Torah Pearls #26 – Shemini (Leviticus 9:1-11:47)

Torah Pearls Shemini, leviticus, Nehemia Gordon, Keith Johnson, Jono Vandor, Torah portion, strange fire, Aaron, judgment, Yehovah, Be Holy for I am Holy, Torah PearlsIn this episode of The Original Torah PearlsShemini (Leviticus 9:1-11:47), we discuss the blessing of fire falling from Heaven, the sin of strange fire offered by Aaron’s sons, and the judgement of fire from Yehovah! Also, listen in as Nehemia Gordon eats a grasshopper! And, was Tevye right when he declared in Fiddler on the Roof that in the Good Book, “somewhere there is something about a chicken!” And what about the duck, goose and the swan? Lastly, what does it mean when Peter quotes Leviticus 11:45, “Be Holy for I am Holy” in 1 Peter 1:15? All this and more in this week’s Torah Pearls!

I look forward to reading your comments! Download Torah Pearls Shemini Transcript
Torah Pearls #26 - Shemini (Leviticus 9:1-11:47)

You are listening to The Original Torah Pearls with Nehemia Gordon, Keith Johnson, and Jono Vandor. Thank you for supporting Nehemia Gordon's Makor Hebrew Foundation. Learn more at NehemiasWall.com.

Jono: G'day! And wherever you may be around the world, it is good to have your company. And g'day to Lindsay and Tina in Colorado, Sarah in South Carolina, Holly in Tennessee, Kimberly in Indiana, Marsha in Georgia, Paul in Alabama, Deborah, William and Rosita in Victoria, Australia, Susie and Pamela in Texas, Rhianne in Surrey in the UK, Charles in New Mexico, Dave in Hawaii, Elmo and Joan and Alberto in Canada; Michael in Illinois. Oh, man, why is there an S?

Nehemia: Illinois, what?

Jono: Why is there an S at the end of that?

Nehemia: Because it was discovered and named by the French.

Jono: Oh, my.

Nehemia: That’s the French spelling.

Jono: There it is. Linda and Deborah in Ohio; David and Edward, California; Warren in Florida; Raphael in Pretoria, South Africa; Judy in Kansas; and Dave in Washington. It is time for Pearls from the Torah Portion with Keith Johnson and Nehemia Gordon. G’day fellows!

Nehemia: G'day, Jono, great to be here from Jerusalem. This is a shout-out to Matt and Dana on the Gold Coast of Australia.

Jono: Hey, there you go.

Keith: Wow. I want to give a shout-out to all the people you just said. I’d like you to say that again, Jono.

Jono: Oh, sure, I’ll just start from the beginning.

Keith: You got people from around the world! I mean, can I jump on that train?

Jono: They are everywhere. And thank you so much to the people who have shared it on Facebook and in their emails and so on and so forth, I really appreciate that. Today we are in Shemini in Leviticus 9, verse 1, to the end of 11, 11 verse 47, and it begins like this. Are you ready? Here we go.

Nehemia: Let’s do it.

Jono: “It came to pass on the eighth day that Moses called Aaron and his sons and the elders of Israel. And he said to Aaron, ‘Take for yourself a young bull as a sin offering and a ram as a burnt offering, without blemish, and offer them before Yehovah. And to the children of Israel you shall speak, saying, Take a kid of the goats as a sin offering, and a calf and a lamb, both in the first year, without blemish, as a burnt offering, also a bull and a ram as a peace offering, to sacrifice before Yehovah, and a grain offering mixed with oil; for today Yehovah will appear to you.’ So, they brought what Moses commanded before the Tabernacle of Meeting. And all the congregation drew near and stood before Yehovah. Then Moses said, 'This is the thing which Yehovah has commanded you to do, and the glory of Yehovah will appear to you.' And Moses said to Aaron, 'Go to the altar, offer your sin offering and your burnt offering, and make atonement for yourself and for the people. Offer the offering of the people, and make atonement for them, as Yehovah commanded.' Aaron, therefore, went to the altar and killed the calf of the sin offering, which was for himself. And then the sons of Aaron brought the blood to him, he dipped his finger in the blood and put it on the horns of the altar and poured the blood at the base of the altar. But the fat, the kidneys, and the fatty lobe from the liver of the sin offering he burned on the altar, as Yehovah had commanded Moses. The flesh and the hide he burned with fire outside the camp. And he killed the burnt offering; and Aaron’s sons presented him with the blood, which he sprinkled all around the altar. Then they presented the burnt offering to him, with its head and pieces and burned them on the altar. And he washed the entrails and the legs and burned them with the burnt offering on the altar. Then he brought the people’s offering, and he took the goat, which was the sin offering for the people, and killed it and offered it for sin, like the first one. And he brought the burnt offering and offered it according to the prescribed manner. And he brought the grain offering, and took a handful of it, and burned it on the altar, besides the burnt sacrifice of the morning. He also killed the bull and the ram as sacrifices of peace offerings, which were for the people. And Aaron’s sons presented to him the blood, which he sprinkled all around on the altar, and the fat from the bull and the ram—the fatty tail and what covers the entrails and the kidneys, and the fatty lobe attached to the liver; and they put the fat on the breasts. Then he burned the fat on the altar; but the breasts and the right thigh Aaron waved as a wave offering before Yehovah, as Moses had commanded.” Now, Nehemia?

Nehemia: Now, why did you stop there? Read the entire chapter.

Jono: I’m not stopping

Nehemia: What’s going on here?

Jono: No, no.

Nehemia: I was just thinking as you were doing that Jono, that you really need to consider doing, pray about this, doing a dramatic reading of the Old Testament. You know, they have different people who will come with the Shakespearean voice, “In the beginning was the...”, you know that kind of thing. You’ve got to do one of those things.

Jono: Right. Would you like the Shakespearean voice?

Nehemia: No, no. The Australian voice is even better. No one has done that. That is awesome.

Jono: You know what, the secret ingredient is a coffee and a square of chocolate.

Nehemia: Is that what it is?

Jono: That’s what it is. Hey.

Nehemia: Okay.

Jono: And then maybe I can do it. All right, hang on, anyway.

Nehemia: And you could translate it into Australian, and like on the sixth day where it says, “God saw that it was good’, it would be like, “And God said, “G’day!”

Jono: G’day!

Nehemia: “G’day, it’s a g’day.” There it is, the Australian version.

Jono: It could happen. I'm thinking about it already. Yes?

Nehemia: So, I think this is such an interesting opening because, imagine 2,000 years ago and you’re sitting in the synagogue and you’ve been working really hard in your fields for six days. Then Shabbat morning you show up and the person opens up the scroll and stands up in front of everyone and starts to read, “And it was, and it came to pass on the eighth day, that Moses called Aaron and his sons.” And you’re like, the eighth day? What on earth is he talking about? What’s going on here? And you know, because the story is a continuation of what happened in the previous section, which is Leviticus 8, verse 33, where it says that he ordained, or sanctified them essentially, Aaron and his sons, for seven days, “and they were to remain in the tent of meeting during these seven days,” etc. And then on the eighth day here’s what happened with these sacrifices.

What this reminds me of is that there are really two different systems that we’re dealing with here, neither of which is an original part of the Bible. The one system is the system of the Parshah, of the weekly Torah portion that we traditionally read in the synagogue. Well, that didn’t exist in the time of Moses. That’s something that somebody came up with by tradition, probably over a thousand years later. There’s nothing wrong with it, it’s a nice tradition and it’s useful, but it’s not an original part of scripture, and sometimes you can forget what’s going on because it’s been a whole week since you read it. In the Hebrew text, Leviticus 8 and Leviticus 9, well, that’s one continuous story; even calling them 8 and 9, those chapters were invented only in the 13th century, less than a thousand years ago. So, we’ve got the Torah portions and we’ve got the chapters, both of which are useful. I’m not saying to throw away the chapters, you know; how would we reference Scripture? In the old days they used to quote the whole verse. Well, most of us aren’t smart enough to do that or have a good enough memory, so we’ll say Leviticus 9:1 instead of, as it says in "…Vayehi bayom haShemini...” you know and quoting the verse. So, it’s a good convenience, but let’s remember, that’s not an original part of the text and let’s not be misled by that. Let’s always look at it in its context, and there’s a flowing context here. The fact that somebody put a chapter and a Torah portion, beginning in 9:1, doesn’t mean let’s forget what it could say.

Jono: Amen.

Keith: It's really interesting that Nehemia said that, because then the first thing you know, the folks that are listening to these Torah portions when we’re reading it, when we’re preparing and when we’re studying, we’re supposed to be going step by step by step. But, every once in a while, something might happen where there might be a little change here and there. And so, when it says in 8 verse 1, “On the eighth day,” it took me a minute to say, now, wait a minute, when was the seventh day? So Nehemia, I’m glad that you did that.

Jono: Yeah, I’m glad you pointed that out.

Keith: But the other thing that it brings up is that, without context, there is no eighth day. Meaning, when we count days, day 1, day 2, day 3, day 4, over in Israel, I believe you guys don’t even do...don’t you, in the Hebrew language, Nehemia, “the day 4”, “the day 5”, “the day 6,” that’s how you count?

Nehemia: We don’t say, “Sunday,” “Monday,” “Tuesday.”

Keith: Right.

Nehemia: We say “yom rishon,” “yom sheni,” “yom sh'lishi,” “yom revi'i,” “yom chamishi,” “yom shishi,” which literally means “first day,” “second day,” “third day,” “fourth day,” “fifth day,” “sixth day.”

Keith: Exactly.

Nehemia: And then the seventh day we actually call “Yom HaShabbat,” the Sabbath day.

Keith: Right. Exactly. So, in that counting of time, there is no “eighth day,” meaning, the next day is the first day. So, after seven days, it’s the first day. So, when you’re reading this out of context, and you say, “the eighth day,” I’m skimming, thinking, wait a minute, where was the seventh day? So, I’m actually glad that you brought that up because, if you don’t get a chance to see sort of the big picture, you can kind of get a little bit lost.

Jono: Amen. Now, Keith, I want to take a moment here and say that I have been so blessed to read this long-awaited dynamite book that Nehemia Gordon has just finished and will be available on the shelves very, very soon.

Keith: Really? You mean this book that Nehemia’s writing?

Jono: You’ve read it? Come on, you’ve read it.

Keith: No, are you kidding me? I mean, I’ve read it twice. It’s amazing.

Jono: It’s an amazing book.

Keith: Yeah. In fact, I’m still wondering when I’m going to look on the New York Time's bestseller list and see it.

Nehemia: I’m in the final editing phases.

Keith: No, no. You’ve been in the final editing phases enough.

Jono: Yeah, no, we’re over the final editing phases. Get over the final editing phases. Get it on the shelf.

Nehemia: No, we’re really at the stage where we’re dealing with kind of minor edits. But what the book is primarily about, I would say, it’s about The Priestly Blessing. The subtitle of the book is “The Hebrew Power of the Priestly Blessing Unleashed.” It’s about the priestly blessing, the blessing that’s actually commanded in Numbers, chapter 6, verses 22-27.

What’s interesting is, you know, one of the things we mention in this program is that the Torah is not in chronological order. There is the example where Numbers 9 takes place before Numbers 1. Here we have an example where there’s a reference to The Priestly Blessing in the book of Leviticus, which is before the book of Numbers, showing that it’s not in chronological order. It says in verse 22, “And Aaron lifted up his hands to the people and he blessed them.” So, Aaron had some kind of a blessing; presumably, it’s the blessing that God revealed in Numbers chapter 6, although we don’t know the exact chronology of Numbers 6. Anyway, so then it says in verse 23, “And Moses and Aaron came to the Tent of Meeting and they went out and they blessed the people.” Then it says, “And they saw the glory of Yehovah.” Glory, whoo!

Jono: Yeah!

Nehemia: They saw the glory; actually, it says, “and the glory of Yehovah appeared to all the people…”

Jono: Yes.

Nehemia: …which is kind of interesting. What on earth is the glory of Yehovah? I think it’s something we’ve kind of hinted at before, but we could literally all sit down and spend years researching this and looking at all the opinions. There’s a lot of different opinions about what the glory of Yehovah is. Some people identify this as the Schinah, the Shekhinah, which is actually a term that doesn’t appear in the Tanakh exactly, but the concept appears as the place where Yehovah causes his name to dwell. So, it’s that dwelling of the name, the indwelling of Yehovah’s name, that’s the Schinah (Schinah means “the indwelling”), the Shekhinah, and then you say “the Shekinah glory” in your tradition. Well, that’s simply in Hebrew, “Schinaht kavod,” which is “the indwelling of the glory.” So, what is this glory? There are different Jewish theologians who have different opinions. Some will say it is Yehovah and others will say, well, no, it’s an angel of Yehovah that represents him. That’s where the theologians make their bread and butter, arguing about this sort of thing.

Jono: Sure.

Nehemia: When really, in Scripture, I would say it’s not entirely clear. So, I honestly don’t know exactly what the “kavod” is. I know that it’s described in the book of Ezekiel; and Isaiah, he seems to be describing there the Kavod Yehovah as he perceived it. But this is something that the people saw. I love the next verse, verse 24. Before we get to 24, maybe Keith can talk about the glory.

Keith: You know what, actually before the glory, I was going to talk just a little bit about this idea of this process of declaring who the priests are that are actually going to do the work. Because I think that this is interesting. I mentioned this before in the program; in the tradition I come from, once you declare your call, “Okay, I feel called to serve as a pastor,” or, “I feel called to serve as a priest in the Catholic Church or the Episcopal Church,” and other places, sometimes called pastors, sometimes called priests. I mean, if you’re really a big timer you get to be called Pontifex Maximus.

Jono: Great.

Keith: But the bottom line is that you get this call on your life.

Nehemia: But didn’t you meet the pope?

Keith: Hold on. And then there’s this process that you go through, and what’s interesting to me is the process that’s here in the Tanakh on the setting aside of the priest and the process that takes place today in many traditional religious institutions…I’m not sure for you, Jono, but I come from a tradition where you can be called on the street, on a corner, and set up a church, or you can go through the process like I’ve got to go through. In the Methodist church, it takes about 10 years from undergraduate, graduate, elder’s orders, all of that stuff. But the same thing that I take 10 years to do, someone else tomorrow, Jono, if you’re in the United States, you could walk down the street of Charlotte and say, “I feel called to be a pastor.” You could get someone to ordain you by mail, you could get a building...

Jono: You don’t even need an ordination in the tradition that I come from, all you need is a 900-foot Jesus and a good story and you’re in.

Keith: Okay, well, and the point is…

Nehemia: Now, what’s that? What do you mean about the 900-foot Jesus?

Jono: Okay, so let’s say you claim to have had a vision or a dream or something happened, you’ve got a great big story, whatever it may be, but you can open a church…

Nehemia: Now, what tradition is that story?

Jono: Oh, Pentecostal-Evangelical.

Nehemia: Oh.

Keith: So, I guess what I wanted to say was...

Nehemia: So, I heard a really funny story a number of years ago. I’m going to interrupt Keith; I’m Israeli.

Keith: What?

Nehemia: So, I heard this really funny story years ago, it’s a true story. This guy I worked with was telling me how in America anybody who proclaims themselves to be a religious denomination is by definition recognized by the United States as a religion. Which, you know, okay. So, this guy I worked with was telling me, back in America, in Chicago, he was telling me how he saw an ad in the newspaper that said, “Get in on a new religion on the ground floor!” Or “Get in on the ground floor of a new religion!” And so, he answered the ad and he met this woman in a bar, and she was the priestess of this new religion that she founded. He said, well, what do I need to do to get in on the ground floor, to get ordained? She said, “Buy me a beer!” So, he bought her a beer, literally. He bought her a beer and she ordained him, and he is now legally, by the state of Illinois, an ordained pastor of some religion that no one’s ever heard of.

Jono: Keith?

Keith: Alright, well I think that’s kind of…

Nehemia: The Torah has a little bit of a different system, doesn’t it?

Keith: Yeah. The system here, I look at this and it just kind of gives you a certain level of being sober regarding what it meant to be one who would represent, or to serve, the people as a representative. And you know, I just think there’s something that could be gleaned from this for those that are in ministry. I look at this for myself and I think, wow, not that we have such a process that exists today, where we go and hear, the sacrifices, etc. (and we’re going to talk about it in the next chapter), but how Yehovah looks at the fact that you serve, or that Yehovah looks at the fact that you represent. I mean, it’s not something to play around with. So, I think…

Jono: Absolutely.

Keith: This section is really a pretty clear picture of how serious it is, and even as regards to Nehemia’s book that’s coming out regarding the priestly benediction and the prayer, I mean, it isn’t something that’s just casually thrown around. This is like, literally, setting the name upon people. So, I mean it really is something that causes me to just kind of slow down a little bit as I’m reading this, and the next section is even a little bit harder to deal with.

Jono: Sure, we’re going to get into that. But just before we do, Nehemia, I just want to ask you; in my study notes of my New King James Study Bible, here in verse 22…

Nehemia: Yeah?

Jono: …it says, “Aaron blessed them”. The ultimate function of the priests was to bless the people. When God gave the priestly blessing, He said that the priests would put His name on the children of Israel, and He would bless them. Would you agree with that? Is that the ultimate function of the priest?

Nehemia: Well, I’d say that’s one of the functions; it's not the only function. There’s a verse that I think we’ve quoted in Deuteronomy which kind of defines what their function is. I think we quoted that when we talked about the leprosy, which, chronologically, hasn’t happened yet.

Jono: When we traveled too far.

Nehemia: Just like the Torah, the Torah Pearls are not revealed in chronological order. So if you look at Deuteronomy 21:5, for example, it says, “And the priests of Levi will approach, for in them Yehovah your God has chosen to serve him and to bless the name of Yehovah and according to them shall be every manner of strife and every nagah,” which can be translated as “plague,” or “leprosy.” They have several functions here; to bless the people, to serve Yehovah, and to teach the people the Commandments of Yehovah.

Jono: And to settle disputes…

Nehemia: To settle disputes and to teach the people what the commandments of Yehovah are. So, we have here several functions of the priest; it’s not just to bless them. But that is a major function of the priests; to proclaim the name over the people. Absolutely.

Jono: There it is. And so, when the people saw it, that’s, of course, the fire came, “the glory of Yehovah and the fire from before Yehovah and consumed all the burnt offering and the fat on the altar. And when all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces.” Ouch, that’s what they did.

Nehemia: Yeah.

Keith: I wonder about that, and I get to these issues all the time now. When you get context for something; for example, addressing the issue of time. Every time I see a day or, every time I see something, that’s always the first thing that comes to my mind. Well, I remember when we were preparing for Yom Teruah, the day of shouting, then I started thinking, okay, every time I see people shouting, I wonder what they’re shouting. And of course, for me, it wasn’t hard, Nehemia and Jono, to think they shouted the name or something and then that’s why they fell face down, because His name is so holy and that would be something that would cause them…I don’t know that that’s the case, but it’s interesting how when you’re reading this…

Jono: It’s possible, yeah.

Keith: …when you’re reading this, depending on what it is that you’re focusing on, you tend to have those things jump off the page. So, for me, when I look at that line, it says that they shouted; well, first fire came down and then here comes the shout. So, the question becomes, what did they shout? It doesn’t say.

Jono: No, it doesn’t say.

Keith: It doesn’t say what they shouted, but definitely, the response of the fire caused them to shout something, and then they found themselves prostrate before him. So, I think that’s pretty cool.

Jono: And Chapter 10, of course is…

Nehemia: Whoa.

Jono: Yeah?

Nehemia: Whoa, Chapter 10? What?

Jono: Hey.

Nehemia: There’s a lot in this verse. It’s interesting; so, you have Leviticus 9:24…I just realized what you guys were talking about, because I’m like, "The shout? What shout?" And that’s what you have is “shout”?

Jono: What do you have?

Nehemia: The Hebrew word is “vayaronu,” which means to sing for joy.

Keith: Uh-oh.

Jono: Really?

Nehemia: “All the people saw, and they sang for joy!”

Jono: “They sang for joy and they fell upon their faces.”

Nehemia: And they fell upon their faces. Now, what they sang for joy, I don’t know, because it doesn’t say. But they were joyously singing, and that’s actually…

Keith: Oh, my goodness.

Nehemia: …there’s a Hebrew name derived from that, a common name for girls, which is Rina, which means song, joyous song, so “vayaronu,” and they sang for joy. Because it’s not the word “vayariyu,” which means, “and they shouted”. It’s a different word.

Jono: Wow.

Nehemia: “And they sang for joy.”

Keith: Well, now, there we go.

Jono: Yeah.They sang for joy and they fell.”

Keith: There’s a pearl. We’ve got to slow down, and you know what? This is a great opportunity because here’s an example where we’ve come across this, we’re reading, we’ve got the Methodist Bible, and the NIV, we’ve got Jono over there in the Pentecostal who knows…you become a preacher with a beer, and then you’ve got...

Nehemia: Is that a beer or beard?

Keith: No. So, then you’ve got him reading, and so is this not an example of where the eyes were opened, right there with that verse?

Jono: Excellent.

Keith: So, Nehemia, this is a great time for you to pray that all of us would have our eyes opened that we would see the wonderful things hidden. And isn’t that a great example…

Jono: It is.

Keith: …of a pearl that just comes from the Torah that you don’t see if you don’t know the language and the history and the context. All that together, that’s pretty powerful.

Jono: Brilliant.

Nehemia: Yehovah, our Heavenly Father, Creator of the Universe, please look down from Heaven and open our eyes that we may see the hidden wonderful things of your Torah. Amen.

Jono: Amen.

Keith: Amen.

Jono: Psalm 119, verse 18. Can I jump to Chapter 10?

Nehemia: No! What are you talking about?

Jono: What?

Nehemia: Verse 24 is one of the most exciting verses in the whole section, “And a fire came forth from before Yehovah and consumed that was upon the altar, the burnt offering, and the fats.” I mean wow; I can’t gloss over that.

Keith: Yeah.

Nehemia: So that’s an amazing thing. A fire came forth. That’s something that happened in a number of other instances. We see that happen with David.

Keith: He’s excited.

Jono: So obviously there’s Elijah, that’s on Mount Carmel?

Keith: Yeah. That’s right.

Nehemia: That actually happened twice with Elijah; once on Mount Carmel in 1 Kings 18:38, and the other time, when the men came to arrest him, and that’s in 2 Kings, chapter 1. It happened three times there actually, verses 10, 12, and 14. It also happened with Solomon in 2 Chronicles 7, verses 1 through 3. Let me read that real quick. It’s important because what we have here in Leviticus 9:24 is, Aaron and Moses are dedicating the altar, and the fire comes forth from Yehovah and burns up their sacrifice. In 2 Chronicles 7, it’s Solomon dedicating the Temple. It says, “When Solomon ended his prayer, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices and the glory of Yehovah filled the house.” So, what do we have here? We’ve got a dedication of the Temple and the altar, we’ve got the fire coming down and consuming the sacrifices upon the altar, and we’ve got the glory of Yehovah making its appearance. So, I mean, that’s not a coincidence; there’s definitely something going on there.

“The priest could not enter the house of Yehovah for the glory of Yehovah had filled the house of Yehovah. All the Israelites looked on while the fire came down and the glory of Yehovah was upon the house and they fell down upon the pavement, with their faces to the earth and praising Yehovah for He is good, for His mercy endures forever.” So here we’re actually told what they said, and maybe that’s what the Israelites at that time also said. It says here, literally, “hodoth le-Yehovah,” thank or praise to Yehovah, for He is good, for His mercy endures forever. And the two other stories…but before that, we’ve got to find the David one.

Jono: There’s a similar one, on a smaller scale I suppose, in regard to Judges 6…

Nehemia: There it is.

Jono: …20. Do you want to fill us in on that one? That’s Gideon, right?

Nehemia: Yeah, that’s Gideon. There are two. There’s Judges 6 and there’s Judges 13, and both of those have something of that nature, possibly.

Jono: Yeah, well, a fire rises up out of the rock and consumes.

Nehemia: 1 Chronicles 21:26, “David had built an altar there to Yehovah and offered up whole burnt offerings and peace offerings. When he called upon Yehovah, He answered him by sending down fire from Heaven…”

Jono: Wow.

Nehemia: “…upon the altar of the burnt offering.” 1 Chronicles 21:26. And then we have those two stories in the book of Judges, like you said. Could we really quickly look at those?

Jono: Yep. So, it says, in verse 20, “So Gideon went in and prepared a young goat, and unleavened bread from an ephah of flour. He put meat in a basket, and he put broth in a pot, and he brought them to Him under the terebinth tree and presented them. The Angel of God said to him,” this is verse 20, “’Take the meat and the unleavened bread and lay them on the rock and pour out the broth.’ And he did so. Then the Angel of the LORD put out the end of the staff that was in his hand, and touched the meat and the unleavened bread, and fire rose out of the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread. And the Angel of the LORD departed out of his sight. Now Gideon perceived that he was the Angel of the LORD. So, Gideon said, ‘Alas, O Lord GOD! For I have seen the Angel of Yehovah face to face.’”

Nehemia: Yeah. So, there we’ve got a situation where the fire comes forth and burns up his sacrifices. We have a similar thing, possibly, in Judges 13, and there the angel appears to Manoah, who is the father of Samson.

Jono: Samson.

Nehemia: This is before Samson’s born; at this point he’s a fetus in his mother’s womb. "And Manoah said to the Angel of Yehovah, 'Can we persuade you to stay while we prepare a kid for you?'” They want to bring him a sacrifice. “And the Angel of Yehovah, said to Manoah, 'Though you detain me, I will not eat your food. But if you offer a burnt offering, you must offer it to Yehovah.'” So that’s amazing. They want to bring a sacrifice to this man that’s appeared to them and given them a prophecy, and he’s like, don’t offer anything to me, offer it to Yehovah. And then it goes on and it says, “For Manoah did not know he was the Angel of Yehovah.” So, Manoah just thinks this man is a prophet; that he’s been sent by Yehovah. He still wants to offer a sacrifice; he doesn’t even realize he’s talking to an angel.

Keith: Right.

Nehemia: In verse 17, “Then Manoah said to the Angel of Yehovah, ‘What is your name, that when your words come to pass, we may honor you?’ And the Angel of Yehovah said to him, ‘Why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful?’ Or actually, it could also mean, “hidden”. That’s actually the same word in the prayer that we say.

Jono: Psalm 119:18, yep.

Nehemia: Psalm 119, where we say “gal eneinu ve-nabi-tah niphlaot mi-Torahteha.” The word “niphlaot,” is the same word here, which is “pelle” or “felle,” it’s the same root, which means “hidden.” So why do you ask my name? It’s hidden. You don’t need to know my name; worship Yehovah. You know the name of the one that you need to worship and bring the sacrifice to, and it ain’t me.

In verse 19, “So Manoah took the young goat with the grain offering and offered it upon the rock to Yehovah. And He did a wondrous thing while Manoah and his wife looked on.” Now, what that wondrous thing is, we don’t know, but it’s definitely something that impresses them. Then it goes on in verse 20, and kind of implies that it had something to do with a flame consuming the sacrifice. “It happened as the flame went up toward heaven from the altar, the Angel of the LORD ascended in the flame of the altar! When Manoah and his wife saw this, they fell on their faces to the ground.” Again, falling on their faces.

Jono: Yeah.

Nehemia: “When the Angel of Yehovah appeared no more to Manoah and his wife, then Manoah knew that he was the Angel of the Yehovah.” So, the angel disappears. I think this is such an amazing story because this man appears to them; they don’t realize it’s an angel, but he’s speaking this prophecy, and they want to bring a sacrifice to him.

Jono: Yeah.

Nehemia: And the man, who happens to be an angel, says, you don’t need to know my name, you know the name of your Creator; bring the sacrifices to Him, not to his agent…

Keith: Amen.

Nehemia: …not to His representative, not to His angel.

Jono: Amen.

Keith: Amen.

Nehemia: But then, look at the next verse, verse 22, and then I’ll end with this. “And Manoah said to his wife, ‘We shall surely die because we have seen God!’” They still don’t get it.

Keith: Exactly.

Jono: They’ve seen Elohim, right? I mean…

Keith: Is it possible?

Nehemia: They’ve seen the angel and, seeing the angel, they think the angel is the same thing as Yehovah. They don’t realize the angel…I mean, they may realize on some intellectual level that the angel represents Yehovah, but they’re confusing the messenger with the sender. You know, the rabbinical sages actually point out that this is one of the great errors of the idolaters in ancient times. That, if you look at the Canaanites, what they would do is, they would confuse the messenger with the sender. They would look at the forces of nature, they would look at the storm, and say, “We know God sent that storm and the storm, therefore, is God.” And they’d worship the storm; they’d call him Baal, the Lord of the storm. They'd look at the sea, and they know God created the sea, and they would worship the sea as God. They were worshipping essentially the messengers, the agents of God, the things that God created, as God himself. That essentially is the ancient form of idolatry that existed in Israel…

Jono: Indeed.

Nehemia: …before we got here, and some of us have picked it up. I’m speaking of my people, of the Jewish people, who sometimes will look at angels, and they will pray to angels, literally. Orthodox Jews that I grew up with have prayers to angels; not all of them, but many of them will pray to angels. They’ll pray to dead rabbis.

Jono: Yeah.

Nehemia: So, some of the very things that we were warned about here in this story, and throughout Scripture, such as not praying to the messenger, are the things that we’re doing until this very day.

Jono: Keith?

Keith: That’s why I think when we’re hearing about this, what’s so important is, here’s this manifestation. He selects these men, he says, “You will be my representatives,” they say, “okay.” They go through the process, they go through the ordination, or…use the word, the consecration. And then He shows the sign that in fact, yes, the work that they have done on my behalf is acceptable to me. He brings the sacrifice, and the fire comes down. Now, what do the people do? They sing, they fall on their faces. But over time, as the Creator of the universe does these things on behalf of those that are serving Him, doesn’t it always become that pretty soon it’s the person who says, "I’ve caused this thing to happen," and the people focus on the person? I mean, we see that throughout the Tanakh.

Jono: We’ve seen it a lot.

Keith: Yeah. So, I do think that it’s important that this idea of the manifestation, and maybe Manoah and his wife saw the manifestation and said, "Okay, that’s God." I don’t know. But in the end, the manifestation that comes from Him, the focus is to be on Him…

Jono: Amen.

Keith: …not the one that represented him, that brought that thing to happen.

Jono: Amen. Absolutely. And that does bring us to chapter 10. I’m going to chapter 10.

Keith: Oh, my goodness. Yeah?

Jono: I mean that really, really does. Now, let see, this is, “Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it, put incense on it, and offered,” what I’ve got here in the New King James, it says “profane fire before Yehovah, which He had not commanded them. So, fire went out from Yehovah and devoured them, and they died before Yehovah.”

Keith: Yours said, “profane fire”?

Jono: I’ve got profane, what have you got?

Keith: Mine says it’s “unauthorized.” Nehemia, what do you have?

Nehemia: So, it says “esh zarah”, which literally means a “strange fire.” It’s very interesting because the Hebrew phrase, essentially the Hebrew word for idolatry, is the phrase “avodah zarah,” which means strange to worship, a strange worshipping of God. The Hebrew thought looks at anything that is worshipping Yehovah, not through his commandments, but through the commands of men, as an “avodah zarah,” as a strange fire, as a strange worship. The concept comes from this exact passage here. God didn’t command us to make an idol of Him, and so what do we do? We make an idol and we worship that idol, and then everything else in addition that people use for idolatry.

But the point here is that they thought they were doing something holy, they thought, "Wow, God has burnt up this offering, this is so amazing," and they were probably excited, thinking, "Oh, my gosh, the glory of Yehovah has appeared to us, and the fires consumed the sacrifices. Let’s worship him even more by bringing in another burnt offering." They were bringing, essentially, incense; and there were very specific commandments related to incense. Now, remember how bored we were? Let’s be honest; we were bored when we were reading the sections in Exodus that described all the rules and regulations of the Tabernacle. And I think the point is that, if God gives you all those specific rules and regulations, stick to them.

Jono: Yes.

Nehemia: Don’t add to them, don’t take away from them. Don’t make up and say, "Okay, well, I’m going to bring another incense beyond what he commanded." They thought they were probably doing a holy thing and that’s why he says in verse 3, it’s literally, “bekrovai ekhadesh ve-al kol ha’am echabed,” which means, “through those who are close to me, I will be sanctified. And before all the people, I will be honored.” The point is, not everybody who brings a strange incense is going to be burned up, but those who are close to me, my priests who are my representatives, I’m going to hold them to a higher standard. I think that’s a scary thing.

Jono: It is a scary thing.

Nehemia: It is.

Jono: The responsibility upon the priest is incredible.

Nehemia: It is. It’s responsibility, and I would say that’s a responsibility that anybody who approaches Yehovah and tries to teach others about Him, that you’ve got a responsibility there.

Keith: Right.

Nehemia: You’ve got to be very careful with the words that you choose and the actions that you carry out, because Yehovah will be sanctified by those who are close to Him. You can go out and you can preach the Word of Yehovah and call others to repentance, but be careful. You better live by your words and not be a hypocrite.

Jono: Amen.

Keith: Amen. And I want to say something about this, and I kind of looked at this from a little bit of a different perspective, and I don’t want to put myself in the minds of these two sons of Aaron, but one of the things I wonder is, maybe it wasn’t…one possibility, maybe it wasn’t the fire that they focused on. Maybe it was the response of the people and they wanted that response of the people again. Okay, here this fire came, and look at the response of the people. And the response of the people was they sang, and they bowed before the Creator of the universe. And I’ve seen this actually happen, where there’s a look for the response and then the focus becomes on the response.

Jono: Oh, yeah.

Keith: Is it possible that what these two were saying was, "Hey, we want the response of the people like that, so we’re willing to do whatever we have to do, including offer strange fire, if we can get that same response." And so, when Nehemia brought this verse that says, “I will show myself holy, I will be honored,” when I read that, I think of the focus of Yehovah saying, "Look, this is going to be about me; I will be considered holy, I will be honored”.

But what often happens is, especially in ministry; how can I get the honor? How can I get the focus? How can I be the one that they’re focusing on? And that’s why I think it’s so…it’s almost like this situation just makes you have to slow down, and like Nehemia says, okay, so stop. What is the focus? Is the focus about Him, really? Or is the focus about us?

And I think again, it’s unfortunate that so many people from my tradition won’t read these sections, and the pastors and the teachers and those that go through this process, they don’t really read these sections because they think they’re no longer applicable. But I think this is clearly applicable in terms of what we see in ministries all over the world.

Jono: Amen.

Nehemia: I think there’s a really important principle here, because we just saw the fire coming down from before Yehovah and consuming the sacrifice, and that was the blessing. And then when they sinned, they probably thought, "Well, now, I want the mercy." But it doesn’t work that way. If you want to have these amazing things happen to you when you do right, you’ve got to be prepared for serious consequences when you do wrong. And there are two whole sections, one in Leviticus and one in Deuteronomy that talk about the blessing and the curse.

There were these amazing blessings that were promised for keeping the Torah, but the curses are also intense, and I think the warning here is, you can’t expect the good without the bad. If you want to be close to Yehovah and you want that blessing from Yehovah, and everyone wants the blessing, don’t they? Well, be prepared for the consequences when you let Him down. He is merciful; because He could have burned up everybody, and He didn’t. He only burned up those who were directly responsible. But the point is, don’t expect good things only.

That’s a statement that Job made. When bad things happened to him, his wife said, "Curse Yehovah already and die." And he said, "Yehovah gives, and Yehovah takes away." We can’t expect the good and not the bad from Yehovah. That’s just part of the way the system is set up. If you’re close to Him, then there are consequences when you fall short.

Jono: And does it not instill in us a real sense of the fear of Yehovah? I mean, He disciplines us, right?

Keith: Yes.

Nehemia: Amen.

Jono: He disciplines us with…

Nehemia: There’s definitely awe here, absolutely.

Jono: Okay. So, I was going to say, Keith, I have sons; you have sons. This next verse, “Moses said to Aaron, 'This is what Yehovah spoke, saying, By those who come near Me, I must be regarded as holy; And before all the people I must be glorified.’ So, Aaron held his peace.” Two of his sons have died. “Then Moses called Mishael and Elzaphan, the sons of Uzziel, the uncle of Aaron, and said to them, 'Come here and carry your brethren out from before the sanctuary, out of the camp.' So, they went near and carried them by their tunics out of the camp, as Moses had said. And Moses said to Aaron, and to Eleazar and Ithamar, his sons," so he’s got two more sons, “‘Do not uncover your heads nor tear your clothes, lest you die, and wrath come upon all the people. But let your brethren, the whole house of Israel, bewail the burning which Yehovah has kindled. You shall not go out of the door of the Tabernacle of Meeting, lest you die, for the anointing oil of Yehovah is upon you.' And they did according to the words of Moses.”

You just can’t help but put yourself in his situation and think about Aaron and what is going through his mind, and yet he has to complete that which he has started.

Keith: Oh, man, and I think that that’s why this section is so hard. For me, definitely it is hard, and I’m sure for you, and anyone I think it would be, but just this idea that you’ve been brought into service, you’ve brought your children into service, they’ve been brought into service, and then immediately at the beginning of this process…I mean, how long after the eighth day does this happen? And does Aaron not wonder, "What have I gotten myself into? And yet he does this thing that I don’t know that it’s easy to do, and that was that he stayed silent. He didn’t say anything. And that would be hard. I don’t know if in his heart he was saying anything. I’m sure he was, but at least here it says he doesn’t say anything.

Jono: No, he held his peace is what I’ve got.

Nehemia: Can we jump quickly to the end of the chapter, and then go back to 8? There’s this whole incident where Aaron is supposed to eat this sacrifice, this sin offering, and he can’t do it because he’s so sad about the death of his two sons. And Moses comes, and he challenges him, and says, "Why didn’t you do this? And that that’s what we were commanded; we were commanded this earlier in Leviticus chapter 6." I don’t think he said, “chapter six,” but he’s referring to something that was commanded in Leviticus 6:19, 22-23…

Jono: Sure.

Nehemia: …about the internal versus the external sin offering. If it’s brought internally you don’t eat the meat; if it’s poured out on the base of the altar, then you do eat it. And he’s like, "Well, why didn’t you eat this?" He says in verse 18, “Behold, its blood was not brought inwards to the holy, surely you should eat it in the holy place as I’ve commanded.” In verse 19, “And Moses says to Aaron, 'Behold, today…” etc., etc., he says, at the end of the verse, “’These things have happened to me. If I eat the sin offering today, will it be good in the eyes of Yehovah?' And Moses heard, and it was good in His eyes.”

And I think there’s a profound principle there, which is really the balance of what happened at the beginning of the chapter. At the beginning of the chapter there was this concept that, if you go beyond the letter of the law, if you bring a sacrifice God didn’t command, that’s essentially a sin. It was very specific in Exodus that if you bring strange fire you will be cut off. There was a specific commandment about that. It’s brought once in the morning and once between the two evenings and the early evening, and any other thing beyond that, you will be cut off. It was very specific in Exodus. They went, and they brought the strange fire contrary to that, and the fire came and burned them up. So, it’s like there’s this letter of the law, and if I don’t stick exactly to the letter of the law, I’m going to get burned up.

Here at the end of the chapter, we’re seeing that, you know what? There is the letter of the law, but there’s also the spirit of the law. And what Aaron, I believe, is expressing here is that spirit of the law. He's saying, “Look, okay, you were right, Moses; I’m supposed to eat this according to the letter of the law. But I’m in mourning, I’m sad, my two sons just died. How can I go and eat this sacrifice, which is supposed to be a joyous thing, to eat that in Yehovah’s presence?” Even though that’s the letter of the law, he’s saying essentially that would be a sacrilege, and Moses accepts what he’s saying.

I think what we’re seeing here is that, although we must follow the commandments of Yehovah, there is this mercy that tempers those commandments; that requires us to use our common sense and say, "Okay, well, how does this apply in this specific situation, which isn’t the typical situation that was commanded? What do I do in this situation? How do I apply it? What’s the spirit, what’s the principle behind the commandment, and how does it apply here? And that’s what Aaron did, and I think that’s amazing and I think that’s beautiful. This is one of my favorite chapters in the Bible.

Jono: Truly. Keith?

Nehemia: Can I get an Amen?

Jono: Amen. No, because that’s what I’ve got in verse 20, “So when Moses heard that, he was content.” Okay.

Nehemia: Come on.

Keith: Right.

Jono: There it is. Okay.

Keith: Right.

Jono: Here we are in…

Nehemia: Here it says, "And it was good in his eyes," it says.

Jono: Good in his eyes is what you’ve got? “Food permitted and food forbidden,” chapter 11, are you ready?

Keith: Yes.

Nehemia: Sure.

Jono: Here we go. “Now Yehovah spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying to them, Speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘These are the animals,’” okay, these are the ones, “’which you may eat among all the animals that are on the earth: Among all the animals, whatever divides the hoof, having cloven hooves and chewing the cud—that you may eat. Nevertheless these you may not,' and now, that’s pretty simple, right, one simple rule, “’But these you may not eat among those that chew the cud or those that have cloven hooves: the camel, because it chews the cud but does not have cloven hooves, is unclean for you; the rock hyrax,’” whatever that is, “’because it chews the cud but does not have cloven hooves, is unclean to you; the hare, because it chews the cud but does not have cloven hooves, is unclean to you; and the swine, though it does divide the hoof, having cloven hooves, yet does not chew the cud, it is unclean to you. Their flesh you shall not eat, and their carcasses you shall not touch. They are unclean to you.’” A rock hyrax, what is it?

Nehemia: Well, it’s interesting. I think most translations don’t have “rock hyrax” in verse 5, do they?

Jono: Keith, what have you got there?

Nehemia: What have you got?

Keith: Let’s see here.

Jono: In the Newly Inspired.

Nehemia: That’s Leviticus 19:5.

Keith: Yeah, the cony.

Jono: Leviticus 11:5. The cony?

Keith: Yeah, the cony. That’s the hyrax.

Jono: What’s a cony?

Nehemia: What is a cony? Like Coney Island. There must have been conies in Coney Island. So anyway.

Jono: I don’t think I agree with a cony.

Nehemia: I don’t know what a cony is. But anyway, the hyrax is actually an animal that lives in Israel and throughout this region, and it’s this little guy, kind of like a rock badger essentially. The interesting thing is that the way they chew their cud is really fundamentally different than all the other ruminants, and just for those who don’t know, the word “ruminant” refers to animals that chew their cud.

So, for example, cows and goats and sheep, what they have are multiple stomachs. They’ll eat their hay or grass or whatever, and it gets digested partially in one of their stomachs, and then they essentially throw it up and it comes back up in their mouth and you see them chewing, and what they’re doing is they’re chewing the cud, and the cud is that food that comes up. Then they swallow it again to a second stomach and some of them have multiple stomachs.

Jono: Yeah.

Nehemia: Or, they all have multiple stomachs, the ruminants, and what the Torah is saying is that you may eat ruminants that have split hooves. Then, we have a list of animals that have either a split hoof, and that aren’t ruminants, or ruminants that don’t have split hooves. So, one of them is the “shafan.” Shafan is the animal they translate as hyrax. The interesting thing about it, though, is it doesn’t have more than one stomach. It doesn’t technically chew its cud, but what it apparently does do, and this is still being researched by scientists, but apparently what it does is…there’s no other way to say it than to just say it…it eats its undigested feces, which it then…

Jono: Ey.

Nehemia: So, it has two types of poop. One type of poop is the stuff it’s done with, but then it has another type of poop that it eats because it’s only partially digested, and then it goes through another phase of digestion.

Jono: Alright.

Nehemia: So, in that respect, it’s analogous to the process of the ruminants, in that it requires chewing the same poo up multiple times, even after partial digestion. So that’s the hyrax. And there’s an interesting little story about the shafan, which is that…

Keith: So, a question…

Jono: Keith?

Keith: …just before we go any further.

Nehemia: Yeah?

Keith: So, we know now about the poop. We’re not eating these animals. So, what I’m trying to figure out is okay, look, we’re not going to eat these animals, okay? So, what I want to find out is, are you going to explain to us why…

Nehemia: Well, first we need to know what the animal is, right?

Keith: Oh, okay.

Jono: Because, I mean, hey, Keith, camel is a delicacy among some.

Keith: Yeah, I agree.

Nehemia: Not to mention camel’s milk has become increasingly popular around the world, and since it comes from an unclean animal, or a forbidden animal to eat, you can’t, therefore, drink the milk either.

Keith: Yes, I agree.

Nehemia: Well, so there’s a little interesting story about shafan, which is an animal that’s from this region of the world, from Israel. One of the groups of people that came from here were the Canaanites, who were known to the Greeks as the Phoenicians. They were called Phoenicians because one of the major products of the coastal Canaanites was purple dye, and Phoenicia simply means the land of purple.

Well, the Phoenicians, the Canaanites, colonized the entire Mediterranean region, and one of the areas that they were the first people to settle in, certainly the settling with cities, was Spain. And the name Spain, apparently, as some scholars say, comes from Hispaniola. The name comes from the word Shafan that the Canaanites, who spoke a dialect of Hebrew, a language very similar to Hebrew, arrived in the coast of Iberia, and they saw these things that reminded them of the hyrax. And they called it ‘eretz hashafan,’ the land of Hispan, of the hyrax. So, Hispaniola may actually refer to this animal, the hyrax.

What’s interesting about these animals…there are two signs that are given, two witnesses. There’s the split hoof and there’s chewing the cud. Then we have this category of animals that have one and not the other, and what’s interesting about them is that they have a level of uncleanness that other animals don’t have. That specifically is referred to in verse 8, where it says something about them that it doesn’t really say about any other animal. In verse 8, literally, it says, “From their flesh you will not eat and their corpses you will not touch.”

Now, it doesn’t say about not touching the corpses of any other animal. On the other animals, it says, if you touch their corpses you become unclean. But there’s no commandment not to touch the corpses. Here there’s specifically a commandment not to touch the corpse of a pig and not to touch the corpse of a camel and of a hyrax and of a rabbit. So that’s actually a level of uncleanness that we don’t see with the other animals.

With the other animals…let’s look at verse 11. It talks about, let’s see, here it’s talking about the swarming things of the sea that live in the water, and it says, “They are an abomination to you, you shall not eat their flesh and you shall abhor their corpses.” Certainly, most Jewish commentators explain that ‘to abhor their corpses’ means not to eat their corpses, and I mean, there’s no commandment to not touch the corpse of a dead lobster. Whereas there is a commandment not to touch the corpse of a dead pig and a dead camel. And then another verse that has a similar kind of thing, or a similar situation…

Jono: Okay, no, I’m just going to say it. Certain things pop to my head, like a pig bristle brush; that’s not unusual. Are the bristles of a pig considered out of the question?

Nehemia: Well, that’s a good question, because if you take…well, I guess to make it, you’ve got to touch it. But once it’s been made into something else and is not considered part of the carcass, then that’s the type of thing I’d say to people, work it out for yourselves in prayer and study with fear and trembling.

But just to go back to the things that we’re not allowed to touch versus the things that, if we touch them, we become ritually unclean. And remember, there’s no commandment to become ritually unclean. Verse 27 says, “And all that walk upon their paws, all the animals who go upon four, they shall be unclean for you,” meaning you’re not allowed to eat them. “Anyone who touches their corpse will become unclean until evening.” So, if you find a dead bear or a dead dog or a dead cat, and you touch the corpse; we’re not forbidden to touch that corpse. We’re forbidden to eat it. And, if we do touch it, we become unclean until evening. Whereas the pig, we’re actually commanded not to touch, which is unique in this chapter. There’s nothing else that says in this chapter…

Jono: It is. That’s right.

Nehemia: …that you’re forbidden to touch it. Again, if we look in verses 29-31, we have a list of a bunch of different types of land animals, which include the tortoise and the rat, etc., and lizards. In verses 29-31, it says, “These are unclean for you among all the crawling things and the swarming things, anyone who touches them, when they die, shall be unclean until evening.” So, you’re not forbidden from touching a dead rat. You’re forbidden to eat it, but you’re not forbidden from touching it, whereas you are forbidden to touch a dead pig. So, isn’t that amazing that a rat is less unclean than a pig?

Jono: Sure. But, is verse 8 specific to the pig? Because in my…

Nehemia: Well, no, it’s those four animals.

Jono: All those animals, yeah.

Nehemia: All four.

Jono: So, the hyrax and the hare and the pig and the camel.

Nehemia: Exactly. Right.

Jono: Got it.

Keith: And I think, Jono, your question is an important one, because one of the things that happens, and we can talk more about this issue of what’s an abomination, but when we talk about the unclean animal, mostly the discussion is about the pig, not about the other three things.

Jono: So, it’s those other three as well; it’s the camel, the hyrax, and the hare, as well as the pig, to touch the carcass of.

Keith: Nobody goes to a restaurant…

Nehemia: Well, there are people who eat rabbits. But what’s interesting though, going back to verses 29-31, we have a list of these animals and each translation is going to translate them slightly different. So maybe you could read verse 29 for us?

Jono: Hang on a second, how did we get there?

Nehemia: 29-30.

Jono: What?

Nehemia: I jumped ahead to 29-30 because I’m talking about the different things…

Keith: He’s not going to let you do your normal reading, Jono. Are you kidding me?

Jono: You’re messing with myokay, 29.

Keith: He’s messing with your reading.

Nehemia: 29 and 30.

Jono: Here it goes, “These also shall be unclean to you among the creeping things that creep on the earth: the mole, the mouse, the large lizard after its kind; the gecko, the monitor lizard, the sand reptile, the sand lizard, and the chameleon.”

Nehemia: Now, that’s really interesting, because if you touch the bodies of these animals, you become unclean. It’s not forbidden, but if you want to go to the Temple afterward, you have to go through this process of washing in the water and becoming ritually clean. What’s interesting is what’s not listed; what’s not mentioned in this list. And that’s things that we see every day, things like ants. According to this, if you read the whole chapter, what you find out is that touching a dead ant doesn’t make you ritually unclean, it’s only these specific animals.

Jono: Ah, that’s interesting.

Nehemia: You’re not allowed to eat them, because an ant doesn’t chew its cud and doesn’t have a split hoof, but touching their corpse doesn’t make you ritually unclean, and that’s an important thing. If we look at the flying animals, we also find out that if you, for example, touch a dead mosquito, it doesn’t make you ritually unclean. You’re not allowed to eat it, and the reason you’re not allowed to eat it is that we have a list of 20 birds in Leviticus 11 here, it says in verse 13, “These you shall abhor from the birds, you shall not eat them, they are abhorrent to you.” And then it lists 20 different species of birds, and those species of birds were forbidden to eat.

Jono: Yeah.

Nehemia: For example, the eagle, the vulture, etc., and the owl, and then it also includes at the end of verse 19, the bat.

Jono: The bat.

Nehemia: Which we don’t think of as a bird, but in the Torah it’s an animal that flies and, therefore, it’s in the category of “oph,” which maybe we shouldn’t translate as birds, maybe we should translate as “flying thing.” And then in that category is also any kind of swarming, flying thing. So, we’re not allowed to eat mosquitoes, and we’re not allowed to eat dragonflies, but touching their corpses is not listed as something that makes you ritually unclean. And then we’ve got to talk about…I’m going to stop here, and we’ll come back to these things. I know you’ve got the reading you want to do.

Jono: I have got something.

Nehemia: Jono Vandor’s dramatized reading of the Old Testament!

Jono: I do want to get back to verse 21; we’ll be there in just a second.

Nehemia: (Mock British Accent, high pitched) It splits its hoof, but it does not raise its... Yeah.

Jono: “‘These you may eat of all that are in the water: whatever in the water has fins and scales, whether in the seas or in the rivers, that you may eat. But all in the seas or in the rivers that do not have fins and scales, all that move in the water or any living thing which is in the water, they are an abomination,” Now the word “abomination” is used quite a lot here. Moving along, it says, “they'll be an abomination to you. They shall be an abomination to you,” it repeats it, “you shall not eat their flesh, you shall regard their carcass as an abomination. Whatever in the water does not have fins and scales, that shall be an abomination to you. And these you shall regard as an abomination among the birds.” Now, again, it says they’re an abomination, and it repeats it, “The eagle, the vulture, the buzzard, the kite, and the falcon after its kind; every raven after its kind, the ostrich, the short-eared owl, the seagull, and the hawk after its kind; the little owl, the fisher owl, and the screech owl; the white owl, the jackdaw, and the carrier pigeon; the stork and the heron after its kind, the hoopoe,” what are those?

Nehemia: Hoopoe.

Jono: Hoopoe.

Nehemia: That’s Israel’s national bird, the hoopoe.

Jono: Cool, there it is. “And the bats,” as you mentioned, Nehemia. Oh, boy, I’ll tell you what, I don’t know about you, Keith, but in the religion I came from, I regret to say I did eat a lot of abomination.

Keith: Yeah, I don’t even know if it was religion, I just think it was my culture. I mean basically in my culture, we were given that which the other people didn’t want, and they became delicacies, so I think it’s interesting when you’re reading this, again the issue becomes…

You know, there’s a part of me that wants to say, so what’s the scientific purpose and reason behind this particular animal? Why this one? And then we’ve talked a little bit about that, but in the end, doesn’t it really just come down to, these are the animals that are clean, these are the animals that are unclean; these are the ones you can touch, these are the ones you can’t; these are the ones you can eat, these are the ones that you can’t?

Jono: Yep.

Keith: It’s kind of like the whole thing with the priests. Why this kind of offering? Well, why this way? Why does it have to be washed this way? And why does it have to be presented at this time? Well, I think that if you’re the Creator of the universe and you created everything, I mean I’m talking about everything, and you’ve internally planned for your people what it means for them to walk according to your purposes, here’s what I’m telling you, and this is the instruction. It kind of reminds me of how sometimes they’ll say, "Now, listen when you’ve got this certain camera that you’re using, don’t put it in this situation, or don’t leave it in the sun, put it at room temperature," and people say, “Ah, forget the instructions, I’ll do what I want,” then they wonder why it breaks.

Nehemia: Did you mess up your camera, Keith?

Keith: No, I’m good. But I just read the instructions, you know? If you read the instructions, which is really what we’re doing through Torah Pearls is we’re reading people…we’re giving people the instruction manual, trying to help them understand it in language, history, context, all these kinds of things, so that they can understand how it is that they can be in a relationship with the one whom they call their God, the Creator of the universe. And it’s pretty powerful. Don’t eat this kind of fish, don’t eat this kind of thing, eat this, but don’t eat that. Wouldn’t it be just nice if we got to the point where we said, “Okay”?

Jono: Yes. Wouldn’t it just? And speaking of getting to the point, where you just say okay, here we are again, back in verse 21, “Yet these you can eat.”

Nehemia: Before we go, we’ve got to talk, in verse 16, where it says the ostrich. So, a lot of experts of ancient Hebrew say that actually the translation here, “ostrich”, is incorrect, and the reason they say that is that there’s a verse in the book of Micah, where it says, “Therefore I will wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked: I will make a wailing like the jackals and a mourning like the ostriches.” Well, ostriches, it turns out, actually, roar kind of like a lion. They have a roar.

Jono: Wow.

Nehemia: So, they explain that the context…we’re actually dealing here with a type of owl, and if you think about he’s saying “he’s going to wail like an owl,” meaning he’s going to cry, you know, think about how owls make a hoot, “hoo, hoo, hoo,” that sounds like a person crying. So that actually fits a lot better in the context of Micah. And so “bat ya’ana,” which is usually translated as ostrich, probably refers to a type of owl. Which would actually mean that ostriches are kosher.

Jono: Potentially, a giant chicken.

Nehemia: Yeah, there it is. And so, for example, in the NIV, which I know is Keith’s favorite translation, it translates “bat ya’ana,” as “the horned owl.” The King James Version has “the owl,” The New King James has “the ostrich.”

Jono: Interesting.

Nehemia But, apparently this refers actually to an owl.

Keith: Yeah, the translation committee, the Methodist translation committee got that one right.

Jono: Nice.

Nehemia: They got that one, they finally got one right. Hallelujah.

Keith: Yeah.

Jono: There it is. “All flying insects that creep on all fours,” now, hang on. “Flying insects that creep on all fours shall be an abomination to you.”

Keith: Come on.

Jono: Why, because someone pulled off the other two legs? What’s going on?

Nehemia: Well, I think it means four or more.

Jono: Okay.

Nehemia: The other two are hands, they’re not legs.

Jono: Okay. Sure enough. “Yet these you may eat of every flying insect that creeps on all fours,” here it is again.

Nehemia: Uh-oh.

Jono: By the way, there are flying creatures that creep on all fours, we have some here in Australia called, what’s it called, the sugar glider. There you go. “Those which have jointed legs above their feet with which to leap on the earth, these you may eat: the locust after its kind, the destroying locust after its kind, the cricket after its kind, and the grasshopper after its kind.” Now, Keith?

Keith: No, I have nothing to say about this. I want Nehemia to explain about the grasshopper and eating it.

Nehemia: Now I’ve got to confess something, which is that I’ve always wanted to eat a grasshopper. The reason is that I feel like, here’s this commandment where God has given us something that we’re allowed to eat, and I’ve never eaten one. And it’s not like a giraffe, like, you know, go get giraffe meat, right? Which is kosher, by the way; a giraffe chews its cud and has a split hoof. But where are you going to get giraffe meat? Whereas locusts are everywhere, right? And grasshoppers and crickets are everywhere. So, I always wanted to eat a grasshopper, and about a week ago I actually did. I did it. I ate the grasshopper, and it was disgusting.

Jono: Now, listen, can I play…

Nehemia: It was horrible.

Jono: …can I play the audio? Can I put the audio right here?

Nehemia: Please, play the audio.

Jono: Here it is, listen up, this is Nehemia Gordon, eating a grasshopper.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) Well, I’m here in the Galilee, and I’m preparing to eat a grasshopper. Actually, we’re commanded in the book of Leviticus that there are certain foods that we’re allowed to eat and certain foods we’re not. And let me read the passage here, Leviticus chapter 11, it starts in verse 22, it says, “Even these of them you may eat, the locust after its kind, and the bald locust after its kind, and the cricket after its kind, and the grasshopper after its kind.” And in verse 21, it explains, “These may you eat all the winged swarming things that go upon all fours, which have jointed legs above their feet.” Jointed legs above their feet, that’s a grasshopper.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Knees.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) “Wherewith to leap upon the earth.” So, we’ve actually pulled off the legs, that they use to leap upon the earth. Boiled it for 10 minutes to kill all the parasites, and then we fried it up, or I guess we sautéed it with some butter, onions, and garlic. And now, I’m going to have the blessing of this opportunity to fulfill the commandment in the Torah.

Female voice: (Audio recording) “Baruch atah adonai eloheinu,”

Nehemia: (Audio recording) Yeah, about that. Here it goes. This is a blessing.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Eat it! Eat it!

Nehemia: (Audio recording) Look, there’s people doing everyday things that the Torah deemed to be an abomination, and this is actually a blessing that God has given us.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Amen.

Male voice: (Audio recording) Amen.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) And if I throw up, this video will never go on YouTube.

(Children laughing while he eats grasshopper.)

Female voice: (Audio recording) Wow.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) Can I get some water, please?

Male voice: (Audio recording) Oh, it’s behind you.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) He needs a cup.

Female voice: (Audio recording) How does it taste? Like garlic, right?

Nehemia: (Audio recording) Disgusting.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Like garlic, right?

Nehemia: (Audio recording) Well, it’s kind of gooey on the inside and the exoskeleton, which is the outside, I’m just chewing and chewing, and nothing is happening. So, it’s kind of like the shell of an artichoke that you just can’t eat it. Pretty nasty. Well, we’re not done though, because I’m going to do the legs, too.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Oh, you’re breaking him.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) (Coughing.) Now, here are the legs.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Oh, it’s very, very crunchy.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) It’s actually pretty tasty.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Pretzels.

Female voice: (Audio recording) It’s like French fries.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) Actually, pretty good, yeah.

Female voice: (Audio recording) It sounded like…I bet it tastes like chicken.

Nehemia: (Audio recording) It does not taste like chicken.

Female voice: (Audio recording) Pretzels?

Jono: Ugh.

Nehemia: There it is.

Jono: That was so gross, it was so disgusting, and I can’t believe you ate it.

Nehemia: Me neither.

Keith: Sure is.

Nehemia: But I had to do it. And I guess the moral of the story is that not everything that’s permissible to be done is a requirement to.

Keith: Yeah, but at the same time, if you’re hungry and you’re trying to keep, you know…I bet that wouldn’t taste so bad if you’re starving.

Jono: Yeah, well, that’s true.

Nehemia: There it is.

Jono: There you go.

Keith: Yeah.

Nehemia: Look, it didn’t taste so bad, to be honest with you. It was the texture that was kind of weird. But look, I don’t like liver, and I don’t eat cow brains.

Keith: Okay.

Nehemia: And I guarantee you that the grasshopper was…

Jono: The brains.

Nehemia: …much better in texture…

Keith: Okay.

Jono: Oh, my goodness, okay. Now, listen, you seemed to kind of enjoy the legs, were they all right?

Nehemia: The legs were kind of crunchy, kind of like popcorn. But hey, can I go back to the forbidden birds starting in verse 13?

Jono: Yes.

Nehemia: And so, we’ve got 20 birds, and the interesting thing is, in Deuteronomy it’s 21 birds. But leaving that aside for a minute…

Jono: Oy.

Nehemia: …the issue is that we don’t actually know what all these birds are. When we talked about the ostrich, which is really an owl, well, what if there’s another bird and we don’t know what that bird is? And so, some people have said, "Well, what we really need to do, since we don’t know what all the birds are," and there’s no signs, like for land animals and sea animals. We’ve got the two signs; we’ve got the split hoof and the chewing the cud, and for the sea animals we’ve got the fins and scales. We don’t have a physical sign for the birds, we just have the list. And if we don’t know every bird on that list, we’re kind of in a difficult situation. And so, some people have said, "Well, don’t eat any bird except for the birds that we know for sure are biblically permissible." And there are, actually, three species that we know are biblically permissible because they’re mentioned specifically as something that Israelites ate. One is the pigeon and the dove, those were brought as sacrifices, so they’re definitely permissible to eat. The third bird that we know is permissible is the quail, and we know that because God gave the Israelites quail to eat in the desert. And now, one of the important points here is that...

Jono: Hang on.

Nehemia: Yeah?

Jono: The pigeon, the quail, and the?

Nehemia: The dove.

Jono: But didn’t…hang on. I’ve seen Fiddler on the Roof and I’m sure Reb Tevye said that somewhere in the good book it says something about a chicken!

Nehemia: Well, that’s an interesting point, the whole chicken issue. So, I’m getting to that. In verse 15, we see it talks about…and throughout that section, it talks about not just eating that bird, like in verse 15, it says “and all the ravens after its kind,” which means anything related to the raven, which is a cousin of the raven, is forbidden.

Jono: Ah, okay.

Nehemia: And the point is that anything related, therefore, to the dove, the pigeon or the chicken would be permissible because it’s part of the same family of bird. And the chicken, it turns out, is actually a cousin of the quail. So, based on that we’d be allowed to eat chicken. Then some people say the chicken is actually mentioned, there’s an obscure verse in the book of Job.

Jono: So, Reb Tevye may not be making it up, this one, it’s possible.

Nehemia: No, hold up. Okay, so the verse is in Job 38:36. Let me read you the King James Version, first.

Jono: Okay.

Nehemia: It says, “Who has put wisdom in the inward parts and who has given understanding to the heart?” Now, the word for “heart” that appears throughout the Bible is the word “Lev,” and here the word is a completely different word that they’re translating as heart, the word is “sechvi.” And some of the ancient sources tell us that “sechvi,” is actually the biblical word for chicken. And I say the biblical word, because the word that most Jews use today for chicken, “tarnegol,” is a word that comes from Aramaic, and so the biblical Hebrew word for chicken it turns out is probably “sechvi.” Since we know that the “sechvi…” let’s put it this way, if the word “sechvi” is the word for chicken, we know the word “sechvi” is not in that list.

Now, what does that mean in the context of Job? Think about that. So, it’s saying, “Who has put wisdom in the inward parts,” and that word that they translated as “inward parts,” doesn’t mean that either; leave that for now. “Who has given understanding to the chicken?” So, what does that mean? And I say chicken because I’m a city slicker. It actually means that species, which includes both the male and the female of the sechvi, and I forget what the word is for the male, I guess the male is the rooster. So, who has given wisdom to the rooster? How does the rooster have wisdom?

Jono: I don’t know.

Nehemia: You live on a farm, you tell us.

Jono: Okay, so he knows when the sun’s coming up, or just before.

Nehemia: There it is, he knows when the sun is coming up. Isn’t that amazing? So, Job is talking here about all the wonderful things in nature, and one of the things he’s talking about is that the rooster…you could put him in a dark room and he still knows the different times of day.

Jono: You know what?

Nehemia: God has given him wisdom. That’s amazing. Can I get an Amen? Woo!

Jono: That’s one of the things that I love when I’m lying in bed and I’m half asleep, and then I hear…

Keith: Cock a doodle doo!

Jono: I hear it! I hear our rooster. We’ve got a rooster, and he starts doing his thing, and I just like counting how many times he crows, because it’s always different. I don’t know why I like that, but I do.

Nehemia: And here’s an interesting little side point, which is, what noise in America, Keith, does a rooster make?

Keith: That’s a good question.

Jono: What? Is it different? What are you talking about?

Nehemia: No, he says, “cock a doodle,” right?

Jono: I mean, I know the water goes down the toilet in a different direction here, but what do you mean?

Nehemia: So, in Australia do the roosters say, “cock a doodle doo”?

Jono: Pretty much.

Nehemia: Okay. So, in Hebrew, if you read children’s books, they never say “cock a doodle doo.” The Hebrew rooster says “coo-coo-ri-coo,” “coo-coo-ri-coo.”

Jono: What?

Nehemia: It’s not “cock a doodle doo,” it’s “coo-coo-ri-coo.”

Jono: That’s kind of the same thing, isn’t it? I mean really, if you really had to do an impersonation…

Nehemia: It’s a different language.

Jono: (impersonating a rooster) Or something like that.

Nehemia: That’s actually really good. That’s a really good impersonation.

Jono: Where are we up to?

Keith: Just about the end of chapter 11.

Jono: So, because of the quail…now, the quail is related to the chicken, right? I mean, I don’t really know.

Nehemia: Well, that raises the question of what about things like ducks and geese, and what’s the other thing that we eat in the Western world?

Jono: Turkey.

Nehemia: We’ve got the goose. Well, the turkey is a cousin of the chicken, that’s not a problem. But we’ve got the goose, and we’ve got the duck, and we’ve got the...

Jono: The swan?

Nehemia: The swan, there it is. The swan. Those are the things that the Europeans ate, essentially. So, what about those animals? And some Karaite Jews say, "Well, no, we can’t eat those animals, those are all related to each other, and they’re not mentioned as being a clean animal or related to a clean animal." However, if we look at 1 Kings, chapter 4, verse 23, we see the list of animals that were eaten in the House of Solomon, and one of them is…it’s translated in your English translations, and, for example, in the King James…King James translates it as “fatted fowl,” but it doesn’t say what fowl. The JPS, Jewish Publication Society, has it as “fatted geese”, because “barburim,” is the Hebrew word for geese. And so, according to that, again, the word “barburim,” isn’t on the list of the forbidden birds. So apparently, if you ask me, geese, ducks, and swans are kosher, are biblically permissible.

Jono: Fair enough.

Nehemia: And it’s certainly something that Jews have eaten over the last thousand years or so, and possibly longer.

Jono: There it is. Where am I picking it up? Shall we go to verse 41?

Nehemia: Let’s see.

Jono: “And every…”

Nehemia: Look, I’ve got to say something about Verse 27.

Jono: Okay.

Nehemia: “All those that go upon paws, all the animals who walk upon fours, they are unclean for you, anyone who touches their corpse shall be unclean until evening.” So, some people have said, well, you can’t have a dog, because the dog is unclean. But actually, the dog is only unclean when it’s dead, and even then, you’re allowed to touch its dead corpse. You’re just not allowed to eat it.

Jono: You’re just not allowed to eat him. Yeah, sure.

Nehemia: You’re just not allowed to eat it, and then you become unclean until evening. So, a living dog is not unclean; it’s perfectly clean. It’s only unclean when you want to eat it. A dead dog.

Jono: Eww.

Nehemia: Look, to each their own, but I follow the Torah.

Jono: Thank you.

Nehemia: I also want to talk about verse 43; got to talk about that real quick. Here it’s talking about things that crawl upon the earth. And it says, it literally says in Hebrew, “Don’t abhor or make abhorrent your souls with anything that crawls upon the earth, or anything that swarms upon the earth,” literally. “You shall not be made unclean by them…”

Jono: “Lest you be defiled by them.”

Nehemia: “…lest you be defiled by them,” right. And so, some people have read this and say, "Okay, well, we can’t, therefore, touch the corpse of a dead snake." But actually, it doesn’t say that, and the way that most people have interpreted this historically is to mean that you’re making yourself abhorrent and making yourself unclean by eating them. It’s the eating them that’s forbidden.

Jono: Now, I’m really glad you brought that up, because here, as you know, Nehemia, we have brown snakes.

Nehemia: I didn’t actually know that, but okay.

Jono: What are you talking about? I was in the middle of a conversation with you when I found one in the hallway.

Nehemia: Oh, that’s right. Yeah, I didn’t remember.

Jono: And so, one of the most-deadly, I think the second deadliest snake on the earth, the brown snake, we’ve got some interesting snakes here, Keith. And every now and then you’ll come across a snakeskin, and so what you’re telling me is that it’s okay for the boys to keep a snakeskin in their top drawer?

Nehemia: Um, I don’t know why they would want to, but it’s definitely not forbidden by the Torah.

Keith: Right.

Nehemia: Just don’t eat it. They’re just not allowed to eat it.

Jono: They’re not going to eat it, I can assure you of that. Okay.

Nehemia: Okay.

Jono: Here it is. “For I am Yehovah, your Elohim. You shall, therefore, consecrate yourselves, and you shall be holy; for I am holy. Neither shall you defile yourself with any creeping thing that creeps upon the earth. For I am Yehovah who brings you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God. You shall, therefore, be holy, for I am holy.” Keith, where have we heard that before?

Keith: Well, whenever I get this verse, and whenever this verse comes up, I always have myself a little personal revival, because I always think about the fact that He says, "Now, look, I’ve told you to do this, I’ve told you to do this, I’ve told you to do this…" “Ah, maybe we don’t want to do it, maybe it’s inconvenient.” “Hey, listen, am I not the one that brought you out of Egypt? Am I not the one that rescued you with a strong arm?” In other words, He’s like saying, “I told you to do this, I’ve told you to do this, I’ve told you to do this, and, in the end, I’m the one that brought you out of bondage…”

Jono: Amen.

Keith: “…so do this.”

Jono: “And therefore, you shall be holy, for I am holy.” That’s quoted in the New Testament, Keith, in 1st Peter, chapter 1, verse 15. Peter apparently reminds us of that. I find that interesting, because I’m just going to have a whinge here for a second.

Nehemia: Can we repeat that? Because, being the Jew here, I’m not as familiar as all of you.

Jono: Alright. We don’t usually go to the New Testament, but I’m going to go to 1st Peter, chapter 1, verse 15, “But as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, 'Be holy, for I am holy.'” And there’s a little asterisk there, Keith, and if I go to the asterisk, it tells me, it says, look at Leviticus 11:44-45.

Keith: There it is.

Jono: That’s where we are. This is what Peter is quoting, he’s quoting this, and this is the end of the chapter after we’ve just spoken about everything that you can and you can’t eat, and I’m just letting people know in case they’re struggling with this, going, "Is this applicable today? Because, you know, in Acts chapter 10, you know, aren’t we told that Peter received some kind of a vision where God told him he can eat all sorts of manner of things, he can have all of those?" All I’m saying, if that is the case, Peter quoted this that says, “You shall, therefore, be holy, for I am holy.”

Keith: Amen. In the context of the clean and the unclean.

Jono: In the context, yeah, absolutely.

Nehemia: Well, as you guys know…look, I’m the Karaite Jew, and although this isn’t my scripture, I’ve got to ask you what the context here is. It’s quoting “Be holy because I am holy,” and I’m going to read from Keith’s Bible, the Nearly Inspired Version. 1 Peter, chapter 1, verse 14, “As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires…” Say "evil desires".

Jono: Evil desires.

Keith: Yes. Evil desires

Nehemia: “…you had when you lived in ignorance.” So, there were certain things, Peter is saying, at least…again, this isn’t my Scripture. But if you’re going to bring a text, let’s understand it in context. He’s saying that there are people of evil desires that they didn’t even realize were evil when they lived in ignorance. But just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do, for it is written, "Be holy because I am holy."

Jono: Amen.

Nehemia: So, what would that mean? Since the context of the original quote is Leviticus 11, what could those evil desires be that they didn’t know about when they lived in ignorance? What could He possibly mean?

Jono: Hey, listen, I would have to say, because I was in that situation, I ate all manner of, oh my goodness knows what, and when I was in ignorance. Now, I know better, I don’t eat those things anymore.

Keith: Amen.

Jono: Why? Because I want to be as holy as He is holy.

Keith: Amen.

Nehemia: So, you think He actually may be talking about Leviticus 11?

Jono: He’s quoting directly from Leviticus 11, right, Keith?

Keith: Oh, absolutely.

Jono: There it is.

Keith: Absolutely. So, there it is, that’s something for people to think about. What does it mean to be holy? And He says here at the end of chapter 11, that’s something we don’t think is applicable, here He says, the application is, “Now remember, I’ve told you to do those things. I’m the one who brought you out of Egypt, be holy for I am holy.”

Jono: Amen.

Keith: So, eating unclean things certainly does not put us in a position of being holy. Amen?

Jono: Amen. Absolutely.

Keith: Amen.

Jono: “This is the law…” verse 46, “This is the law of the animals and the birds and every living creature that moves in the waters, and of every creature that creeps on the earth, to distinguish between the unclean and the clean, and between the animal that you may eat and the animal that may not be eaten.” That is the end of Leviticus, Chapter 11, and that ends our Torah portion. How about that?

Keith: Amen.

Jono: There it is.

Nehemia: There it is.

Jono: Thank you, Nehemia Gordon, and Keith Johnson. And next week we are in Tazria and Metzora, Leviticus 12, verse 1, to 15, verse 33. And until then, dear listener, be blessed and be set apart, be blessed and be holy as He is holy, by the truth of our Father’s Word. Shalom.

You have been listening to The Original Torah Pearls with Nehemia Gordon, Keith Johnson and Jono Vandor. Thank you for supporting Nehemia Gordon’s Makor Hebrew Foundation. Learn more at NehemiasWall.com.

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  • Dianne Givens says:

    I so appreciate these Torah Pearls! Yehovah always opens my eyes and ears to glean something for me, feeding me with that food from His hand that is convenient for me. This week, I especially appreciated the conversation about that which we SAY we are doing for Yehovah’s glory, that is really for our own glory. Whew! What truth!!! Our Father has me in a circumstance in which I am being given the opportunity to let the glory go to HIM instead of myself, whereas in the past, I sought it out for myself (albeit unknowingly until He shined His light on my motives). Thank you to all three of you for these Torah Pearls. Although they were recorded years ago, the truths you expound upon will never grow old, because Truth is progressive – and Father Yehovah can always cause any of us to glean something for our lives specifically; a pearl within a pearl, as it were. Many blessings to you and your families!

  • TruthHunter says:

    I remember “dissecting” grasshoppers when I was young. If you find the ones full of eggs, you might get quite a bit of nutrition.
    An American woman went to Australia while waiting to be picked up, she struck up a conversation with a local. He said “did you come hear to day?” She answers, “NO! I didn’t come here to die, just for a visit!”

  • Nunya Biz says:

    That pic, it’s from Aaron’s Bible…one of the few pics of Incense Altar I cud find that was hollow, like the one in the Arch of Titus…well done, gentleman.

  • Tracey Sales says:

    Ha! So here’s a funny thing!
    Here I am, in Australia, painting my ‘Abba inspired art’ and listening to Torah Pearls (as you do!) but I’m wrestling with the fact that I’m painting a Hoopoe Bird in a Palm Tree, thinking why did I choose this subject and what meaning does it really hold.. when Nehemia says, “it’s the national bird of Israel!!” This I did not know! Amazing! So thank you Nehemia for my new found inspiration! And thanks to all of you for your show, for revealing wonderful things about the Torah and in a way that makes me smile!

  • don murphy says:

    u are braver then I to eat one of those things. it says u may eat them, not that u have to. yuck.

  • don murphy says:

    No proof JC ever existed. deut.4:2

    • Anita Burke says:

      Yehoshua fulfilled all four of the spring moedim TO THE DAY (dont forget about the four days of inspection!) and he will fulfill the spring moedim when he returns … and following the precedent, that would also mean TO THE DAY … I can’t wait for Shmini Atzeret!

      • Aryeh François says:

        Anita, I’m glad that you want to believe in Jesús, but this is not the place for trying to fill in Christian beliefs into the Torah.

        You need to realise that when a Jew says « to fulfill » a mitzvah or commandment, it means « to *do* » a mitzvah or commandment. In that sense, every Jew fulfills all the moëdim every year and every mitzvah or commandment which they perform they fulfill.

        This has nothing to do with the day when mashia’h will or will not come.

        On a *funny* note : Jesús came by the other day and did a wonderful job on my garden. Yéhoshu‘a came by and got my loved one out of jail. Joshua came by and we partied like it was 1999.

  • Joy says:

    You guys skipped right past one of the sections I have a question about. The Scriptures version says in Ch 11: 34 Any of the food which might be eaten, on which water comes, becomes unclean, and any drink which might be drunk from it becomes unclean.35 And on whatever [any] of their carcass falls becomes unclean – an oven or cooking range – it is broken down. They are unclean, and are unclean to you. 36 But a fountain or a well, a collection of water, is clean, but whatever touches their carcass is unclean. 37 And when [any] of their carcasses falls on any planting seed which is to be sown, it is clean. 38 But when any water is put on the seed and any part of any such carcass falls on it, it is unclean to you.

    As Jono says, what do you make of it??? Water makes food unclean?

  • paulettegray says:

    It was interesting that you referred to the fact that there are no physical features that identify the birds that shouldn’t be eaten. I don’t know where I heard that it’s the birds that eat carrion or flesh that cannot be eaten. so there may be an identifier.

    • Anita Burke says:

      that would make sense to me, “dont eat vultures” NO PROBLEM … eat vegetarian birds? but what about birds that eat fish? i think as Nehemiah explained, fish are different from the land animals, so birds that eat fish would be okay, yeah?

  • Kelly-Ann De Villiers says:

    A hyrax is a small mammal also called a dassie in South Africa and there are hundreds of them on Table Mountain. (Sometime called a “rock rabbit”)

  • Steve says:

    During the discussion of chapter 10 where it mentions the death of Aaron’s sons, you fail to mention the version that adds understanding to what might have caused them to act impulsively,10: 8 ADONAI said to Aharon, 9 “Don’t’ drink any wine or other intoxicating liquor, neither you nor yours sons with you, when you enter the tent of meeting, so that you will not die.

  • suzanholland says:

    just wanted to add one comment about 1 Pet 1:15…Peter seems to define what he means by “being holy” (in context); see 2:1, 11-12. 15-22; 4:1-3 (and Ch.3 in the context of marriage), and no where when reading this epistle do you get the sense that he is talking about food… Just wanting to be honest with the text. shalom

    • Keywester 1 says:

      Peter says to be holy in all your “conversation” – meaning your total lifestyle. Lust was mentioned… lusting for foods is a “thing: – not just lust in context of non-marital sex. I believe that Peter followed Torah all his days, to the best of his ability (i.e., not without sin.) As Yeshua directed, he dispensed with rabbinical additions to Torah, but I believe he never ate unkosher food.

    • Bella says:

      Yeshua explained what defiles in Mark 7 v 14-23.
      You are not contaminate by food but by what comes from the heart – words and deeds – as further defined in v 1-13.
      Ps 34 v 12-16 is also referred to in 1 Peter 3.
      Thank you for amazing insights and stimulating thoughtful study and application.

      • ScottinTexas says:

        In Leviticus 11, God defines what is and is not food. Keeping His commandments are always a blessing. Thus, eating things NOT food will be bad for us and even create problems for mankind. We see this in some viruses.

        Translators have ADDED words via a parenthetic in Mark 7:19 that are NOT in the inspired original text. This is translator opinion, and error, not part of Scripture. It also violates Deuteronomy 4:2 and 12:32.

        Yeshua is only talking about FOOD here not unclean things that we are commanded not to eat.

        To further make the point, in Acts 10, God uses unclean animals (not food) metaphorically. Peter focuses on the metaphors literally, anddoesn’t get it, but by verse 28, Peter has clarity of the real meaning of the vision, it is about associating with unclean people, not a new definition of food.

  • ScottinTexas says:

    Manoah and his wife were there, we were not. Perhaps they had good reason to believe they had seen God just as Moses did on Sinai wherein the language is similar as well as Jacob when wrestling with “The One sent by YHVH” (poorly translated as “the angel of YHVH,” which makes us wrongly think of a cherub like Gabriel or Michael. This “angel” (malak) is not just any messenger or “one sent,” but THE One sent by YHVH, aka “The Anointed One.” The Anointed One is of course, the Messiah, or Yeshua, YHVH who saves (The Anointed One sent to save us in YHVH’s Name).

    • suzanholland says:

      I would agree that from this text (regarding Manoah) and several others, the “Angel of YHVH” is not “just and angel” but a manifestation of YHVH Himself (which is why the people, upon realizing this, always fear for their lives). I do not think, however, one can make the assertion that this Angel is the (pre-incarnate) Yeshua (the LOGOS/dabar of YHVH), although that is certainly a possibility (but it is nowhere made clear in the text itself). Bottom line–Manoah DID “get it” 🙂 shalom

    • Gnarlodious says:

      Correction. There is nothing in the story (Genesis 32:24-32) that mentions “The One sent by YHVH”, the word YHVH is not even used.

  • Janice says:

    Grains, grasses, fruit trees are the closest to absorbing the minerals from the earth, animals that eat grains ect are next, life is in the blood, don’t eat pretators as you might develope a preditory nature. can eath the mean of the gentle animals, cows, goats, sheep, if blood is properly vacated. All in all Father knows best.

  • Janice says:

    Also of the clean animals used for sacrifice; their blood vessel up their neck is so designed as to cut the blood off to the brian, quickly so doesn’t feel pain.

  • Janice says:

    Swine was also used in all the pagan natons sacrifices.

  • Janice says:

    It seems that generally unclean are those that are predictors, that run after their prey and tear it apart, also those that clean up the garbage of the water and earth the dead rotten material. Also concerning feet, some feet can get infection more than others, swine does not sweat and internalizes toxins. There is that prepared for ood and that prepared to clean up the dead, rotten stuff of earth or water.

  • Thankyou so much for your teaching. For Charing your wisdom.
    But I am wondering about Vayikra 11:11, here they use a stronger word “detestabel” and also that it applise to their carcasses. Does this mean that I can not touch the Shell of the shrimp?

  • Karen says:

    I was reading Judges 6 last night and noticed that Gideon offered a sacrifice to YHWH as a result of his encounter with the Angle of the LORD on his own. I really thought that only a priest was to perform that duty, if it were to be acceptable. The generations that grew up who did not know YHWH, (Judges 1) did they not have the Tabernacle or service in place in order to worship? How is it that YHWH allows alters and sacrifices outside of the Tabernacle and priestly order He established?
    Just curious.

  • Erin says:

    Indeed a very interesting conversation. All of Torah continues to tug atme with many questions.
    Most important can anyone expound on how one can follow when so much of Prophet writings tell them and now us, those appointed went after other baal/gods???
    After all, all have been born in sin, YHWH setup for us to obey Him alone!

    Thanks for any response.

    • Jacob says:

      You must LOVE YHVH to keep his commands and vice versa. Many come to Torah and forget about the love that it is pointing us towards. The love of messiah. Love for our neigbor and Neigbor. love is the best and it is the answer to your question. How to follow? Love who you follow. Don’t lose Him.

  • Moses Ekwuabu says:

    Thank you for the commentary how does KOSHER coming to this? now most people are talking about KOSHER but not clean and unclean. Do you have any article on Kosher? if you do can you send to me. YeHoVaH bless. Moses
    moekwuabu@yahoo.com

  • Paula Stein says:

    Thank you for imparting wisdom and insight on what is, sadly, a new concept for me…following Torah. Concerning the teaching of Lev. 11, I was wondering if you could bring some clarification on verses 32-39. Is this speaking specifically of the swarming things or is it referring to all unclean animals? I’ve been told it applies to all unclean animals, but when I read it, it seems to me in context, it’s talking of the swarming things. How does this affect eating out in restaurants, or buying meats from the grocery stores? I’m confused, and welcome any insight you have on this topic. Thank you again.

    Shalom

    Paula Stein

    • Aryeh François says:

      In the hebrew, 11.29-38 is one closed section (parashah setoumah) if that helps you to understand it a bit better. That paragraphe is about what happens when one of the 8 tamé creepy-crawlies (the « Sheretz haShoretz » and their species) or a piece of said creepies falls onto food or into a food/drink container or utensil.

      In the hebrew 11.39-47 is a different closed section (parashah setoumah) dealing with the touching of a carcass of a kosher or non-kosher animal all the way down to the creepies.

      Remember, as far as taméa and tahora are concerned, they are states of being which prohibit or allow entrance into the Temple.
      Kashrut deals with « the living being that may be eaten and that which you shall not eat ».

      This section does not treat eating out in restaurants (which becomes more a question of 1, meat which comes from a kosher animal or not ; as well as 2, meat slaughtered in a kosher manner [so as to remove the most amount of blood from the blood vessels] ; as well as 3, meat prepared to eat in a kosher manner [including removing the rest of the blood from the flesh]).

      This *can* have an impact on the meat bought in a grocery store (which becomes a question of 1, meat slaughtered in a kosher manner [so as to remove the most blood from the blood vessels] ; as well as 2, meat prepared for cooking [by removing the rest of the blood from the flesh]).

      As we Jews do, it will be up to you to decide after determining through prayer and study, where you will fall on the spectrum of stringency and leniency concerning the consumption of such animals, touching their carcasses and things « contaminated » through contact with the tamé carcasses.