I. 'fHAT PERSONAL PURITY WAS AND 18 A MATTER OF THE VERY GREATEST UON• SEQUENCE IN THE SIGHT OF Goo. Into the relation of the sexes, and into the thouahts, words, and actions which belong to that relation, sin has introduced confusion° and degradation. That which should have been the source of nothing but pure and holy joy has become the ground on which the very worst and most debasing consequences of sin are exhibited. Save, perhaps, in some phases of heathen idolatry, there is nothing in which man bas shown so griev~ms a ~cparture from the will of God, and so pitiful a spectacle of uttermost degradation, as m the realm of the sexual relations. It W1lS the design of the Holy One of Israel to train for himself e. people which should be free from the fiagitious e.nd e.bominable corruption into which the heathen nations had- sunk. But he desired to go further than this: to promote and foster, by careful legislation, not only (1) morality in its more general sense, but also (2) decency of behaviour, and even (3) delicacy of thought. The Jews were taught and trained to put far away from them everything that was unclean. With this view it was ma.de unlawful not only for those who had knowingly violated moral laws, but for those who had unwittingly offended the laws of ceremonial cleanness, to draw near to their God or to their fellows. IL THAT SPECIFIC INSTRUCTIONS THEREON ABE A HATTER OF HOLY EXPEDIENCY. It was needful that the children of Israel should receive particular and precise instruc- tions, for they were to be separated from all surrounding nations in their customs, and so in their character-notably in this matter of purity. Moreover, they were admitted to the near presence of God, and must therefore be clear of all impurity; death would be the penalty of defiling the tabernacle of God (ver. 31). Special admonitions and special care are needed: 1. In the case of those who are placed in circumstances of peculiar delicacy. 2. In the case of those who are bound to be above all suspicion of any kind of indelicacy. 3. In the case of the young, who may be led into evil, the magnitude and consequences of which they cannot know. Parental warning, wisely and timely given, may save sons and daughters from much bodily mischief and spiritual suffering. JIJ. THAT, IN THIS HATTER, WE MUST CONSIDER WHAT IS DUE, NOT ONLY TO OUR· SELVES, BUT TO OTHERS ALSO. All those details of Divine precept, by which every person and article anywise brought into contact with the unclean man or woman (vers. 4 -12, 20-24, 26--27) became unclean, bring out the important truth that impurity is an essentially communicable evil. It is so physically; "let sinners look to it." It is so spiritually. How guilty in the very last degree are those who drive a ntJfarious trade in corrupt literature I How shameful to put indecent thought into print to pollute the young! How demoralizing to the soul, how displeasing to God, how scrupulously to be avoided, the questionable conversation that borders on the indelicate and impure (Eph. v. 3, 4, 12; Col. iii. 8) !-C.
PART III. BEOTION II.
EXPOSITION. the Lord and died" (ver. 1), when the OHAPTER XVL fate of Nadab and Abihu would no.turally THE CEREMONIAL PURIFICATION OF THE have led Aaron to desire a more perfeot WHOLE UONGBEGATION ON THI! GREAT DAY knowledge than had as yet been imparted OP ATONl!HENT. This chapter, containing to him as to the manner in whioh he was the account of the institution of the cere- to present himself before the Lord. Logic- moniol to be need on the Day of Atone- ally it might either ocoupy its present ment, would take its place chronologically position,as being the great and culminating immediately after the tenth chapter, for atoning and cleansing ceremony, or it might the instructions conveyed in it were de- be relege,ted to a pla~ among the holy days livered to Moses " after the death of the in oh, :r.xiii., where it is, in fact, shortly two eon, of .Aaron, when the11 offered before noticed. That it is placed here shows that CH. XVI, 1-34,] THE BOOK OF LEVITICUS. 237