The Law to Guide Us
or maybe to point us to something else . . . ?
It all began with Abraham; it was with him that God made a covenant, thus creating Judeo-Christianity. From there followed his son, Isaac, and grandson, Jacob-- these three are known as the "Patriarchs;" Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all claim heritage from the Patriarchs. Jacob, whom God renamed "Israel" had 12 sons, whose decedents made up the 12 different tribes of Israel. When Moses led the twelve tribes of Israel out of Egypt, God dictated to Moses the Hebrew Law.
At the top of the law is the 10 Commandments. These are the serious, tip-top rules for following God, and avoiding his wrath. The 10 Commandments have endured throughout History, and form the basis (whether you like to admit it or not) for much of what we know as civil law today. After the 10 Commandments come 613 laws, also given to the Hebrews from God, through Moses. These laws are found in the Pentateuch (the first 5 books of the Bible), and consist of 365 negative commandments, and 248 positive commandments.
-The commands range from moral issues, such as:
"Don't have sex with your mother/father" or "Don't extort money from the poor"
-theistic commands, such as:
"Love God above everything else," or "Do you best to emulate God's qualities"
-and ceremonial and ritual practices, such as
"Don't trim your sideburns," or "Don't eat meat and milk mixed together."
(If you want to see every one in a list, Wikipedia has compiled one)
This law taught the Jews how to live morally, and how to please God. Some of them, even though they seem strange and pointless, actually have very practical uses. God's wisdom is truly reflected in these laws, as you'll find rules that cater to things like germ theory, which mankind didn't even begin to understand for another 2000 years (This had to be from God, clearly. How else would the Jews have thought of that stuff?). But there is a huge problem with these 613 laws: NO ONE can POSSIBLY follow them perfectly. Once again, following the law to a T is IMPOSSIBLE.
However, the law also accounts for this, and in its fairness, it allows you to atone for your sins and failures to follow it in a number of ways, such as forgiving the debts of those who owe you bigtime. Still, the primary way to atone for your sins in Hebrew law is to offer animal sacrifices. There is a good deal of time spent in scripture discussing how these sacrifices are to be made, and in those scriptures, it becomes obvious that the thing of most importance is blood.
What kind of animal does the blood come from?
What qualifies a particular animal to be sacrificed?
How do you kill it?
Now use the blood in a ritual.
How much blood do you use?
Where does the blood go?
What happens to the bloodied things afterward?
See? For the Jews, it's all about blood when it comes to atoning for your sins before God.
Interestingly enough, the Old Testament, which people love to rag on for being antiquated, judgmental, and ritualistic to no end, actually says that this is all pointless. If you read Psalms, you'll notice it said a number of times that God really doesn't want blood and sacrifice. That's not what he's really after at all. What God really wants is your heart-- he wants you to have a humble spirit before him, and love him just as he loves you. If you truly love him, he doesn't care whether or not you offer sacrifices. Also, for a religious text that people typically associate with anger and judgment, you'll find references to God loving you and loving his people quite often, even in the books of law. Food for thought
. . .
The blood, of course, could only come from certain animals, such as doves, bulls or lambs. And it couldn't be any old animal, either-- your sacrifice had to be the best of the best, with no defects, diseases, or spots. If you were sacrificing a lamb, for instance, it's coat had to be perfectly white and spotless. Interesting regulation considering this perfectly white animal was about to be completely stained with blood. Had enough talk about blood yet?
Fast forward a thousand years or so, and we come to the birth of Jesus. I'm not going to get into how exactly we know that Jesus is the Son of God--this blog isn't about apologetics--so just accept that by faith for now so that you may understand the overall message. I may address Jesus' incarnation at another date. This time, I'm not going for how Jesus came to be, but why.
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