Reading: Leviticus 14-15, Psalm 34
Oh, good. More bodily discharges and leprous diseases. What a joy.
Actually, there is a good amount of joy to be found here. But to understand it, we have to take a moment and think about what disease, and particularly skin disease, meant in the ancient world.
While our understanding of ancient cultures is by definition quite limited, we can infer from what we do know about how diseases were “treated” that such events were almost universally seen as a matter of religious offence, and were cause for ejection of the subject from society. The diseased were being punished by the gods for whatever reason. The most visible the disease, the greater the social impact of being cursed by the gods. The diseased were dangerous, because association with them would bring the curse of the gods on others. The visibly diseased were isolated, a policy that has continued in human society right up to the present day, though we give other reasons for doing so. Leper colonies were once extremely common throughout the world, and despite advancement of our understanding of how to prevent the spread of such diseases, they still exist in some places.
How is this different for the people of Israel? Well, in some ways it isn’t. Those with skin diseases (leprosy is used as a catch all term for a variety of skin conditions) were subject to monitoring by the priests. Under some circumstances they were forced to live outside the camp. But then things change. Unlike the leper colony model in which the diseased are forever pushed out of society, the God of Israel puts in place a way to purify and return to society those who have been diseased.
The purification ritual for skin diseases is not a sacrifice in the same way as the other sacrifices described in Leviticus. It does not begin at the altar of the tabernacle, but outside the camp, where the diseased person has been living. There are two birds involved. The first dies. The second is immersed in a mixture of it’s blood and water with a scarlet cord. Blood and water, the source of life. A scarlet cord. This is a birth story. The second bird emerges cleansed and is set free. The person then shaves off all their hair. They are being born anew. After seven days living in the camp but outside their tent, they go to the entrance to the tabernacle and make a sacrifice in the more usual way. On the eighth day, just like the dedication of a newborn. The imagery of purification of the diseased is the story of a new birth, a new life, a new creation. If one of the people of Israel suffered from a disfiguring disease, they are given hope for a new life. It is a subject of fascination that the same rules apply to buildings. The inanimate world can also look forward to a new life.
The rest of today’s reading involves more regulations of bodily fluids involved in procreation. Again, the subjects of the divine curse cause impurity. The people of Israel are reminded by these rules about what parts of their lives aren’t functioning as designed.
In all these cases of impurity, there arrives a moment where the priest makes atonement for the impurity of the person. But what can a priest really do? The person coming to the tabernacle really has business not with a priest but with the ruler of Israel with whom they have a covenant breach- the God who rules from his throne inside the tabernacle behind a veil. How are the actions of the priests doing anyone any good? They never get to interact with the other party in their case. Even if they follow all the rules laid out in Exodus and Leviticus so far, they have a problem: they cannot approach God.
Tomorrow’s reading is all about the way this problem is dealt with. We have already seen that the guilt of the people and their judgement will be carried on the shoulders and in the heart of the high priest. For all these sacrifices to mean anything, the high priest will have to bear all the guilt of the nation into the presence of God.