Holy Division

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying: “Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy…. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD… [Leviticus 19:1-2, 18, NRSV].

Several years ago, a preacher friend shared a joke with me. He asked, “Why did YHWH give us Leviticus as the third book in the Bible?” I admitted that I had no idea. He retorted, “To discourage us from trying to read the entire Holy Text from cover to cover.” An e-mail colleague, who teaches OT at Luther Seminary (St. Paul, MN), relates how one of her students told her that he didn’t realize that he could fall asleep on a treadmill until he did so while reading Leviticus.

To be sure, most modern churches give Leviticus short shrift. Only a couple of readings from Leviticus are found in the three-year cycle of the Revised Common Lectionary. While I’ve read Leviticus, front to back, I’ve never preached on any portion of it. My personal journal contains but three short entries, all on the OT reading assigned for this upcoming Sunday: Leviticus 19:1-2, 15-18 [the Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost, RCL, Year A].

Noted OT expert, Robert Alter, whose extensive and exhaustive three-volume translation of The Hebrew Bible I’ve mentioned from time to time, suggests that there is a single verb that focuses the major themes of Leviticus — “divide” (Hebrew, hivdil). It’s the verb that is also heavily utilized in the Priestly story of Creation:

And God saw the light, that it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness. … And God made the vault and it divided the water beneath the vault from the water above the vault, and so it was [Genesis 1].

In the Genesis story, prior to the important “divisions” by God, the world was a mere chaotic interfusion of disparate elements, what Alter calls “welter and waste.” What enables existence and provides a framework for the development of human nature, conceived in God’s image, and of human civilization itself, is a process of division and insulation: light from darkness, day from night, the upper waters from the lower waters, and the dry land from the sea. This same process of division and insulation is found in the ritual, sexual, and dietary laws of Leviticus.

Within Leviticus, there is a clear division between God and God’s creation. God is wholly other. Moreover, God is holy. Note that this week’s OT reading begins with the familiar refrain in Leviticus: “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy” [19:2]. Holiness is an attribute of God. In a true sense, Holiness is the attribute of God. In order for the holy God to dwell in the midst of an unholy people, certain controls and guidelines—even limitations—are necessary.

If you’ve seen the movie, “Oppenheimer,” or if you are otherwise familiar with the development of the atomic bomb (or, for that matter, the tragedies at Chernobyl or Three-Mile Island), you might think of God as a powerful atomic reactor on steroids. If one approaches that kind of power carelessly, without the necessary caution and preparations, one will inevitably be harmed. This is not because God desires to harm us. Instead, it’s because of God’s power and ultimate goodness.

Therefore, as indicated in the Leviticus text, just as God divides the holy from the common, the unclean from the clean, so also Israel was to mirror God’s divine order. Israel was required to follow various rules and ordinances. Some foods were off limits. There were/are rules regarding sexual intimacy. Some actions were/are prescribed. Only then is the holy God able to dwell with Israel without destroying the people.

It must be stressed, however, that within the Leviticus chapters that precede this Sunday’s OT reading, the writer’s apparent obsession with skin diseases, with sacrifices and other rituals, is not a means of dividing or separating Israel from the neighbors who lived with or near God’s chosen people. Instead, the division—the insulation—was to enable a lifestyle within which God could dwell among them. Leviticus is, therefore, not so much about personal holiness as it is the maintenance of order so that life with God—rather than chaos and destruction—might flourish.

Clawing our way back toward this week’s reading, most OT scholars have designated the textual unit from chapter 17 through chapter 26 as the Holiness Code. Within the Code (think “body of laws”, not something written by Da Vinci), we hear repeated many of the Ten Commandments:

Every man shall revere his mother and his father, and My sabbaths you shall keep, I am the LORD your God” [19:3].

Do not turn to the idols nor make molten gods for yourselves, I am the LORD your God” [19:4].

One also hears commandments that govern the interaction between the Israelites and others, particularly the poor:

And when you reap your land’s harvest, you shall not finish off the edge of your field, nor pick up the gleanings of your harvest, you shall not finish off the edge of your field, nor pick up the gleanings of your harvest…. For the poor and for the sojourner you shall leave them. I am the LORD your God [19:9-10].

Moreover, in mirroring God, the Israelite is not to steal, nor lie, nor defame or deal falsely with others. The Israelite may not hate his or her fellow human being, nor take vengeance or harbor a grudge. Oh, and one more thing—and this is why this Leviticus passage is paired with the Gospel lesson assigned for this week [Matthew 22:34-46]. In the Gospel text, when asked which commandment is the greatest, Jesus repeats Deuteronomy 6:5, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” But quoting Leviticus 19:18, Jesus quickly adds, “And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself” [19:18b, NRSV].

Loving neighbor as oneself—that sometimes is a tall order.

God commands, “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy.” And so, we are to love our neighbor, not because doing so signals virtue on our part, nor because it might be good business, nor because we’d like our neighbor to respond in love to us. We are to love our neighbor because we are to mirror the holy God we worship—the holy God who divides and insulates in order that He might live with us—the holy God who already loves that neighbor.

I’m taken aback just a bit by God’s pronouncement, communicated to us through the author of Leviticus: “You shall be holy.” Often, I don’t feel very holy. I can be judgmental. My tongue can be quick and sharp. I all too often show a lack of patience. My list continues; alas, my point is made.

Can we see, however, that God’s words are not only a command; they are also a promise: We shall be holy. Believing that promise is the first important step we might take toward forming the sort of community that God calls us to be, a community that not only loves God, but also our neighbors.