Love Others, Lean In, Let Go: Reading Leviticus with Jesus

When I was a Ph.D. student at the University of California I needed to supplement my meager teaching assistant income with other work. So I took a job at the University’s hazardous waste facility which accepted old paint, expired household chemicals, and used motor oil, to be recycled or disposed of safely. I loved the work – helping the environment, being outside, and not having to focus intellectually on anything in particular. One of the difficult things about the job, however, was handling containers that people would put old motor oil in – like the plastic Langer Apple Juice containers which were made of thick, tough plastic. After emptying the containers we were supposed to cut them in half with an

X-Acto knife and let them drain over a grate before we recycled them. On one occasion, I was struggling with a particular container and did the unthinkable – I turned the X-Acto knife toward myself pulling on it as I tried to slice open the container. Can you guess what happened next? Well, as I pulled, the knife slipped out of the container and plunged into my left forearm. That’s the story that popped into my mind this week as I read through Leviticus. Leviticus, I realized, is a lot like the X-Acto – a useful tool that can be dangerous in the hands of a foolish person.  So my first point might be the most simple and obvious but necessary nonetheless.

          1.    Leviticus is difficult and dangerous. Use it with care.

 Please make sure that you understand me. Leviticus is no more a menace than an X-Acto. An X-Acto is a great tool, very helpful and important for a lot of work. But it must be used properly and by someone who knows what he or she is doing and who understands the risks. When I cut my arm, it wasn’t the knife’s fault. It was my own poor judgment, my own cavalier attitude toward something that carries inherent risks. And Bible-reading, friends, involves inherent risks. So read it carefully. It’s also the case that helpful tools can be more than misused. They can also be weaponized – used in horrible violence – in the same way that the simple box cutter was used by terrorists to capture the cockpits of planes used in 9/11. We are all aware of people who use the Bible in the same way – seeking to harm others - like the hate group Westboro Baptist church whose members shout with glee at the funerals of soldiers and declaring that God hates gay people, citing Leviticus.

But it’s not simply Leviticus that’s difficult. The whole Bible can be a challenge to understand and use correctly

sometimes. The evangelical American historian Mark Noll reminds us of the danger by discussing the use of the Bible during the Civil War. Because February is Black History month, it seems more than appropriate to point out that during the Civil War, the biblical arguments made for keeping slaves were considered much more convincing than arguments for abolition. After all, Noll points out, slavery enjoys a consistent witness in both the Old and New Testaments with plenty of specific passages allowing it and requiring slaves to obey their masters. Christian abolitionists appealed to broader biblical principles of love and freedom, but according to Noll, the idea that an anti-slavery spirit of the law could defeat a pro-slavery letter of the law “was not only a minority position; it was also widely perceived as a theologically dangerous position.” So much so that Moses Stuart, perhaps

the most respected American biblical scholar of his day, said abolitionists “must give up New Testament authority, or abandon the fiery course which they are pursuing.” 

Now I can’t imagine anyone agreeing with Moses Stuart and yet it would be foolish to deny that many things can be argued from the Bible. So how should we read it? I can’t pretend to answer this fully but wish to point us toward how Jesus read the Bible, specifically the way he read and used Leviticus. So despite the warning on the label, so to speak, Jesus’ use of Leviticus should challenge anyone who also might say, “Don’t read Leviticus. It’s too dangerous.” Jesus read it. But HOW did he read it?

          2.    If you want to read the Scriptures (and Leviticus) correctly – love others.

Two times every day, the observant Jew recites aloud a creed. This creed comes straight out of Deuteronomy (6:4-9). It was called the Shema (taken from the first word in Hebrew) and reflected the heart of Jewish spiritual practice.

⁴ Hear [Shema], O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. ⁵ Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. ⁶ These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. ⁷ Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. ⁸ Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. ⁹ Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

The Shema was the first prayer that children were taught to say and reveals the best expression of the most fundamental Jewish belief. It outlines a lifestyle for spiritual formation: listen, recite, instruct, write out, and even wear, the Torah, in order to love God. The point was simple: love God by living the Torah.

As a good Jew, Jesus would have devotionally been taught to recite the Shema daily. Later in his life, he encounters an expert of the law who asks him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” Jesus answers by reciting the Shema with a twist and in doing so creates what one New Testament professor calls, “the Jesus Creed.” Jesus will quote the traditional Shema but will amend the sacred text by borrowing from Leviticus 19:18 saying, “And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[Lev. 19:18] ⁴⁰ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matt. 22:39-40).

This is Jesus’ summary of what spiritual formation looks like: love God and live Scripture by loving others. I believe that Jesus’ view clues us into the significant difference between how he reads the Scriptures versus how the Pharisees read them. See, the Pharisees’ theology works from the abstract by reading Scripture and applying it. Jesus, however, will suggest something quite revolutionary: we must read Scripture with an eye toward loving others, even enemies as we would wish to be loved. Our love for God and commitment to live God’s word is revealed by our love for others. Take the Sabbath as an example (see Matthew 12). The Sabbath is ironclad commandment in the law for all Jews to follow. The Pharisees approach the question this way:  Is Sabbath work forbidden in Scripture? Yes. Is plucking grain work? Yes. Is healing work? Yes. Then we have our conclusion—plucking grain and healing on the Sabbath are forbidden.

Jesus’ reading of the Bible, however, involves care for the person: Here is a hungry group or a hurting person in front of me. What do they need? How can I help? Ah, but it’s the Sabbath. Let me now take this person’s unique situation to the Scriptures—and when we do that, we can see even more clearly that the Scriptures themselves address real human faces. They accommodate and address actual human need. Moreover, Jesus will forcefully argue that the Sabbath itself aims to serve people and NOT the other way around: “The Sabbath was made for humankind and not humankind for the Sabbath!”

The Pharisees, however, see no human face when they read the scriptures – for the sake of the text they are quite willing to harm and exclude others. Is it any wonder then why they missed the Word of God with a human face in their midst?

Every Christmas the founder of The Salvation Army, General William Booth, looked forward to addressing the crowd at the Army's annual convention. But on Christmas in 1910, his health was poor and he knew he would not be able to attend the convention in person. When the thousands in attendance were told that he would not be present, a wave of sadness and disappointment swept over the crowd. General Booth's speech was the highlight of the event and something everyone looked forward to. However, Booth had sent a telegram to be read instead. As the moderator opened the telegram the thousands waited in anticipation to hear his message. His telegram was then read aloud to the crowd. It contained one word: Others!   That was it. But one word was all that was needed. Those six letters reminded the crowd what was at the very heart of loving God and reading the Bible rightly.

          

          3.    If you want to read the Scriptures (and Leviticus) correctly – lean in toward unclean people.

In the first chapter of the Gospel of Mark, a leper comes to Jesus falling at his feet. In Leviticus 13 we read that lepers were unclean and accordingly had to live without any physical contact, separated from society, and had to yell their alienated status to others: “Unclean!”

The leper runs up close to Jesus and says, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.” “I am willing,” Jesus says, at which point he does the unthinkable: he reaches out and touches the leper. Then, after touching the man, Jesus says, “Be clean!” The craziness of this act can only be revived if we are aware of the Levitical code behind it:

² “‘If anyone becomes aware that they are guilty . . . if they touch human uncleanness (anything that would make them unclean) even though they are unaware of it . . . they must confess in what way they have sinned. ⁶ As a penalty for the sin they have committed, they must bring to the Lord a female lamb or goat from the flock as a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement for them for their sin. (Leviticus 5:2-6)

Jesus touched the man while he was still considered unclean.

And in the eyes of the law, this meant that Jesus had become unclean himself. The order is significant – embrace came first, followed by healing, and we should ponder the significance of Jesus’ order for ourselves.

Jesus practiced what theologian Miroslav Volf calls the “will to embrace.” The will to embrace is the affirmation of a person’s worth, dignity, and humanity prior to any other judgments we make of the person. Jesus doesn’t first see a leper, he sees a human being in need. The reason the church so often fails to welcome the lepers of our day and time is that we get the order of embrace all wrong. We reverse the story. We yell, “Wait! Stop! Don’t come any closer! Be clean and then we’ll touch you.”

I’m not suggesting that leaning in is always easy or that understanding Scripture will miraculously be made plain. And Jesus, afterwards, honors Leviticus by telling the healed leper to go and show himself to the priest as it commands – which the man fails to do. Jesus honors Leviticus. However, if you want to be spiritually formed in the way of Jesus, if you want to read Leviticus like he does – lean in first.

          4.    If you want to read the Scriptures (and Leviticus) correctly – let go of hatred and judgment.

In Jesus’ famous sermon on the mount, he will discuss the importance of the law and its role in his followers’ lives. At one point he says, “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ [Leviticus 24:20] But I say to you, not to retaliate revengefully by evil means.” (Matt. 5:39-40). So Jesus will quote the lex talionis [law of retaliation] of Leviticus and move it closer to its actual intent. The original law aims to curb rather than promote violence. In that world, it sought to make reciprocity the standard by which one could exact vengeance rather than allowing for an “anything goes” response. Yet, Jesus will say it’s not enough – it is now time to understand more fully what God wants – not to exact vengeance at all on those who hurt us or do wrong. And he will go on to describe how one can do that: turning the cheek, etc. (but that’s for a different sermon). And he will also take this step with other laws that call for drastic punishments, like the killing of those who commit adultery. In Leviticus it states:

¹⁰ “‘If a man commits adultery with another man’s wife—with the wife of his neighbor—both the adulterer and the adulteress are to be put to death. (Leviticus 20:10).

It states this unambiguously. The original intent of the authors was uncompromising. The words cannot be translated any other way – to soften or remove the punishment. And yet Jesus disregards it. In John 8, Jesus is

pushed into a confrontation with the Pharisees over a woman caught in adultery. Apart from the clear ways that the Pharisees aren’t interested in following the law themselves but trying to trap Jesus, Jesus will say to the guilty woman,“Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” ¹¹ “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go and sin no more.”

Jesus’ refusal to “condemn” the woman despite the plain meaning of Leviticus should give us pause as we finish with this book of Scripture. If the Son of God refuses to use the Bible in this way then why do many of us do so with glee? Why do so many of us weaponize the Bible and use it in the service of hatred and condemnation?

The fifth-century theologian Augustine wrote, “The fulfillment and end of scripture is the love of God and our neighbor.” True understanding of scripture is not ultimately realized by discovering the text’s historical or theological meaning; true understanding of scripture is realized when the reader submits to the authority of the text in light of Jesus and experiences personal transformation worked out in greater love for God and human beings. True Bible interpretation then is not determined in the abstract but by a change of heart toward others. If you are not loving others in a greater way, not leaning into their pain, not letting go of fear and hatred – you’re simply not reading it right.