The Garden Within | TZAV צַו - Portion 25

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Teachers of Torah have coined the Hebrew term PaRDeS (פרדס – a word literally meaning “garden” or "orchid") to refer to a four-tiered system of biblical interpretation, which reveals that each word, verse, and story in the Bible could be simultaneously understood on four different levels.  

Through this year-long course, we will explore the very words of God from these levels of the garden.  The name The Garden Within was chosen for this teaching series because it adopts the PaRDeS system of learning and because it delights in the spiritual pleasure through reaching new understandings and being pierced by lightning flashes of the intellect. The pleasure gained, of course, also refers to the nearness we feel to God when learning His Word.

One of the primary goals of The Garden Within is to demonstrate that the “stories” in the Torah are not merely one-time occurrences, temporal incidents undergone by specific individuals long ago. Rather these stories are archetypal in nature, reflecting or representing various physical and spiritual energies ever present in all aspects of reality and within each and every person.  That is, the Torah is deeply personal and speaks directly to each individual reader for where they are in their life.  So, come, take a walk with God in the Garden of the Torah!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:19

All right, good evening, everyone and welcome to the Garden Within as we continue our journey through the Torah. But as we are getting started, do want to make a very important announcement so that I don't forget uh regarding scheduling uh with uh holy week coming up as well as spring break and all of that. Um, we will take a brief hiatus uh in the garden within for two weeks. So the next Garden Within will be two weeks, which will be April 13th. Um so just do make note of that in your calendar. Uh, but we will have a good class tonight, hopefully, uh, and then we'll pick it up in two weeks. Uh after uh with Palm Sunday beginning uh this coming Sunday, uh then um Resurrection Sunday and so forth, but also spring breaks in there, so lots of things going on, lots of uh services about uh 11 to 13 services or something like that for me over those periods of time, as well as uh spring break for uh my some of my some of my children. So uh just a little car crazy for me. So uh April 13th, maybe when we pick it back up. All right, so let's uh begin with the blessing before the study of Torah. Then we will talk about where we are at in that study and uh dive in. So let's pray. Blessed are you, Lord God, King of the universe, who has sanctified us with his commandments and has commanded us to be immersed into the words and the matters of Torah. Amen. So this week brings us to uh the 25th portion of the Torah's 54 portions. Of course, the Torah uh Genesis through Deuteronomy being divided up into those 54 portions. This week is number 25, which is the portion known as Zav. Uh Zaav is a Hebrew word that means to command. It covers Leviticus chapter 6, verse 8, and goes through chapter 8, verse 36. Uh and so that's where we're gonna be spending our time this evening. And so this the 25th reading from the Torah. Uh, it's the second portion from the book of Leviticus. Uh again, Zav means command, comes from the first word of the verse from Leviticus chapter 6 of verse 9, where the Lord says to Moses, Command Aaron and his sons. Uh the portion Zav reiterates the five types of sacrifices that were introduced in the opening portion of Leviticus. And uh, but then it goes on to discuss the priestly regulations that pertain to those sacrifices. And then the last portion describes the seven-day, uh, what I would describe as the ordination of Aaron as high priest and his sons as they enter into the holy priesthood. All right, so that's kind of a very brief summary of Leviticus 6, uh, eight through chapter 8, or 6, 9 through 8, verse 36. Um, sometimes I, and I apologize, I do that. I always try to catch myself, and sometimes I don't catch myself until right now. Um, it's probably the Leviticus 6, verse 9 in your English Bibles. It's verse 8, I think, in Hebrew Bibles. All right, but I apologize for that. All right, so let's look into our text here, and let's look at uh that verse, Leviticus chapter 6, verse 9. It says, Command Aaron and his son, saying, This is the law of the burnt offering. The burnt offering shall be on the hearth upon the altar all night until morning, and the fire of the altar shall kept be shall be kept burning on it. And so the opening six verses set down the laws about uh this particular offering that are to be brought by the priest each morning on the tabernacle altar. Over a span of only just six verses, the word fire occurs four times, and the admonition to not let the fire on the altar be extinguished is repeated twice. And so if you're just kind of reading that, that should kind of stick out that uh you have this repeat, this repetition, uh, and so that should draw your attention to it. The deeper components of Torah teach that the tabernacle service is, among other things, a paradigm for each person's quest to come near to God and for one's spiritual purpose in this world. So last week when we entered into the study of Leviticus, remember I talked about, hey, when you decide you're going to read your Bible in a year, right? Genesis, you start out like a champion, and Genesis is a great narrative. It's the creation of the world, and you get introduced to all these characters, and it's easy to follow. Abraham's easy to follow, and you know, Isaac and Jacob and Joseph's travails with his brothers and so forth, right? It's it's captivating and it makes for great reading and great storytelling, and it's the kind of thing you can make into children's Bibles and all of that. And Exodus is much the same way, and you can even find many great movies, right? That Exodus uh is the basis of, and you can watch those movies and you can see how they compare to the biblical text, and you can enjoy reading Exodus, and you can enjoy reading about Moses and Pharaoh and the plagues and um the parting of the Red Sea, and imagine how that's done, and uh how the ten plagues are direct attacks on ten Egyptian gods and all of those kinds of things, and you think, man, this reading the Bible in a year is gonna be wonderful, right? And then it all comes to a screeching halt when you hit Leviticus, right? Because all of a sudden you're reading about sacrifices and slaughtering and blood and priesthoods and all of these things that are so foreign to you, and right, and all of a sudden it seems so irrelevant, and you just don't want to read it anymore. And you think, what's the point? But remember, the Torah's five books, and the Leviticus is the central book, and so in many ways, it's the centerpiece, it's the most important, and that's the one that when you're teaching your children how to read or the Bible and all of that, that's the one you start with, right? And so it still is important for us, and so we wanted to remember to keep our eyes open to that, and we even looked at how it, in many ways, is the foundation for much of what Jesus teaches, much of what Jesus does, how he interacts with people, and uh his interaction with people with leprosy, or his teachings uh in the Gospel of Mark on things like pure and impure, clean and unclean, and all of that. All of those things come from Leviticus, but also as we are looking at the Torah through that perspective of the garden, right? The par-ays, those four levels of the onion. Uh, one of the ways to understand the tabernacle system when you're reading it is don't just look at it as this is something a group of people did out in the Middle East in the desert 3,000 plus years ago, but look at it as this is also spiritual technology, and this is a paradigm. This is a uh a way to set in structure uh uh describing our quest for how we come near to God and how we find our purpose in this world. Um therefore it helps us, behooves us to look deeper into things like when we see fire, the importance of fire in these opening six verses of the portion, this repetition of fire and the importance of it continually being um burning and not being consumed and not going out. And believe it or not, that's why we have an eternal light in our sanctuaries, uh, not just here, but probably uh any Christian sanctuary is gonna have an eternal flame. It comes from Leviticus, it comes from your Torah roots of having an eternal flame, right? It understands that there's more to it than just that the priest were to keep this flame alive. There's something more going on to it. And so we want to look into this deeper symbolism of fire on the altar and glean some constructive teachings for our own life. In general, the perpetual fire on the altar, it represents the obligation that we have to continuously serve God and to be constantly aware of his presence and existence. That's one of the reasons we have it in our sanctuaries. Uh, it's to remind us that God is always present, right? Not just when we are having a formal worship service, but always. God is always present. Uh, and that's a good reminder not only for when we're in a sanctuary, but it's a good general practice that God is always present, whether at work or play, whether during the week or on a holiday, whether feeling elevated or particularly dejected, the service of God as defined by the Torah is to never cease. Every situation in life affords us the opportunity to experience God, right? And to perform mitzvot, right, as we have been defining that word, the commandments, as relationship opportunities by making connections with God, and bring light, healing, and rectification not only to ourselves, but to others in the world. But on a deeper level, fire represents the soul's longing to flame upwards, and it expresses our soul's passionate desire to unite with God. This is why candles are very powerful symbols in religious services. That's why you pick the religion, candles are used in it. Uh, that's why it's a powerful tool to like, if you're gonna study or read, it's a powerful thing to do to light a candle. It's something to do to kind of stare at it before you read your scripture, right? And to think about it, because what you see in that flame is to be a mirror of your soul as it's kind of wickering and you know, kind of waving in the wind and so forth. That is an image of your soul kind of fanning and being fanned and wanting to reach to the higher levels and to be fanned into um a unification with God. Fire symbolizes an exuberant love of life. Fire symbolizes a desire to be united with God, a yearning to know God, a yearning to uh serve God. And when uh Rabbi Shlomo Karlback, that we've talked about before, was in the midst of teaching one of his classes, or when he'd be leading a prayer service, or when he would be playing his guitar, he was known as the singing rabbi, whenever he'd be playing and singing, and he felt that the particular group that he was in front of uh was lacking enthusiasm or that they kind of had a malaise over them. He would always stop and he would just yell out, More fire, more fire, right? And that usually did the trick. It upped the voltage, and people uh would break their spell of complacency. The idea of fire is also in the Bible, it's intimately connected with the concept of simcha. Simcha in Hebrew means joy, but joy is more in Hebrew than just a feeling. Joy is something internal, right? Joy is something that even if external circumstances aren't particularly great, it's that internal knowledge, that internal feeling, that internal sense of wholeness and wellness, uh, that joy uh that is beyond words. Uh in Hebrew, uh Simcha begins with the letter shin, that three-pronged letter there on the right. Hebrew goes from right to left. And the shin in Hebrew also symbolizes fire. And I meant to take a picture of it because I find this so fascinating. But the next time you're in like our main building, go by the elevator and look at the elevator because the symbol that it says, like in case of fire, it has as the fire, it looks just like that three-pronged letter. I find it so fascinating. Like um, they actually inadvertently and even in English use the shin to represent fire uh in our building at our elevator. Um, but the letter shin represents fire because the Hebrew word for fire is ash, uh, aleph and shin. In the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 28, verse 47, the Torah warns the people that there will be Moses speaking prophetically. He warns that there will be future exiles, that there will be future trials and tribulations for God's people, because he says that the people will not serve the Lord their God with joy, with simcha. It won't be because they don't serve God. They'll still do it, they'll go through the motions, but it'll be because they don't do it with joy. They'll lach the simcha. And the Arizol explains this verse in Deuteronomy quite literally, not only on a national level, but on a very individual level. And so again, when you're kind of reading through the portions each week, so this week, when you're kind of reading Leviticus 6 through 8, it's something you can be reflective upon and think about what do you do with joy, right? And what kind of things are you going through the motions about this week? What kind of things do you do just out of sense of duty? And that's not always a bad thing. Duty is not always a bad thing. In fact, duty is a very good thing, but sometimes it can become just routine. And what what kind of routines do you need to rediscover the love for, right? You know, you think about maybe, maybe you you make breakfast for your family, or maybe you pack lunch for your kids at school, or or whatever it is, it's become a routine, right? Um a duty. And but it's not that you need to stop it, but maybe you need to rediscover like the joy in that. So maybe when you pack the lunch, write a note in there, right? Do something that helps you understand and do it with some kind of fire, right? More fire. Put some fire back into the things that you do that are good to make them holy again. Um, and this was precisely the point of the Balsham Tov, when he would repeatedly stress, he would advocate the importance of inspiration in our prayer and learning the performance of uh the mitzvot, the connections we have that are given to us in scripture, living one's life in general. A common Hasidic tale is of a man who would once come, who once came to his rabbi, and he told him how sad and depressed he was because of all of these things that were horrible in his life. People didn't like him, people were talking bad about him. It just seemed like one thing after another was just going bad in his life. He couldn't keep a job, he didn't like the job that he had, you name it, it was going south and sour for him. And so he complained to his rabbi about him, and the rabbi who knew this individual well explained to him that the opposite was actually the case. That it was the fact that everything, that he was so sad, um, because he was so sad and depressed, and because he had no joy, and because he was doing nothing with joy, and because he had no fire, and because he had no passion in anything that he did, that was the reason why everything was so wrong. Right. And the rabbi said it's all about perspective. And he said, You've got it all wrong, right? It's about how you are choosing to see things, it's about how you are choosing to respond to what you have been given in life, and that is why you are experiencing what you are experiencing. So not only is joy necessary to channel the fire of the soul, to serve God with gladness, thinking of Psalm 100, verse 2. Fire is also associated in Hebrew with the concept of holiness. In fact, the Hebrew word for holiness or for holy is the Hebrew word kodosh, which is a combination of two words, yekod, which means ignited fire. The word holy in Hebrew means ignited fire. Because remember, Hebrew is a concrete language, it's very earthy, and so a holy, something holy, thinking back to things like the tabernacle, is something that's been ignited with fire. And so if you want holiness in your life, it needs to be ignited with fire, it needs to have passion in it, it needs to have joy in it, it needs to have purpose in it. On Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year, the high priest would enter the Holy of Holies with a pan of burning coals on which he would then burn incense. And the Holy of Holies represents the human soul's innermost spark of holiness, where the soul is afire with its love for God. God first appeared to Moses in a burning bush that was set aflame but was never consumed by those flames. And this powerful image embodies the secret of how to enthusiastically serve God and energetically pursue one's purpose in life without burning out, as happens to so many people. Learning how to renew one's zeal for life on a daily basis is one of the Torah's most fundamental lessons. This is something that I have to come back to time and time again, was one in ministry, is one whose whole career is about serving people. It's very common for pastors or ministers or those in ministry, right, to get burned out, right? The fire definitely consumes us. And so it's often that we have to go back and remind ourselves why did we get into this in the first place? What is our real passion for this? What ignited us for this, right? And I have to go back time and time again to like, it is the word of God that ignites me. It is the my passion and my love for the things and the word of God and learning and knowing the word of God, and then seeing the light bulbs go off in people's eyeballs when they make connections with God's word. Like just that one time when someone's like, aha, thank you. Thank you for seeing clarifying that for me. Thank you for making that connection for me. Like that is the reason I do it, right? And I have to remind myself that that's the way the the fire doesn't consume meat, right? That's the way the fire stays fresh. Um, that's the way it's renewed. And without this kind of renewal, um, at best we can slide into a comfort zone of complacency and at worst we just become stagnant or burnt out. When Shmir Azalman of Liyadi, who was the founder of the Chabad movement, first came to his teacher, who was the Magid of Mizrich, he was new to this passionate way of life and its teachings. And the Magid, who saw enormous potential in his new young student, once called him into his private study. And he intently repeated the following verse from this week's portion to his student ten times. He said to his student, ten times, a perpetual fire shall remain aflame on the altar. It shall not be extinguished. And so this is an example where he took a text from 3,000 years ago or more and he applied it to someone personal. And he explained the words lo tigbe in Hebrew, it shall not be extinguished. He said, you can read the no, lo, lo tigbe, the symbol of all negativity, that the lo shall not be extinguished. That if you keep your passion going, you keep your joy going, lo, the Hebrew word lo, the thing that makes the negative, that will not be extinguished. If we can keep joy, if we can keep passion, if we can keep purpose going, if we can keep the flame lit, negativity, right, like that goes away, right? If we can keep our flame from being extinguished, then the negativity goes away. And so he continued to explain that the Torah and its deep teachings, that's what fans the soul's natural tendency to ignite with a passionate love for God. As this burns, it extinguishes all the negative influences trying to derail the drive for holiness, all the negative influences trying to derail the burning desire to be nearer to God. As people attempt to build their inner altars where the fires of holiness and joy burn continually, they should remember the teachings of this week's portion and be inspired to fan the innermost sparks of their souls until they become flaming, burning bushes that burn but are never consumed. The thanksgiving offering. So as I mentioned, last week's portion, the beginning of Leviticus, as well as this week's portion, you know, kind of review the five main types of offerings that were offered in the tabernacle. So you had the burnt offerings that here, but you also had the thanksgiving offerings. So in Leviticus chapter 7 and verse 11, it says, This is the law of the sacrifice of peace offerings, which shall he offer, which he shall offer to the Lord. A peace offering is a type of thanksgiving offering. If he offers it for thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving. So one of the peace offerings described in this week's portion, Zav, is the thanksgiving offering. The Talmudic sages explain that four types of individuals were required to bring this offering. There was the one who would travel through a desert or gone through any potentially dangerous journey. There was the one who was freed after a dangerous imprisonment, there was one who survived a serious illness, and there was one who journeyed across the sea. Today, instead of an offering, individuals simply recite a blessing. And intriguingly the sages taught that in the Messianic times, when sin will be uprooted from the earth, there will be no need for sin offerings or guilt offerings, but the thanksgiving offering will still be brought as the need and the desire to thank God will be more relevant as ever. Every aspect of a believer's life is permeated by the impulse to thank God and acknowledge his goodness and his kindness. The very first words of a Torah observant person that they recite in the morning are contained in the Mode Ani prayer. I remember when our kids were very little, when we would drive them to school. This was back when our youngest was not even in school, but would go with us, put her in a little car seat, and then the middle child would be going to preschool, and then the oldest would be like in kindergarten or first grade. We would say this. Getting up in the morning is like resurrection. So you're kind of celebrating this idea that God has resurrected you, brought you alive, brought you into a new day. You get to serve him. I give thanks to you, living and eternal king, that you've brought me into this new day, that you've restored life to me, that you've vivified me again. And then it says, Rabba Amunateka, great is your faithfulness, right? A quote from Lamentations chapter three. Uh so you you you you the first words out of your mouth is a thankfulness to God that you've been vivified for a day to know him and to serve him and be loved by him and to love him and just you praise his faithfulness to you. Um that opening of thanksgiving is to set the tone for the entire day. And the daily liturgical prayers contain a plethora of thanksgiving prayers that acknowledge God's kindness. And one of the most exalted expressions of that is Psalm 100. Uh, and this is uh uh very much part of liturgical traditions every morning to recite Psalm 100. Uh so I'm just gonna read to you Psalm um 100 because I think it expresses intense love, awe-inspiring praise and thanksgiving that you can kind of hear just weld up in King David's heart uh for his beloved creator. So Psalm 100, uh a psalm of thanksgiving. Make a joyful shout to the Lord, all you lands, serve the Lord with gladness, come before his presence with singing, know that the Lord He is God, it is He who made us, and not we ourselves. We are His people, we are the sheep of His pasture. Enter into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, bless His name, for the Lord is good, and His mercy is everlasting, and His truth endures to all generations. And then in the Amida prayer, again, this is a prayer Jesus would have prayed three times a day, faithfully, every day He would have prayed this three times a day. Uh part of that prayer says, We gratefully thank you, for it is you who are God, our God, and the God of our forefathers for all eternity. You are our rock, the rock of our lives, you are the shield of our salvation, and we thank you and relate to you our praise for our lives which are committed to your power, and for our souls that we entrust to you, for your miracles, for they are with us every day. Everything alive will greatly acknowledge you. Praise and bless your great name forever. For you are good, O God. You are our salvation, you are our help, you are the beneficent one. Blessed are you, O Lord God, for you are the beneficent one, and it is fitting to always give you thanks. And then there is a Jewish tradition of the practice of blessing God or thanking God at least one hundred times a day. And they actually get that from the Bible. It's a darash, it's a homiletic interpretation of Deuteronomy chapter 10, verse 12. The verse says, And now, Israel, what, and that word what is the key word, what does your God or the Lord your God require of you, but to fear or be in awe of the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways and to love him. So they do a play on words. The Hebrew word for what, what does the Lord your God require of you? The Hebrew word for what is ma. M-A-H. The Hebrew word for 100 is ma. You hear it? Ma, ma. It almost sounds the same, doesn't it? Right? So they heard not what does God require of you, but to be in fear of him and awe of him, to walk in all of his ways and to love him. Instead, what they heard was, one hundred does your God require of you every day. Uh and so uh they see that as a hundred times a day, express gratitude, thanks, and love for God. And so, again, this week, when you're reading this book of Leviticus, it seems so strange and so foreign, there's something very concrete you can take from it. Something you can do very easily this week. Read Psalm 100 every day, whether that's in the morning, in the evening, before you go to bed. I mean, you can read it more than once. It's a very short psalm. Uh, you could maybe pick each day, pick a different translation of it, right? Because every translation is going to pick a different nuance, a little bit different. Do something fun with it like that. But read Psalm 100 at least once a day. And then try your best. Try your best to bless, thank, and love God out loud, verbally, directly to him, at least 100 times a day. See if you can do that. And then do that for a week. And going back to that analogy where the guy comes to his rabbi and says, Nobody likes me, my job stinks, life stinks, everybody, you know, stinks, right? Read Psalm 100 once a day, bless God a hundred times a day, do it for a week, and see if you still think everything stinks. Combining passion, greatness, and humbleness. So sometimes I like to share with you um the jots and the tittles of the text. So, right in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, not one jot or tittle of the law will pass away. And there, he doesn't just mean every T will be crossed and every I will be dotted. He's referring to how the letters are laid out on the page of a Torah scroll. And how that's done is some pages will have two columns, some will have three, some letters will be written big, some letters will be written small, um different formatting, right? So believe it or not, in some ways a Torah scroll is illustrated. And that that those are called jots and tittles, and that Jesus is letting us know in the Sermon on the Mount is part of the inspiration of the scriptures. And so in Leviticus chapter 6, verse 9, again you have this verse, command Aaron and his son, saying, This is the Torah, this is the law of the burnt offering, that is the burnt offering which burns. That's the phrase we're going to come back to, on the altar all night until morning, and the fire of the altar shall burn with it. In this verse, the first letter mem of the word mukta in Hebrew is intentionally spelled or spelt with the small letter mem. You don't have to read Hebrew to be able to tell there's one letter there that's small, right? And again, in Hebrew, it's the first letter because Hebrew reads right to left. That's intentional. That's not a spelling error, that's not a oops, I forgot, you know, that's 14 font and the rest is 18 font. I should have fixed that. That's intentional, right? And we have that axiom if something's weird, it's important, right? It's to draw our attention into it. And we already saw one of these kind of things last week, right? With Vaikra, with the small olive. Later on, in a few verses in the same Torah portion, Leviticus chapter 6, verse 13, about this fire on the altar, it says, A continuous fire shall burn upon the altar, it shall not go out. Most of the commentaries regarding this small letter mem point to the importance of not showing arrogance in one's service of God, and especially not to dramatically exhibit outward piety just to garner attention or favor in other people's eyes. The fire on the altar symbolizes the passion, the enthusiasm needed for true divine service. But the small mim in this verse teaches us not to inflame our egos or focus on the outward appearance of our worship, but rather to cultivate an inner fire, an inner passion for God, offered humbly to him upon the hidden altar of our heart. Another beautiful example of combining greatness and humility is shown elsewhere in the book of Leviticus. Last week we saw that small olif, right, in the very first word of the book of Leviticus, alluding to Moses' humility. But did you know that the small olif in Vicra and Leviticus has a companion. And that is in the first word of the book of Chronicles, in the name Adam, Adam, the Olaf is gigantic. This is alluding to the potential greatness of Adam before the sin in the Garden of Eden, and by extension to the infinite potential of every human soul. Ultimately, greatness and humility are not mutually exclusive. They complement and amplify each other. So Moses, for example, who the Torah describes as the most humble person on the face of the earth, was also Israel's greatest leader and teacher. The great prophet was able to manifest the humility inherit in the small aleph, as well as the great potential of the large olif, the birthright of every soul. Light and fire. We can discover another perspective regarding the altar and the sacrifices offered on it by comparing it to the menorah, the other place in the tabernacle where light played a central role. So when we look at the tabernacle, here in the book of Exodus, it gives a great detail about how the menorah is to be made and how it's to be crafted and all of that. The menorah represents spiritual light. And it's made from pure gold. It was located in the inner sanctuary. The altar represents physical light and was used to burn offerings and is made from an inferior metal. It's made from copper and was located in the outer courtyard. So you have these two aspects of light that are quite different. One is spiritual, it's inner, it's gold, right? One is outer, it's physical, it's copper. So the menorah's light symbolizes our higher, our more elevated nature. You might think about the image of God within us, the part of our soul that has divinity in it when God created us, and he says, you know, we are created in the image of God. We're image-bearers of God, right? There's something about our soul that is divine. It's not the soul of an animal. That aspect of our being created again in the very image and likeness of God. While the fire on the altar symbolizes our more baser, more animalistic nature, the obligation to refine and control those fires. And so we have also a dual nature. We have a divine aspect of our nature, the image of God, created in the image and likeness of God, Genesis chapter 1, right there. But we also have a part of our nature that's very base and physical, right? And more animalistic. So we have these two natures within us, right? We have these two fires. The Torah requires us to ensure that the fire on the altar be kept burning at all times. Again, in Leviticus 6, 12 and 13, the fire on the altar shall be kept burning on it, it shall not be extinguished, a permanent fire shall remain a flame on the altar, it shall not be extinguished. This commandment teaches us to work continuously on elevating our more lower animal natures, so that the body is not drawn after just the physical passions and pursuits, and the soul can follow its natural inclination to all that is holy and pure. Indeed, one would have thought that the menorah, as the representative of the spirit, that that would be the one that would have remained a light all of the time. And by the way, there is a tradition that one of the lamps of the menorah's seven branches never did go out. But the Torah specifically commands to keep the altar lit continually, not the menorah. In other words, that's a reminder to us to continually work on our lower natures, our more baser natures in our quest to achieve emotional and spiritual maturity. Furthermore, by commanding us to keep this fire constantly aflame instead of extinguishing it, the Torah teaches us that rather than extinguishing passion and desire, we are to direct them towards God in a higher purpose. And for this, I think about like in the New Testament, you think about the Apostle Paul. Before he becomes this great apostle to the Gentiles, he is this persecutor of believers. But when you look at Paul, pre-conversion and post-conversion, God doesn't change him. He doesn't change his personality. He's just as zealous before as he is after, or just as zealous after as he was before. What changes is how it's directed, and what it's directed at, and what it's directed for. But God doesn't change the fire, He changes how the fire is used and what the fire is working for, and what the fire is working toward. The Torah refers to sacrifices on the altar as fire offerings, for we are deemed capable of offering every aspect of ourselves to divine service. Ultimately, the light of the soul, symbolized by the light of the menorah, it can only burn its brightest when we transform the fiery nature into a more ethereal and tempered one. And so they work hand in hand. And again, it's this great work that we are called to do to elevate all things into the Spiritual. All things. Aaron as peacemaker. Leviticus chapter 8, verse 12. And he poured some of the anointing oil on Aaron's head and anointed him to consecrate him. So as Aaron receives his anointing, he enters into the office of the anointed priest. As such, he becomes for us a foreshadow of the Messiah, because literally anointed priest means Messiah priest. The word anointed in Hebrew means Messiah. The anointing of Aaron was a one-time event, but it gets remembered in the Psalms of Ascent. Psalm 133, verses 1 through 3. A song of ascents of David. It is like the precious oil upon the head coming down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard coming down upon the edge of his robes, referring to what we just read in this week's portion. It is like the dew of Hermon coming down upon the mountains of Zion, for there the Lord commanded the blessing, life forever. So why is Aaron's anointing here in Leviticus compared to peace between brothers in the book of Psalms? The sages explain that this psalm is sung in memory of Aaron's peaceful nature. Aaron was known as a peacemaker between men. Rabbi Hillel used to say, Be disciples of Aaron, love peace and pursue peace, love all creatures and draw them near to the Torah. And then Aaron would go to Simon and say, You know, Simon, I ran into Reuben, and he was telling me he feels real bad about this fight the two of you are having, and he wants to make peace with you. And so when the two men encountered each other, they would assume the other was the one wanting to make peace. And so they would embrace and set the argument aside. As the disciples of the anointed priest Jesus were also called to be peacemakers, not only are we to be a peaceful people, we are to be a people who are proactively making peace. This is one of the things that characterizes a true disciple of our Messiah. For he said in Matthew 5, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. The inauguration sacrifices. Leviticus 8, verse 14. Then he brought the bull of the sin offering, and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the bull of the sin offering. The Aaronic priesthood was initiated with certain sacrifices to consecrate Aaron and his sons to atone for them as they entered their office. It was a bull for a sin offering, a ram for a burnt offering, and a ram for an inauguration peace offering, and several grain offerings. Moses officiated as priest and offered these sacrifices on behalf of Aaron and his sons. These sacrifices teach us of our Messiah's death, while the priesthood teaches us of his resurrection. For he who was sacrificed for sin also rose to minister before the Almighty on our behalf. Messiah entered into his royal priesthood through sacrificial service as well, but not through the blood of bulls and rams, but he entered the priesthood through his own blood. Hebrews 8, verse 3. For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices, and so it is necessary that this high priest also have something to offer. And in Messiah's high priest he is both the officiating priest and the sacrifice. His priesthood was initiated not through the blood of goats and calves, but through his own blood. He is the bull for the sin offering, the ram for the burnt offering, the ram for the peace offering. Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the bull for the sin offering so that it would represent them before God. Moses slaughtered it, smeared its blood on the horns of the altar, and the application of the blood to the horns of the altar symbolized the purification of the priests from the contamination of sin. Moses then poured the rest of the blood at the base of the altar to consecrate the altar with the blood of the priest's sacrifice. Those ritual applications of blood forged a bridge between the altar and the priests, who would therefore after be serving at it. And similarly, Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the burnt offering, and Moses slaughtered it, and he splashed its blood on the altar, and he in the prescribed manner, and he offered it up as a whole burnt offering on their behalf. Then Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the third sacrifice, the peace offering ram at their ordination. Moses slaughtered it, but instead of immediately applying its blood to the altar, here's the interesting part that if you read the portion, you no doubt be like emailing me and asking me the question, so I'm going to answer it tonight. He smears some of the blood on Aaron's right ear, and then on the thumb of his right hand, and on the big toe of his right foot. Why does he do that, Pastor? Well, hang on, and I'm going to tell you. And it also foreshadows the Messiah. And he does the same for each of Aaron's sons. Then he proceeded to splash the remainder on the altar. There is symbolic power to the imagery, both for them as priests back then, as well as foreshadowing the ultimate priesthood of our ultimate priest and Messiah. Just as the horns of the altar were smeared with blood, so too Aaron and his sons were marked. The altar represents the table of God. The blood markings illustrate the unique relationship between God represented by the altar and his priests. Aaron and his sons have entered a special covenant with God. From a messianic perspective, we can readily appreciate the symbolism of blood markings. Messiah was marked with his own blood. And where was he marked with his own blood? His head, his hands, right? His side and his foot. He gave himself in the sacrifice that initiated his high priest, and his body still bears the wounds. So let's talk about. So in many ways, the same areas of the body, they get hit, Jesus gets hit. But first, let's talk about why the right. Why does it go on the right side of their body? What's the significance of the right? Before we get into the ear, the thumb, and the toe. Well, from the Hebraic side of things, the right side is the site of chesed. That is the site of mercy. It's the site of grace. The left side is the site of judgment. It's the side of law. Okay? So the right side indicates the mediating and atoning work of the priest flowing from God's right side. That is from his side of mercy extending down to his creation. Coming from the right side of God means God is for us. But there's more to the ear, the thumb, and the toe, including its shadows of the Messiah. What do you do with your ear? You listen, right? Shema in Hebrew. Shema in Hebrew doesn't just mean listen, it also means obey. So the right ear is perfect obedience. For Aaron, the blood on the ear pointed to a tent of obedience, that he would listen to God, that he would Shema. In Christ, this finds perfect fulfillment. Isaiah chapter 50, verse 5, the Lord God has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious, it says of the suffering servant. Jesus listens perfectly to his Father. Even in Gethsemane, he says in Matthew 26, verse 39, not as I will, but as you will. So Christ hearing was wholly attuned to God's voice, fulfilling the type by becoming the one who obeyed in our place. The right thumb, sinless service. Aaron's consecrated thumb represented pure hands set aside for God's work. Jesus ministered, and his ministry fulfilled this beyond what any earthly priest ever could. Acts 10, verse 38. God has anointed Messiah, same word used of Aaron here, Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good. And Jesus' hands brought healing, blessing, and salvation, particularly when they were outstretched and bloodied on a cross. Where the former priest works were shadowy and incomplete, Christs were sacrificial on the cross and were once and for all securing eternal redemption. Hebrews 9, 12. And the big toe is a holy walk. Aaron's blood-annointed toe symbolized a holy walk. Jesus walked the path of righteousness perfectly, Hebrews 4, verse 15. But was in all points tempted as we are, yet was without sin in his journey, led him ultimately to the cross, where he fulfilled what God's law demanded for our sake, and now leads us in the way of life everlasting. So Messiah is the one whose ear was always open to the Father, whose hands worked perfect righteousness, and whose walk was without blemish. And through his sacrifice, he consecrates us, making us a royal priesthood, 1 Peter 2 9, able to hear, to serve, and to walk in a newness of life as we follow our Messiah, the ultimate high priest. And that is where we will conclude of this evening. And as I said at the beginning, we will pick it back up in two weeks, April 13th. All right. And we'll still find ourselves in the book of Leviticus. But let's close with the blessing. Baruchata Alonai Notain Hatarah. Blessed are you, Lord God, who has given to us the gift that is the Torah. Amen. Shlom, shlom, go in peace. Hi everyone. Thank you for engaging this teaching. You know, we and Emmanuel have as one of our goals to make our teachings available online to anyone, everywhere, at any time, whether that's through a podcast or our YouTube channel or an MP3 download. It is our gift to you, and we want you to use it however you see it. You can do so with the donate button at the bottom of our teaching.