One of the doctrines of the gospel that will be familiar to readers of this blog is that of Jesus Christ’s substitutionary atonement by his blood. In the protestant doctrine of the Reformation, blood propitiates God’s wrath toward sin. Indeed, the author of Hebrews tells us that “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins” (Heb 9:22). However, Leviticus 5:11–13 seems to contradict this rule.
But if his hand is insufficient to collect two turtle doves or two sons of a dove, then he will bring as his offering for which he sinned a tenth of an ephah of flour for his sin offering. He will not place upon it oil, nor will he set upon it frankincense, for it is his sin offering. And he will bring it to the priest, and the priest will take a handful from it, his full handful, as a memorial. And he will burn it up on the altar upon the fire of Yahweh; it is a sin offering. And the priest will make atonement concerning it, concerning his sin which he sinned, any one of these things. And he will be forgiven for it, and it will be for the priest an offering.1
There’s a deep devotional lesson to be learned here. Indeed, this offering is a special accommodation for the poor. This offering shows that anyone in Israel could have his relationship with God restored, regardless of his economic standing. Yahweh was not just a God of the rich! Other sin offerings would require animals, but in the Ancient Near East, an animal sacrifice was a costly economic sacrifice. Not to be more precise than our actual knowledge allows, but imagine having to give up a month’s salary to restore your relationship with God when you sinned (5:1), perhaps by accidentally touching an unclean thing (5:2)! The poor of course could not afford this. So God graciously provided another way. This supports a fundamental notion about atonement: atonement can only stem from a gracious provision by God.
What should seem so odd to New Testament ears is that this atonement is provided without any loss of life, without anything bearing the punishment of sin (that is, death), with merely the handing over of flour. How does a tenth of an ephah of flour provide atonement?
Now as New Testament Christians we believe that the sacrifices of the Mosaic law could never provide ultimate atonement for sin. Perhaps is this the explanation for why this bloodless sacrifice covered the poor man’s sin? Could we perhaps assume that the sacrifices of the Mosaic law were merely symbols, pointing forward to Christ, and therefore did not atone for sin at all? The problem with this view is that by taking it, we must take the word “atone” (or “make atonement”) used in the Old Testament to describe what sacrifices did as meaning “not atone” (or “not make atonement”), or perhaps as “we don’t know what this word means but it definitely doesn’t mean atone.” The Old Testament repeatedly describes sacrifices as atoning for sin. We must take the biblical text at face value on this point. However, one could rightly ask on what basis Yahweh accepted animal blood as atoning for human sin. If we really believe that the wages of sin are death, we recognize that metaphysically only human blood should be able to cover human sin. For Mosaic sacrifices to atone for sin, they must do so by means of anticipation of the ultimate human sacrifice, the ultimate Passover Lamb, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, Jesus Christ.2
The idea that a bloodless grain offering could serve as a sin offering, in conjunction with the principle of Hebrews 9:22, is a supporting argument for the conclusion that Old Testament sacrifices had their real atoning nature through means of Yahweh’s looking to the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Indeed, the majority of atoning sacrifices in the Old Testament involved the shedding of blood, right back to God’s slaughter of an animal to cover the sin of Adam and Eve (Gen 3:21). That this is true of the vast majority suffices for the Old Testament to model the principle of Hebrews 9:22, that blood is required to expiate sin. But the doctrine of sin we have from both Old and New Testaments teaches that its serious offense to God far exceeds the value of any animal blood. When God covered Adam and Eve’s sin with animal blood, he still expelled them from Eden. Since animal blood is insufficient, we should expect that the value of Old Testament sacrifices included something else (indeed, the ancient Hebrews should have as well–they knew of Genesis 3 just as we do now). The efficacy of Old Testament sacrifices makes sense when seen as anticipatory of a final atonement, of the Servant of Yahweh who bears the sin of his people (Isa 53). So a grain offering can provide real atonement, in that it anticipates Christ!
The implication of all this is that atonement for sin has always been through God’s gracious provision, available to all men equally. And that gracious provision has always been the same: the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ! With this there are obvious demands on your life: repent and believe the gospel of Jesus Christ, for even obscure verses in Leviticus testify to it. But additionally, i think the lesson is to remember to worship God on his terms, not ours. Bloodless sin offerings shouldn’t make initial sense. But God commanded them. Communion, Baptism, Church membership, separation from the world, killing of sin, preaching, evangelism, church gatherings, prayer–all these means of worship that God has commanded of us are out of place in a 21st century world. But these are the things commanded of us, so may we turn to these and worship our Lord enthusiastically as we try to better understand his nature and his Word.
1 Emphasis added, translation mine.
2 I wrote a school paper arguing this that I may adapt for a future blog post.
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