Words are cheap. See when they do because how they act will show you what they actually value. When the fruit in the churches and other social groups are bad, the fruit of the community also turns bad.

If we study only for the test, we do not internalize the lessons and the efforts of our study do not bear fruit. When I studied English grammar and had to diagram sentences, it went through one ear and out the other, but when I had a college internship as a copy editor, I was able to practically apply what I learned when I diagramed those sentences and internalized how to properly write the English language.

The things that God has made can propagate and self-replicate, while the things that men make cannot propagate or self-replicate, despite our current fears of robots and technology learning how to reproduce themselves.

Leaders who aren’t “present” or “with it” in seeking knowledge, wisdom and understanding may watch as their “flocks” — families, congregants, constituents — drift toward popular trends that lack wisdom and understanding. God speaks through challenging yet spiritually understandable means to encourage those who are truly and eagerly seeking truth to seek further.

We need to be very careful about who we submit to as an authority. It’s not important about whether they’re modern or hip as the current culture defines such things. It’s not about whether they can put on a great light show with a big smoke generator during church services. It should be about how to point people to what is most important in life, to give people substance, not marshmallow fluff.

Jesus answered them, “To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted. For whoever has, to him more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him. Therefore I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.

In their case the prophecy of Isaiah is being fulfilled, which says, ‘YOU WILL KEEP ON HEARING, BUT WILL NOT UNDERSTAND; YOU WILL KEEP ON SEEING, BUT WILL NOT PERCEIVE; FOR THE HEART OF THIS PEOPLE HAS BECOME DULL, WITH THEIR EARS THEY SCARCELY HEAR, AND THEY HAVE CLOSED THEIR EYES, OTHERWISE THEY WOULD SEE WITH THEIR EYES, HEAR WITH THEIR EARS, AND UNDERSTAND WITH THEIR HEART AND RETURN, AND I WOULD HEAL THEM.’”
Matthew 13:11–15 NASB95

Here’s more context from Isaiah:

He said, “Go, and tell this people: ‘Keep on listening, but do not perceive; Keep on looking, but do not understand.’ “Render the hearts of this people insensitive, Their ears dull, And their eyes dim, Otherwise they might see with their eyes, Hear with their ears, Understand with their hearts, And return and be healed.”
Isaiah 6:9–10 NASB95

Is God setting us up to fail? No, he has given us the tools for success, if we are willing to not just hear God’s instructions but actually walk them out in life.

Do the blessings and curses only refer to the instructions regarding keeping the Shemitah and Yobel? The warning that exile will allow the land to rest (Lev. 26:34–35) suggests that.

When God curses a people, it’s a combination of withdrawing divine protection from the people and the calling down of supernatural destruction on the people. For example, when God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, it says that the Lord on earth called to the Lord in Heaven to bring down the fire and brimstone on those cities. So happened in Sodom and Gomorrah was more than just a withdrawal of divine protection.

The Promised Land underscores that God keeps His promises

God created humanity out of the dirt or the dust, so that dirt is important to God, but what made humanity more than just a pile of mud is the breath of life from God. In the same way, the Shabbat is a place in time that comes along every seven days that God has blessed and made holy and special. The shabbat is different from the other days because God made it different from the other days.

This is also true with the dirt on the earth and the territories of the nation. The dirt in Eden was different from other places on earth. God is the one who gave the people of Israel, through Abraham, a particular plot of land in a a particular place for Abraham’s descendants through Isaac and Jacob to live in. The land of Israel is anchored to God’s promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their descendants. Land without a promise is just land.

Different types of land are used for different purposes. For example, we live in Sonoma County and where we are meeting is right across from a vineyard and I can tell you that in the wine industry, the terroir of the grapes is very important. Each wine appellation gets its name based on the characteristics of the soil in that area and how it affects the flavor and fermentation of the grapes.

We are not special because we come from the dirt. What makes humans special is the breath of life, the consciousness that God has planted in humans that he hasn’t planted in any other beings.

God blessed His people even when they weren’t living in the Promised Land, even when He gave them a time out from the land. He blessed Joseph while in Egypt, He blessed Daniel in Babylon and Queen Esther in Persia. They were part of a promise He made to Abraham. God didn’t bless them because of how holy they were but because of His holiness and His promises to bless His people and to raise up leaders to protect His people.

God promised to bless the nations of the entire world through Abraham. If God doesn’t keep His promise to Abraham’s descendants, what hope do those of us who are not descendants of Abraham have that He would keep His promises to us? The truth from the Scriptures is that all people are equal before God and all of us are granted the chance to repent of our sins and to trust and obey like Abraham did.

In Jeremiah, the Lord warned that His going to dismantle the nation of Judah by using a reprehensible nation called Babylon to come in force a change in leadership, to warn the people of Israel that they were going in the wrong direction. God did not just throw a life preserver to the people of Israel so as to watch the gentiles drown. God told Abraham in Genesis 12 that He blessed Abraham to be a blessing to the entire world, not just his family.

The promises God made to Israel were to be a blessing to all of humanity. The problem in Jeremiah’s generation was that the people of God were called to be the light of the world, but the only light they were giving to the world was darkness and the gentiles had nowhere to go to learn how to get right with God. How can they see that picture that the people of God are to be a light, when things around just look so dark?

God’s instructions diagnose the problem and point to the solution — Messiah!

There is a beautiful chiastic structure in the Book of Leviticus that points to the promise of the Great High Priest in Yeshua.¹

Leviticus 1–7: Offerings (things that approach the Presence)
- Leviticus 8–10: Priests, time (7+1 days) and Tabernacle
  - Leviticus 11–15: Clean & unclean foods and personal conditions
    - Leviticus 16–17: High priest bears Israel before the Presence
  - Leviticus 18–20: Clean & unclean behaviors
- Leviticus 21–26: Priests, time (moedim of 7 & 8) and Land
Leviticus 27–28: Vows (hearts that approach the Presence)

God is bringing the people of the world closer to Himself, to graft them into people of Israel, if we are willing to leave behind who were were before and to conform ourselves to His image and allow Him to re-create us. We have to be willing to be born again.

“If then, you act with hostility against Me and are unwilling to obey Me, I will increase the plague on you seven times according to your sins. I will let loose among you the beasts of the field, which will bereave you of your children and destroy your cattle and reduce your number so that your roads lie deserted.”
Leviticus 26:21–22 NASB95

Medieval Jewish commentators Rashi and Rashbam both warned that “walking” with — obeying — God only on occasion or walking with God only by chance is akin to walking against Him with hostility. God only wants those who walk with Him deliberately and exclusively. He doesn’t want fair-weather friends. God can make sons of Abraham out of the rocks, but the true sons of Abraham are those who deliberately chose to walk with God.

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise.
Galatians 3:28–29 NASB95

It is because of our High Priest Yeshua, we can walk to God boldly yet respectfully. There is a built in lesson in the Torah that tells us that God wants to be in the midst of His people and that only His Messiah can be the one to re-establish any rebuilding of a new temple. The Messiah is the problem and the solution to how God can live in the midst of His people.

Christians teach that Yeshua’s death has made the Torah basically null and void, yet they have reincorporated the Torah in an ad hoc fashion back into common practice because they realized that completely lawlessness is not closer to godliness.

There are pillars that need to be destroyed, pillars that hold up oppression need to be torn down but most of the ancient pillar of society that those who worship what is new and look down on anything old, need to be upheld. Just because it’s new doesn’t meant its good and just because its old doesn’t mean its bad.

Summary: Tammy