I DOUBT whether many readers of the Church Times would readily pick up this book on Leviticus unless charmed by the photograph of a family of rock badgers on the cover. Failure to do so would deprive them of a spiritual gem; for, as the author shows, “Leviticus is one of the most important books in the Old Testament,” whose teaching urgently needs to be appropriated by our contemporary society “with little understanding of the world as a sacred place, inhabited by the divine”.

Central to Leviticus is the concept of holiness, which is what God is and commands us to be — a holy people. This will demand that every aspect of life is set apart for him. Scarlata sets out to show how Leviticus enables an unholy people to live in the presence of a holy God, though we must remember that it was written for a particular society at a particular time and place.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in understanding the place of ritual in ancient Israel. The author examines both sacrifice and atonement, nowhere prescribed as appeasing God’s wrath. Importantly, this leads him to rule out a substitutionary theory to explain Christ’s death.

Scarlata goes on to consider the importance of the tabernacle, the chosen place of God’s presence in his world, and the necessity for the priesthood to protect it as well as act as a “conduit of blessing” to his people. All this is related to Jesus and the perception of him as the great high priest.

Turning to the food laws, the author admits that we cannot know their rationale. None the less, they show that “eating should not be a mindless physical act,” but requires careful thought; for all creation is sacred. Similarly, the provision by Leviticus of holy time, both in the weekly sabbath and the annual festivals, stands in stark contrast to the tyranny of the consumer world and the internet.

Most difficult for Christians and most often misunderstood are the purity laws designed to protect the tabernacle and so God’s presence in the midst of his people. “Though the commands for purity in Leviticus have been superseded in Christ, the goal of purity is retained and remains central for the life of faith.”

Finally, the author discusses the two critical commandments in Leviticus, to be holy as God is holy, and to love your neighbour as yourself. He asks whether our use of current technology encourages us to live out these two commands in the virtual world.

For Scarlata, Leviticus is not a book to be skipped over, but constitutes a profound challenge to our perception of both God and his creation, a challenge endorsed and met by Jesus.
 

Canon Anthony Phillips is a former headmaster of The King’s School, Canterbury.

A Journey Through the World of Leviticus: Holiness, sacrifice, and the rock badger
Mark W. Scarlata
Cascade Books £17
(978-1-6667-1372-5)
Church Times Bookshop £15.30