Hands-on Religion

[Lev. 1:2] Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, If any man of you bring an offering unto the LORD, ye shall bring your offering of the cattle, even of the herd, and of the flock.
If a voluntary or free-will offering. 3 types of animals to sacrifice in burnt offerings:
1. Offerings of the herd (bull) 3-9
2. Offerings of the flock (sheep and goats) 10-13
3. Offerings of birds (turtledove or pigeons) 14-17
Only domesticated animals may be offered, (tame, innocent and gentle) not wild game, and the perfect animals were acceptable in worship. Offering a second-rated animal is despising the L-rd’s name and pollution His table - meat was a rare luxury, only for the very rich (2 Sam. 12:1-6). Excluded were horses, dogs, pigs, camels, assess, hares, deer’s, beast and birds of prey.
In a burnt offering the animal must be ritually slaughtered at the north side of the outer altar, although the slaughtering may be done by a non-priest, beginning with the receiving of blood the following steps must be accomplished by the priests. The duties of priest include sprinkling the blood 2 times of the outer altar, skinning the animal, cutting it up into whole limbs, removing the sinew of the thigh-vein, and finally, burning all the pieces on the top of the altar. They taught that the emotions of the heart are influenced by one’s outward actions, so it was required that each person exert an extra physical effort by bringing an innocent animal to the Temple and undergoing the ordeal of a lengthy and bloody sacrifice to realize the seriousness and pain that each sin brings.
Burnt was wholly consumed, no part was eaten. The entire combustion indicated the self-declination of body and soul.
One of our fashionable new words is the adjective hands-on, which the Webster’s defines as ‘providing direct practical experience.’ Is your vocabulary up to date? Well, then, Leviticus is a hands-on religion. Consider the direct practical experience it required of OT believers.
He did not lay his hand - but press or lean on the head. This laying on the sacrificial animal occurs more than a dozen times in this book. The children of Israel were not a barbaric or primitive people, they were the descendants of intelligent and sensitive men who had served the L-rd for generations. They had long lived in, and held positions of power in, the most sophisticated culture of their day. Their leader was well educated in all the wisdom of that culture and they were kind to animals. They also did not slaughter their children in the womb. Beloved household pets were known in David’s time, he lived in a culture where even a man with a houseful of children might treat his pet lamb like a daughter.
They were used to killing animals for food for there was no supermarkets. Here we are not talking about killing animals for food. We are talking about destroying them before G-d to make atonement for our sins. The bull or sheep felt the wrath of G-d – divine wrath intended for the man whose hand was on it. Even the dullest sacrificer knew the animal he offered was a substitute for him. It is one thing to kill an animal to feed your family; it is quite another to slaughter one, to pay for your misdeeds. Was it so much easier for a Jew to kill his atoning sacrifice than it would be for you or me? The chief difference to us is that we do not always face or feel the pain Y’Shua suffered for us, because ours is not so directly a hands-on experience. Another difference is that their sacrifices were costly, our is not, unless we tithe. It is easier for us to avoid the ugly reality than it was for the Jews – but the ugly reality is just the same. The innocent dies for the guilty, the sinless for the sinner.
His hand signifies acceptance and identification of himself with his offering. The burnt offering was thus not to gain forgiveness for the sin but to make atonement for the offer’s sinfulness. The burnt offering provides a divine solution for man’s fallen condition. It shall be rather that it may be an acceptable atonement.
Male animals were regarded as more valuable than females. For example, in the case of purification offerings a ruler had to bring a he-goat, but an ordinary person was expected to offer only a she-goat. (4:22-31) Except for the burnt offering and reparation offerings, animals of either sex could be offered: the limitation to male animals shows the high status of these two sacrifices. The male could reproduce many offspring, while the female would produce one. To give up a female was some loss, but to give up a male, great loss.
Chapter one there are three different kinds of burnt offerings, one for the bull, one for the sheep, and one for the turtledoves. It appears that wealthier men generally selected oxen as their offering and men less able took sheep or goats; while verse 14 shows that those yet poor brought doves. G-d thus left sacrifice open alike to the rich, the middle classes, and the laboring poor.
There were some differences in the way the three sacrifices were offered. The owner of a bull must kill it, skin it, and cut it into pieces. The man who brought a sheep must kill it and cut it into pieces, but he was not instructed to kill it. The poor man was only to bring his offering of turtledoves or young pigeons. The priest performed the slaughter and preparation for him. Clearly there was a progression from much direct involvement for the rich to little involvement for the poor.
Possibility is that the rich man needs more hands-on religion to save him from ‘pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness.’ It is no small job to slaughter and skin a bull, the work is nasty and brutish, but it can hardly be called short timed. The man had to plan on spending a good part of the day on it. One man working alone would need half a day to slaughter and skin a bull, if he only quartered the carcass. It would take longer to divide the meat into pieces small enough to burn completely on the altar. When were you last so fully involved in such a memorable statement of your guilt before G-d? When were you last so humbled, so exhausted in the presence of the L-rd?
The man who is truly poor in spirit, no matter how little he brings to G-d, will find it well received and graciously accepted. As for a poor man he was either deprived of the honor, or spared the disgrace, of having to slaughter his offering. The man who is proud or rich in spirit will find himself making a bloody mess of things, hacking and hewing all day for his sin, before he enjoys either rest from his labors or peace with G-d. the larger the portion, spiritually speaking, he has in this life, the harder he must struggle to free himself from it. When we come before our King we would do well with nothing ours and everything His, mistrusting self-reliance and the riches of the world, unless, of course, you like being up to your eyeballs in bull fat on a hot afternoon.