Unclean
I grew up being taught that the reason I needed Jesus was how "bad" I was. It was drilled into me from a very early age that I was sinful and full of sinful desires. Everything in my life, at least when it came to church, was measured by how good or bad my actions, my thoughts, and even my motivations were. A lot of my religious experience was driven by a feeling of guilt and shame.
Then, as I learned more about Jesus, I learned that He didn't talk about everything this way. Yes, some things were still morally wrong, but there were also things in the world that were broken and unclean, not because of wrong morals, but because they were no longer doing what God created them to do. When Jesus healed the man born blind in John 9, He explained that it wasn't because this man sinned, or his parents, "but that the works of God might be displayed in him" (John 9:3). It was an opportunity for God to show that He could fix what was broken.
As my kids get better and better at riding their bikes, I've had to learn how to help with their bike maintenance too. Sometimes the chain falls off and needs to be cleaned and lubed up. Sometimes a tire goes flat and the tube needs to be replaced. Sometimes the seat needs to be raised because the kids never seem to stop growing. Sometimes we have to replace the entire bike because they've outgrown it. My kids did nothing morally wrong to cause any of this. Things fall apart because we live in a world full of entropy and chaos.
The wrong way to read Leviticus is to assume that every law and instruction has a moral basis. Leviticus was written to a very specific people, with specific instructions on how to exist in the presence of a holy God. Yes, many of those instructions are moral, but there are also laws that deal with very specific situations for that specific group of people. So when we read Leviticus, we have to understand the clear difference between holy and common, and between unclean and clean (Leviticus 10:10).
The holiness of God points to how He is of a higher order and status than we could ever imagine. It includes His perfect nature, His perfect character, and His perfect plan. That stands in direct contrast to how "common" we are. We have a human nature, a human character, and human plans, and all of them are finite and limited. When the people of Israel are welcomed into the presence of a holy God, they are being invited near to an infinite and perfect God.
Then there is clean and unclean. While clean, the people of Israel are welcomed into the presence of God, but when they become unclean, they are unfit to enter His presence. This is not necessarily a status of sinfulness. It is a status of eligibility to enter the presence of a perfect God. For example, touching a dead body made a person unclean for seven days (Numbers 19:11), unfit to enter the presence of God, and yet it is not sinful for a man to bury his father. Of course there is overlap between what is sinful and what makes someone unclean, but fault is not what makes someone unclean. Ritual purity is not always the same thing as moral purity.
Leviticus is showing its readers that they are called into this holiness, or better understood, this separation from the other nations of the world. God's holiness is described as separation and distinction from what is "common," and so God gives instruction on how His people are to live their common lives in a sanctified way. That is why He tells them not to eat certain "unclean" foods. It wasn't about bacteria, or about the animals themselves (at least the text never says so), but it tracked how Israel was separate from the other nations of the world (Leviticus 20:24-26). Their ritual laws were not about morality but about loyalty to the instructions their King had given them.
There was nothing shameful or sinful about being unclean. If anything, the law assumes that everyone would be unclean at one point or another in their life. It goes so far as to say that uncleanness spreads by contact (Leviticus 15:5-7). No one is able to remain clean forever, because we live in a world full of both moral sin and ordinary brokenness.
So when someone had leprosy, a skin disease, it wasn't a moral failure that caused it, but because they were unclean, they had to live outside the community (Leviticus 13:46). No one was to touch them, or they would become unclean too, because those were the instructions God had given. The leper had to remain outside the community until the priest proclaimed them clean. The priests were never given the instruction to cleanse and heal anyone. Their responsibility was to proclaim when the disease was no longer present.
That makes Jesus' response to a leper in Mark 1:40-42 that much more significant.
"And a leper came to him, imploring him, and kneeling said to him, 'If you will, you can make me clean.' Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, 'I will; be clean.' And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean."
Jesus is able to impart His cleanness to someone through His touch. This completely changes the relationship between humanity and ritual and moral purity. Jesus wasn't abolishing the laws regarding purity, but rather imparting His own purity unto people. He does this again with a woman who had been bleeding for twelve years (Mark 5:25-34). She touches His garment, and He imparts His cleanness to her.
Leviticus lays the foundation that ritual purity is required for people to be in the presence of God, which leads to all the instruction about what brings purity and what causes uncleanness. Jesus does not change this, but rather provides Himself as the way to that same purity. As 1 Peter 1:15-16 says, "but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, 'You shall be holy, for I am holy.'"
Christ fulfills our ritual purity so that we can grow in our moral purity.
And so the leper, healed of his ritual impurity, goes into the community to spread the news of what Christ has done for him. Jesus had actually told him to say nothing to anyone and go show himself to the priest (Mark 1:44), but a man who had been unwelcome in the community for so long now carried the purity of Christ, and he couldn't keep it in (1:45).
Jesus told that man to keep quiet. After the resurrection, He sends us out to tell (Matthew 28:19). We need to, we must, go out and share how Christ has made us clean.
Then, as I learned more about Jesus, I learned that He didn't talk about everything this way. Yes, some things were still morally wrong, but there were also things in the world that were broken and unclean, not because of wrong morals, but because they were no longer doing what God created them to do. When Jesus healed the man born blind in John 9, He explained that it wasn't because this man sinned, or his parents, "but that the works of God might be displayed in him" (John 9:3). It was an opportunity for God to show that He could fix what was broken.
As my kids get better and better at riding their bikes, I've had to learn how to help with their bike maintenance too. Sometimes the chain falls off and needs to be cleaned and lubed up. Sometimes a tire goes flat and the tube needs to be replaced. Sometimes the seat needs to be raised because the kids never seem to stop growing. Sometimes we have to replace the entire bike because they've outgrown it. My kids did nothing morally wrong to cause any of this. Things fall apart because we live in a world full of entropy and chaos.
The wrong way to read Leviticus is to assume that every law and instruction has a moral basis. Leviticus was written to a very specific people, with specific instructions on how to exist in the presence of a holy God. Yes, many of those instructions are moral, but there are also laws that deal with very specific situations for that specific group of people. So when we read Leviticus, we have to understand the clear difference between holy and common, and between unclean and clean (Leviticus 10:10).
The holiness of God points to how He is of a higher order and status than we could ever imagine. It includes His perfect nature, His perfect character, and His perfect plan. That stands in direct contrast to how "common" we are. We have a human nature, a human character, and human plans, and all of them are finite and limited. When the people of Israel are welcomed into the presence of a holy God, they are being invited near to an infinite and perfect God.
Then there is clean and unclean. While clean, the people of Israel are welcomed into the presence of God, but when they become unclean, they are unfit to enter His presence. This is not necessarily a status of sinfulness. It is a status of eligibility to enter the presence of a perfect God. For example, touching a dead body made a person unclean for seven days (Numbers 19:11), unfit to enter the presence of God, and yet it is not sinful for a man to bury his father. Of course there is overlap between what is sinful and what makes someone unclean, but fault is not what makes someone unclean. Ritual purity is not always the same thing as moral purity.
Leviticus is showing its readers that they are called into this holiness, or better understood, this separation from the other nations of the world. God's holiness is described as separation and distinction from what is "common," and so God gives instruction on how His people are to live their common lives in a sanctified way. That is why He tells them not to eat certain "unclean" foods. It wasn't about bacteria, or about the animals themselves (at least the text never says so), but it tracked how Israel was separate from the other nations of the world (Leviticus 20:24-26). Their ritual laws were not about morality but about loyalty to the instructions their King had given them.
There was nothing shameful or sinful about being unclean. If anything, the law assumes that everyone would be unclean at one point or another in their life. It goes so far as to say that uncleanness spreads by contact (Leviticus 15:5-7). No one is able to remain clean forever, because we live in a world full of both moral sin and ordinary brokenness.
So when someone had leprosy, a skin disease, it wasn't a moral failure that caused it, but because they were unclean, they had to live outside the community (Leviticus 13:46). No one was to touch them, or they would become unclean too, because those were the instructions God had given. The leper had to remain outside the community until the priest proclaimed them clean. The priests were never given the instruction to cleanse and heal anyone. Their responsibility was to proclaim when the disease was no longer present.
That makes Jesus' response to a leper in Mark 1:40-42 that much more significant.
"And a leper came to him, imploring him, and kneeling said to him, 'If you will, you can make me clean.' Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, 'I will; be clean.' And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean."
Jesus is able to impart His cleanness to someone through His touch. This completely changes the relationship between humanity and ritual and moral purity. Jesus wasn't abolishing the laws regarding purity, but rather imparting His own purity unto people. He does this again with a woman who had been bleeding for twelve years (Mark 5:25-34). She touches His garment, and He imparts His cleanness to her.
Leviticus lays the foundation that ritual purity is required for people to be in the presence of God, which leads to all the instruction about what brings purity and what causes uncleanness. Jesus does not change this, but rather provides Himself as the way to that same purity. As 1 Peter 1:15-16 says, "but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, 'You shall be holy, for I am holy.'"
Christ fulfills our ritual purity so that we can grow in our moral purity.
And so the leper, healed of his ritual impurity, goes into the community to spread the news of what Christ has done for him. Jesus had actually told him to say nothing to anyone and go show himself to the priest (Mark 1:44), but a man who had been unwelcome in the community for so long now carried the purity of Christ, and he couldn't keep it in (1:45).
Jesus told that man to keep quiet. After the resurrection, He sends us out to tell (Matthew 28:19). We need to, we must, go out and share how Christ has made us clean.
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