Cleanse the Tabernacle

After describing the so-called ‘sin’ offering, Leviticus chapter four ends with the statement: “In this way the priest will make atonement for [the worshiper] for the sin they have committed, and they will be forgiven.” A quick reading of that verse makes it sound like the sacrifice described in Leviticus was how a person obtained forgiveness of sins to obtain eternal life. This is most certainly NOT the case. Allow me to explain.

Leviticus four contains instructions for ‘atoning,’ but what does atone mean and what exactly is being atoned? Well, ‘atone’ simply means to cleanse and, contrary to what you might think, it is NOT the worshiper that is cleansed from sin in Leviticus four. Rather, it is God’s house, the tabernacle. How do we know? It comes down to the simple difference between two tiny Hebrew words: ‘al and ’et. ‘al means ‘on behalf of’ and ’et is used to mark the direct object of a verb, i.e., the thing that receives the action of the verb. In this case, what is cleansed.

The point here is that people are marked with the word ‘al and the tabernacle is marked with the word ’et. This means that a very literal translation of the end of Leviticus four is, “In this way the priest will cleanse [the tabernacle] on behalf of the worshiper for the sin he has committed, and he will be forgiven.”

But there’s more. The word ‘forgive’ here is not a general word the way we think of forgiveness. Rather, it is a technical word used only when there is a pre-existant relationship, and only the greater (say, for example, a king) may forgive a lesser (say, a king’s subject). Thus, the meaning of ‘and he will be forgiven’ is literally, ‘the pre-existent covenantal relationship will be restored.’

Let me give you that whole verse again: “By making the sacrifice described in Leviticus chapter four, the priest will cleanse the tabernacle on behalf of the worshiper because of the sin he has committed, and he will be restored in his relationship with God.”

When we import our New Testament understanding of atonement onto Leviticus, we too easily misunderstand the message of Leviticus, namely: Keep God’s House Clean. But when we start with the Old Testament and move toward the New (the way God did it), we see that Jesus’ blood cleanses US because WE are God’s house.