On several occasions, through his messenger Moses, God commanded Pharaoh to free the slaves, but the Egyptian monarch refused. In order to get Pharaoh’s attention, God sent a series of plagues upon the Egyptians: frogs, lice, gnats, flies, lightning, and hail.
Not gonna lie, that sounds a lot like Houston, but I digress.
The plagues grew more severe, but Pharaoh wouldn’t listen until God finally ran out of patience and sent the last plague: the death of every Egyptian firstborn son. In the wake of this tragedy, Pharaoh relented and allowed the Hebrew slaves to go free…for about five minutes, at which point he changed his mind and ordered his troops to pursue the rogue slaves and return them to Egypt.
Nevertheless, the Israelites escaped, but as it turns out, leaving was the easy part. From the second half of the book called Exodus all the way through the end of the book called Judges, the Israelites struggled to find a way to survive as an independent community with no king, no land, and no shared history other than the chains they wore in Egypt.
I assume that the lives of nomadic herdsmen have always been tough, but things were extra harsh throughout Mesopotamia during the years following the Israelites’ escape from Egypt. By studying ancient pollen residue, archaeologists have confirmed that a massive drought led to a famine about the time the Israelites were adjusting to life after slavery. During that time, nomadic tribes like the Israelites lost as much as half their population. Infant mortality rates throughout the region topped fifty percent. The limited supplies of food and water led to localized violence as roving bands of warlords took whatever they could by force.
Facing the possibility of death in the desert, some of the Israelites actually complained about having lost the security they enjoyed as slaves:
The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the Lord’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.” (Exodus 16:3)
This world of hardship and regret was the context that gave rise to Leviticus. Believe it or not, all those crazy rules were God’s way of giving the struggling Israelites a path toward hope and survival as they wandered aimlessly through the wilderness. Most people today who dismiss Leviticus because it’s too harsh and arbitrary are simply showing their deeply entitled snobbery.
When you put yourself in the sandals of those men and women who were just trying not to die and to keep their kids alive, while honoring the God who loved them, the purpose behind this book comes into focus: Leviticus is a love story.
Love is the reason why so much of Leviticus is about sanitization. Love is why God told the Israelite leaders: You must distinguish between clean and unclean, and teach the Hebrews (Leviticus 10:10- 11, paraphrased). To us, it sounds like rigid religion; to the Hebrews trying to stay alive, keeping clean things away from unclean things meant survival.
Love is why God gave the people strict rules about what to eat, and what not to eat. It wasn’t arbitrary or manipulative; there were always deeper reasons behind the food laws. Pigs, for example, are disgusting creatures that will eat absolutely anything. Pigs will consume their own dead offspring if given the chance. Did you know the mafia used to dump their victims’ corpses in pig pens because pigs consumed everything—bones and all—thus eliminating all incriminating evidence? Maybe that’s why God said, “Y’all really shouldn’t eat those things.”
Shrimp, which were also forbidden in Leviticus, are basically the pigs of the sea. They’re filthy. Other animals that the Israelites were not allowed to eat included bats, rats, vultures, hyenas, weasels, and catfish. Most of the forbidden creatures were scavenging bottom-feeders that survived by consuming the carcasses of other dead animals.
God wasn’t just being mean when he outlawed bacon and bats. He was looking out for his kids because he wanted them to live. Why? Love.
Love is why God told the Israelites to be extra careful with skin diseases and infections (Leviticus 13:1-44). Communicable illnesses could have spread and wiped out the whole community overnight, so God handed down quarantine guidelines for the sake of love:
“Anyone with such a defiling disease must wear torn clothes, let their hair be unkempt, cover the lower part of their face and cry out, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ As long as they have the disease they remain unclean. They must live alone; they must live outside the camp.” (Leviticus 13:45-46)
Seven months ago, I would have said this sounds like cruel and unusual punishment. Just because you’re a little concerned about getting sick, you’re going to force someone into isolation, to cover their face, and to look all messy and disheveled? But COVID-19 has revived the Leviticus instinct within us all. My hair has been unkempt since March 2020. People now refer to social distancing, wearing a mask, and washing your hands as acts of love.
And that is exactly the point Leviticus makes. All this time, we’ve been making fun of Leviticus, and now we’re living it.
Excerpt from “Scripture and the Skeptic” by Eric Huffman.
