Dr Paul Allen

The burnt offering is one of the oldest and most common offerings in history. It’s entirely possible that Abel’s offering in Genesis 4:4 was a burnt offering, although the first recorded instance is in Genesis 8:20 when Noah offers burnt offerings after the flood. God ordered Abraham to offer his son, Isaac, in a burnt offering in Genesis 22, and then provided a ram as a replacement. After suffering through nine of the ten plagues, Pharaoh decided to let the people go from bondage in Egypt, but his refusal to allow the Israelites to take their livestock with them in order to offer burnt offerings brought about the final plague that led to the Israelites’ delivery (Exodus 10:24–29). The Hebrew word for “burnt offering” actually means to “ascend,“literally to “go up in smoke.”  The smoke from the sacrifice ascended to God, “a soothing aroma to the LORD” (Leviticus 1:9). Technically, any offering burned over an altar was a burnt offering, but in more specific terms, a burnt...

How should New Testament believers view the Old Testament dietary laws outlined in Leviticus 11? This is an important question, not only because the answer affects what we can or can’t eat (like bacon cheeseburgers), but also because it relates to a deeper issue: the Christian’s relationship to the Mosaic Law. The New Testament is clear that the dietary prohibiti ons of Leviticus 11 are no longer binding on believers today (cf. Mark 7:19; Acts 10). But in 2 Timothy 3:16, Paul said, “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, [and] for training in righteousness.” If all Scripture is profitable, then that must include passages like Leviticus 11. So how are the dietary laws of Leviticus 11  profitable  for New Testament Christians? Or put another way, how should New Testament believers approach a text like Leviticus 11, in order to interpret it correctly and apply its truth appropriately? THREE KEY QUESTIONS...

The Scapegoat by William Holman Hunt (1827-1910) (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) No book in the Old Testament presents a greater challenge to the modern reader than Leviticus , and imagination is required to picture the ceremonies and rites that form the bulk of the book. However, it is important to try to understand the rituals in Leviticus for two reasons. First, rituals enshrine, express, and teach those values and ideas that a society holds most dear. By analyzing the ceremonies described in Leviticus, we can learn about what was most important to the Old Testament Israelites. Second, these same ideas are foundational for the New Testament writers. Particularly the concepts of sin, sacrifice, and atonement found in Leviticus are used in the New Testament to interpret the death of Christ. The God of Leviticus, whose essential character is shown to be holy life, is shown in the Gospels to be present in Christ and His redemptive work. Precisely because the rituals of Leviticus a...