Consecrated or devoted anyone or anything to God lately? Here's the fine print.

Leviticus Chapter 27: On Consecration, Tithes, and Conclusion

Leviticus 27:1-34

Day 31 of self-isolation. A beautiful sunny, but cool, day here in Toronto. Everyone is hearing rumors of areas in the world opening up again and we’re all itching for our local government to give us the go ahead. In the meantime, let’s take advantage of our ‘downtime’ as best we can. A friend of mine who knows I have been studying Leviticus sent me this picture earlier today, just in time as we look closely into the last chapter of the book.  I knew there was another reason for doing this. 

The Passage

The majority of this passage is about consecration. You would do best to open a modern translation of your Bible and read it for yourself before we dig into it. Alternatively, I have tried to summarize the key points for you below.

Verses 1-8 discusses the consecration of persons. Verse 2 reads: “When a man makes a difficult vow, he shall be valued according to your valuation of persons belonging to the Lord.” Then verses 3-8 go on to describe that ‘valuation’ based on age and gender.
Verse 8 reads: “But if he is poorer than your valuation, then he shall be placed before the priest, and the priest shall value him; according to the means of the one who vowed, the priest shall value him.”

Verses 9-13 deal with the consecration of animals, primarily as offerings to the Lord, making the person presenting the offering ‘holy’. However, if one is not sure it a clean animal, the priest decides, and puts a value on it, which would need to be paid if the one who owned wants to redeem it, and a one-fifth amount of the value would be added to the redeeming price.

A person can also consecrate his house to God and the priest will put a value on it (14-15) and if the person wants to redeem the house – take it back for his own use, he would need to add one-fifth of the valuation price.

Fields could also be consecrated (16-24). The passage talks about how that is done, and how the value varies depending on when it is done. It also talks about the fact that it cannot be redeemed if once consecrated, it is sold. And when the year of jubilee comes around, it does not go back to the one who consecrated in the first place, but rather to the Lord, the original Owner and passed over to the priest. The section goes describes how if someone consecrates a field to the Lord that he has bought, it requires a valuation by the priest and at the year of jubilee returns to the person from whom he bought it.

Verse 25 may stand on its own or may be applicable to all the consecrations identified earlier in the chapter.  It reads: “Every valuation of yours, moreover, shall be after the shekel of the sanctuary. The shekel shall be twenty gerahs.”

Verses 26-27 deal with the commandment that first-born clean animals already belong to the Lord and cannot be consecrated by man. Unclean (first-born) ones (e.g. a horse) can be redeemed and/or sold if not redeemed.

Verses 28-29 is about devoted things: “Nevertheless, anything which a man sets apart to the Lord out of all that he has, of man or animal or of the fields of his own property, shall not be sold or redeemed. Anything devoted to destruction is most holy to the Lord. No one who may have been set apart among men shall be ransomed; he shall surely be put to death.”

Verses 30-33 deal with tithes. This section talks about how we are to tithe on the land and its produce, and the herds or flocks. It also says that if a man “wishes to redeem part of his tithe, he shall add to it one-fifth of it.”

And the last verse (34) closes off the chapter and whole book of Leviticus by stating “These are the commandments which the Lord commanded Moses for the sons of Israel at Mount Sinai.”

Thoughts on the Passage

This is a difficult chapter to make heads or tails out of, not only as to what God expected of the Israelites in those days, but what it may be saying to us today. Let’s start off with a modern (Wikipedia) definition of the word ‘consecration’:

Consecration is the solemn dedication to a special purpose or service. The word consecration literally means "association with the sacred". Persons, places, or things can be consecrated, and the term is used in various ways by different groups.

Chuck Smith says this whole chapter is about us “being totally serious” when we commit something or someone (like ourselves) to God. We need to think about it, because going back on that commitment has an incredible cost. Sometimes we dedicate our children or animals and they turn out to be so good in some other area of life, that we want them back for ourselves. I think of parents who dedicated their children to the Lord, and they grow up to be doctors who want to serve in a third world country, but the parents want them to stick near home now that they’re doctors. God says, “okay, but it will cost you a 20% premium.” He doesn’t like this changing of our minds back and forth.

The consecration of persons. David Guzik suggests a person could dedicate themselves to God, or their children. I would assume that the Israelites could dedicate their slaves to God’s work, too. Valuation of those individuals was assigned as per God’s instruction. This was according to their age and general usefulness or potential contribution to society. More importantly, even a poor person could if they wanted to, give their life to the Lord, and the priest would assign a special value for them. I would assume that this value was in case one changed their minds and had to buy back their consecration as discussed above. Matthew Henry seems to indicate that some of the “redemption” may have been due to an over-supply of manpower for the tabernacle. Certainly not the case we find ourselves in today. Also, we note that females were less esteemed in those days, but that changed with Christ and the New Covenant for we know, “in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female” (Gal. 3:28).

The consecration of houses. Sometimes people would sanctify their houses to be used for God’s service.

Verse 25 implies a fee of some sort, but little information or commentary can be found on that. [Do let us know if you are more successful.]

For animals and First-born clean animals – see me thoughts in the passage section above.

Devoted things. David Guzik talks considerably about this as he writes:

To devote something to the Lord was a further step than consecration by a vow; it often had the meaning of destroying the item (or executing the person) so that it could not be utilized by anyone else, and all of its [deemed or assessed] value was given to God.  Joshua 6:17 among other passages, translates this word ‘devoted’ with the word ‘accursed’ – because that thing devoted to God would be destroyed, being used for no other purpose. For these reasons, an item devote to God could not be “bought back” by giving its value plus 20% to the tabernacle treasury; it had to be given – and presumably destroyed – unto the Lord. . .. In this sense also, one could not escape execution by being “bought back” from the Lord; they had to face the penalty [that God had set] for their crime.

Tithing. Smith says you need to understand that God just takes claim of one-tenth of everything. There’s no room for quibbling here. Image how much better off the world would be if every person in it just followed that one commandment. And we are not to borrow on our tithes – keep our hands off of it, God says. If you do borrow, you need to add 20%. That’s some interest. What do I mean by borrowing? Well, perhaps for some of us it means delaying paying out title – especially our regular title to our local church. Perhaps this interest penalty should apply to us?  Hey, I’m not making this up – it’s right here in God’s Word and the concept of tithing has not disappeared with the New Covenant.

Last words. Guzik reminds us that these were not mere traditions and customs, though men began to attach traditions and customs to these commandments; these were - and are - the commandments (not suggestions) of the LORD. Woe to us who may neglect the ones that can be and were intended to continue with the New Covenant.

I have found Leviticus to be much more interesting than I expected. I hope you did as well. Next time we embark on the study of what many may consider the least interesting book of the Bible perhaps because of its name – Numbers.  That’s it. Numbers. Well, some people find numbers to be fascinating. Let’s find out.  Thanks for joining me on these studies. Let me leave you and Leviticus with these words from Chuck Smith:

Now as we go through the book of Numbers, whenever you get into the numbers, just skip [them] if you want. It's not required reading. When you get into the genealogies of the families, skip those, they're not required reading. I'll let you off on that, but there are some neat little nuggets buried in some of these genealogies, and truths, and thoughts.

I look forward to finding those gems with you.

It would be great if you would share your thoughts or questions on this blog in the comments section below or on social media.