From verse 13 to verse 24 of our chapter, we have the law with respect to birds. All of the carnivorous kind, that is, all that fed on flesh, were unclean; the omnivorous, or those who could eat any thing, were unclean; all those which though furnished with power to soar into the heavens would nevertheless grovel upon the earth were unclean. As to the latter class, there were some exceptional cases (ver. 21, 22.); but the general rule, the fixed principle, the standing ordinance, was as distinct as possible—"All fowls that creep, going upon all fours, shall be an abomination unto you." (Ver. 20.) All this is very simple in its instruction to us. Those fowls that could feed upon flesh, those that could swallow any thing or every thing, and all groveling fowls, were to be unclean to the Israel of God, because so pronounced by the God of Israel; nor can the spiritual mind have any difficulty in discerning the fitness of such an ordinance. We can not only trace in the habits of the above three classes of fowl the just ground of their being pronounced unclean, but we can also see in them the striking exhibition of that in nature which is to be strenuously guarded against by every true Christian. Such an one is called to refuse every thing of a carnal nature. Moreover, he cannot feed promiscuously upon every thing that comes before him. He must "try the things that differ;" he must "take heed what he hears;" he must exercise a discerning mind, a spiritual judgment, a heavenly taste. Finally, he must use his wings; he must rise on the pinions of faith, and find his place in the celestial sphere to which he belongs. In short, there must be nothing groveling, nothing promiscuous, nothing unclean, for the Christian.
As to "creeping things," the following was the general rule: "And every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth shall be an abomination; it shall not be eaten." (Ver. 41.) How wonderful to think of the condescending grace of Jehovah! He could stoop to give directions about a crawling reptile. He would not leave His people at a loss as to the most trivial affair. The priest's guide-book contained the most ample instructions as to every thing. He desired to keep His people free from the defilement consequent upon touching, tasting, or handling aught that was unclean. They were not their own, and hence they were not to do as they pleased. They belonged to Jehovah; His name was called upon them; they were identified with Him. His Word was to be their grand regulating standard in every case. From it they were to learn the ceremonial status of beasts, birds, fishes, and creeping things. They were not to think their own thoughts, to exercise their own reasoning powers, or be guided by their own imaginations in such matters. God's Word was to be their sole directory. Other nations might eat what they pleased, but Israel enjoyed the high privilege of eating that only which was pleasing to Jehovah.
Nor was it as to the mere matter of eating aught that was unclean that the people of God were so jealously guarded. Bare contact was forbidden. (See ver. 8, 24, 26-28, 31-41.) It was impossible for a member of the Israel of God to touch that which was unclean without contracting defilement. This is a principle largely unfolded both in the law and the prophets.—"Thus saith the Lord of hosts, 'Ask ye now the priests concerning the law, saying, If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt do touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall it be holy?' And the priests answered and said, 'No.' Then said Haggai, 'If one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean?' And the priests answered and said, 'It shall be unclean.'" (Hag. ii. 11-13.) Jehovah would have His people holy in all things. They were neither to eat nor touch aught that was unclean.—"Ye shall not make yourselves abominable with any creeping thing that creepeth, neither shall ye make yourselves unclean with them, that ye should be defiled thereby." Then follows the powerful reason for all this careful separation.—"For I am the Lord your God: ye shall therefore sanctify yourselves, and ye shall be holy; for I am holy: neither shall ye defile yourselves with any manner of creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. For I am the Lord that bringeth you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: ye shall therefore be holy, for I am holy." (Ver. 43-45.)
It is well to see that the personal holiness of God's people—their entire separation from all manner of uncleanness, flows out of their relationship to Him. It is not upon the principle of "Stand by thyself: I am holier than thou;" but simply this: "God is holy," and therefore all who are brought into association with Him must be holy likewise. It is in every way worthy of God that His people should be holy. "Thy testimonies are very sure: holiness becometh Thy house, O Lord, forever." What else save holiness could become the house of such an One as Jehovah? If any one had asked an Israelite of old, Why do you shrink so from that reptile which crawls along the path? He would have replied, Jehovah is holy, and I belong to Him. He has said, "Touch not." So also now, if a Christian be asked why he walks apart from the ten thousand things in which the men of this world participate, his answer is simply to be, My Father is holy. This is the true foundation of personal holiness. The more we contemplate the divine character, and enter into the power of our relationship to God, in Christ, by the energy of the Holy Ghost, the holier we must, of necessity, be. There can be no progress in the condition of holiness into which the believer is introduced, but there is and ought to be progress in the apprehension, experience, and practical exhibition of that holiness. These things should never be confounded. All believers are in the same condition of holiness or sanctification, but their practical measure may vary to any conceivable degree. This is easily understood. The condition arises out of our being brought nigh to God by the blood of the cross; the practical measure will depend upon our keeping nigh by the power of the Spirit. It is not a man setting up for something superior in himself—for a greater degree of personal sanctity than is ordinarily possessed—for being in any wise better than his neighbors. All such pretensions are utterly contemptible in the judgment of every right-thinking person. But then, if God, in His exceeding grace, stoop down to our low estate and lift us into the holy elevation of His blessed presence, in association with Christ, has He not a right to prescribe what our character is to be as thus brought nigh? Who could think of calling in question a truth so obvious? And further, are we not bound to aim at the maintenance of that character which He prescribes? Are we to be accused of presumption for so doing? Was it presumption in an Israelite to refuse to touch "a creeping thing"? Nay, it would have been presumption of the most daring and dangerous character to have done so. True, he might not have been able to make an uncircumcised stranger understand or appreciate the reason of his conduct; but this was not his province. Jehovah had said, "Touch not," not because an Israelite was holier in himself than a stranger, but because Jehovah was holy, and Israel belonged to Him. It needed the eye and the heart of a circumcised disciple of the law of God, in order to discern what was clean and what was not. An alien knew no difference. Thus it must ever be. It is only Wisdom's children that can justify her and approve her heavenly ways.
Ere turning from the eleventh chapter of Leviticus, my reader might, with much spiritual profit, compare it with the tenth chapter of Acts, ver. 11-16. How strange it must have appeared to one who had, from his earliest days, been taught the principles of the Mosaic ritual, to see a vessel descending from heaven, "wherein were all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air;" and not only to see such a vessel so filled, but also to hear a voice, saying, "Rise, Peter; kill and eat." How wonderful! No examination of hoofs or habits! There was no need of this. The vessel and its contents had come from heaven. This was enough. The Jew might ensconce himself behind the narrow inclosures of the Jewish ritual, and exclaim, "Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten any thing that is common or unclean;" but then the tide of divine grace was rising majestically above all such inclosures, in order to embrace, in its mighty compass, "all manner" of objects, and bear them upward to heaven, in the power and on the authority of those precious words, "What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common." It mattered not what was in the vessel if God had cleansed it. The Author of the book of Leviticus was about to raise the thoughts of His servant above the barriers which that book had erected, into all the magnificence of Heaven's grace. He would teach him that true cleanness—the cleanness which Heaven demanded—was no longer to consist in chewing the cud, dividing the hoof, or any such ceremonial marks, but in being washed in the blood of the Lamb, which cleanseth from all sin, and renders the believer clean enough to tread the sapphire pavement of the heavenly courts.
This was a noble lesson for a Jew to learn; it was a divine lesson, before the light of which the shadows of the old economy must pass away. The hand of sovereign grace has thrown open the door of the kingdom, but not to admit aught that is unclean. This could not be. Nothing unclean can enter heaven. But then, a cloven hoof was no longer to be the criterion, but "what God hath cleansed." When God cleanses a man, he must needs be clean. Peter was about to be sent to open the kingdom to the Gentiles, as he had already opened it to the Jews, and his Jewish heart needed to be enlarged. He needed to get above the dark shadows of a by-gone age, into the meridian light that was shining from an open heaven, in virtue of a completed sacrifice. He needed to get out of the narrow current of Jewish prejudices, and be borne upon the bosom of that mighty tide of grace which was about to roll through the length and breadth of a lost world. He had to learn, too, that the standard by which true cleanness must be regulated was no longer carnal, ceremonial, and earthly, but spiritual, moral, and heavenly. Assuredly, we may say, these were noble lessons for the apostle of the circumcision to learn upon the housetop of Simon the tanner. They were eminently calculated to soften, to expand, and elevate a mind which had been trained amid the contracting influences of the Jewish system. We bless the Lord for these precious lessons. We bless Him for the large and wealthy place in which He has set us, by the blood of the cross. We bless Him that we are no longer hemmed round about by "Touch not this; taste not that; handle not the other thing;" but that His Word assures us that "every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving; for it is sanctified by the Word of God and prayer." (1 Tim. iv. 4, 5.)
CHAPTER XII.
This brief section reads out to us, after its own peculiar fashion, the double lesson of "man's ruin and God's remedy." But though the fashion is peculiar, the lesson is most distinct and impressive. It is, at once, deeply humbling and divinely comforting. The effect of all Scripture, when interpreted to one's own soul directly by the power of the Holy Ghost, is to lead us out of self to Christ. Wherever we see our fallen nature, at whatever stage of its history we contemplate it—whether in its conception, at its birth, or at any point along its whole career, from the womb to the coffin, it wears the double stamp of infirmity and defilement. This is sometimes forgotten amid the glitter and glare, the pomp and fashion, the wealth and splendor, of human life. The mind of man is fruitful in devices to cover his humiliation. In various ways he seeks to ornament and gild, and put on an appearance of strength and glory, but it is all vain. He has only to be seen as he enters this world, a poor helpless creature, or as he passes away from it, to take his place with the clod of the valley, in order to have a most convincing proof of the hollowness of all his pride, the vanity of all his glory. Those whose path through this world has been brightened by what man calls glory, have entered in nakedness and helplessness, and retreated amid disease and death.
Nor is this all. It is not merely helplessness that belongs to man—that characterizes him as he enters this life: there is defilement also. "Behold," says the Psalmist, "I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." (Ps. li. 5.) "How can he be clean that is born of a woman?" (Job xxv. 4.) In the chapter before us, we are taught that the conception and birth of "a man-child" involved "seven days" of ceremonial defilement to the mother, together with thirty-three days of separation from the sanctuary; and these periods were doubled in the case of "a maid-child." Has this no voice? Can we not read herein a humbling lesson? Does it not declare to us, in language not to be misunderstood, that man is "an unclean thing," and that he needs the blood of atonement to cleanse him? Truly so. Man may imagine that he can work out a righteousness of his own, he may vainly boast of the dignity of human nature, he may put on a lofty air and assume a haughty bearing as he moves across the stage of life; but if he would just retire for a few moments and ponder over the short section of our book which now lies open before us, his pride, pomp, dignity, and righteousness would speedily vanish, and instead thereof, he might find the solid basis of all true dignity, as well as the ground of divine righteousness, in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.