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Leviticus

Leviticus is the third book of the Torah in Judaism, and of the Old Testament in Christianity. It lays out many religious laws, rituals, and moral guidelines. Here are some examples:

• Dietary laws: Leviticus provides detailed guidelines on what is considered clean and unclean for consumption. For example, the book prohibits eating certain kinds of animals, particularly those that do not chew the cud and have cloven hooves, like pigs.
• Rituals: Leviticus describes rituals for various sacrifices to God, including burnt offerings, grain offerings, and peace offerings. It also sets out rules for the consecration of priests and the conduct of the priesthood.
• Laws of purity and holiness: The book contains many laws related to maintaining ceremonial purity, such as rules around childbirth, menstruation, skin diseases, and emissions.
• Laws regarding moral conduct: Leviticus also addresses various ethical and moral behaviors. This includes prohibitions against stealing, lying, cheating, mistreatment of the poor and the foreigner, and various forms of sexual misconduct.
• Festivals and holy days: Leviticus outlines the timing and rituals for various Jewish holy days, such as Passover, Feast of Weeks (Shavuot), Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), and Feast of Booths (Sukkot).
• The Jubilee year: Leviticus 25 introduces the concept of the Jubilee year, a time of rest for the land, forgiveness of debts, and liberation of slaves every 50 years.

These rules provided the foundational law for ancient Jewish society and are still considered significant in Judaism today, although interpretations and applications vary among different Jewish communities. In Christianity, the moral laws of Leviticus are often upheld, but generally Christians believe that the coming of Christ fulfilled the ceremonial and sacrificial laws, so they are no longer obliged to follow them.

Leviticus is a canonical book of the Old Testament which relates to the Priests and Levites among the Jews, or the body of the ceremonial law. In the Priestly view, only God is intrinsically holy. Leviticus is a simple book. Its main message is that God is holy, and humans are not, and most of the book is about ways to overcome that gap. Holy things are holy because they are removed from the realm of the common by means of rules. To be in a state of purity simply means that one is qualified to contact the sacred. The Priestly conception of god is of an immortal and asexual being - association with death and sexuality that renders one impure. One cannot enter the holy sanctuary, God’s realm, when impure through contact with death or sexuality. Leviticus is a book of the Bible that shares the civil, ritual, and communal law given by God to the nation of Israel.

The function of Leviticus is to maintain an identity in the formation of the Yahwistic cult centered around the temple. Although the sacrificial offerings have been abandoned since the destruction of the Temple, the Jewish dietary laws of abstinence of certain foods and animals selected for slaughter continue in the same manner. Land that is repeatedly defiled by sexual transgressions cannot be purified. Eventually it will simply “vomit out” those who dwell on it. Every sin pollutes the sanctuary until such time as God is driven out entirely and the community will be left in a godless state, without blessing or protection.

The Hebrew Bible has little to say about homosexuality. Scholars and general readers of the Bible typically identify just two verses—Lev. 18:22 and 20:13—as containing explicit prohibitions on same-sex relations, and they address only the matter of male homosexual relations. Most importantly, both contain the phrase vocalized as mišk?bê ?iššâ), a longstanding crux for interpreters. In fact, Jacques Berlinerblau found this phrase so unintelligible that he believed scholars should “admit defeat” in light of the perplexities it presents and forgo further attempts to arrive at a sensible interpretation of these biblical texts.

Leviticus

"2. ... if a soul touch any unclean thing, whether it be a carcase of an unclean beast, or a carcase of unclean cattle, or the carcase of unclean creeping things, and if it be hidden from him; he also shall be unclean, and guilty.... 7 And if he be not able to bring a lamb, then he shall bring for his trespass, which he hath committed, two turtledoves, or two young pigeons, unto the Lord; one for a sin offering, and the other for a burnt offering. 8 And he shall bring them unto the priest, who shall offer that which is for the sin offering first, and wring off his head from his neck, but shall not divide it asunder:"
Leviticus 5

"9 Do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations:"
Leviticus 10

"3 Whatsoever parteth the hoof, and is clovenfooted, and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that shall ye eat. 4 Nevertheless these shall ye not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the hoof: as the camel, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. 5 And the coney, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. 6 And the hare, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. 7 And the swine, though he divide the hoof, and be clovenfooted, yet he cheweth not the cud; he is unclean to you. 8 Of their flesh shall ye not eat, and their carcase shall ye not touch; they are unclean to you. 9 These shall ye eat of all that are in the waters: whatsoever hath fins and scales in the waters, in the seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat. 10 And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you: 11 They shall be even an abomination unto you; ye shall not eat of their flesh, but ye shall have their carcases in abomination. 12 Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you.... 22 Even these of them ye may eat; the locust after his kind, and the bald locust after his kind, and the beetle after his kind, and the grasshopper after his kind. 23 But all other flying creeping things, which have four feet, shall be an abomination unto you."
Leviticus 11

"27 Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard."
Leviticus 19

"10 And the man that committeth adultery with another man's wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death."
Leviticus 20

"9 And the daughter of any priest, if she profane herself by playing the whore, she profaneth her father: she shall be burnt with fire.... 13 And he shall take a wife in her virginity. 14 A widow, or a divorced woman, or profane, or an harlot, these shall he not take: but he shall take a virgin of his own people to wife.... 17 Speak unto Aaron, saying, Whosoever he be of thy seed in their generations that hath any blemish, let him not approach to offer the bread of his God. 18 For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach: a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or any thing superfluous, 19 Or a man that is brokenfooted, or brokenhanded, 20 Or crookbackt, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken; 21 No man that hath a blemish of the seed of Aaron the priest shall come nigh to offer the offerings of the Lord made by fire: he hath a blemish; he shall not come nigh to offer the bread of his God."
Leviticus 21

" It shall be a statute for ever in your generations: ye shall celebrate it in the seventh month. 42 Ye shall dwell in booths seven days; all that are Israelites born shall dwell in booths: 43 That your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God."
Leviticus 23

"16 And he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord, he shall surely be put to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him: as well the stranger, as he that is born in the land, when he blasphemeth the name of the Lord, shall be put to death. 17 And he that killeth any man shall surely be put to death."
Leviticus 24

"23 The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land is mine, for ye are strangers and sojourners with me... 37 Thou shalt not give him thy money upon usury, nor lend him thy victuals for increase.... 44 Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. 45 Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession. 46 And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever:"
Leviticus 25

Leviticus is largely ignored by modern Christians because it’s felt that Jesus replaced the Law (except where He didn’t) and that Paul said a lot of it didn’t apply (except for the parts that did). And for all of that, many are still willing to cite Leviticus for things that they think are sinful, while ignoring it for things they don’t. They tend to cherry-pick which of the Levitican laws (not to mention most of the Bible) they think still apply, and which don’t.