4. Sacrifice and Responsibility (Remastered)

Sacrifice and Responsibility

R.J. Rushdoony

Our Scripture is Leviticus 4:1-15. 

“And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a soul shall sin through ignorance against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning things which ought not to be done, and shall do against any of them: If the priest that is anointed do sin according to the sin of the people; then let him bring for his sin, which he hath sinned, a young bullock without blemish unto the Lord for a sin offering. And he shall bring the bullock unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before the Lord; and shall lay his hand upon the bullock’s head, and kill the bullock before the Lord. And the priest that is anointed shall take of the bullock’s blood, and bring it to the tabernacle of the congregation: And the priest shall dip his finger in the blood, and sprinkle of the blood seven times before the Lord, before the vail of the sanctuary. And the priest shall put some of the blood upon the horns of the altar of sweet incense before the Lord, which is in the tabernacle of the congregation; and shall pour all the blood of the bullock at the bottom of the altar of the burnt offering, which is at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And he shall take off from it all the fat of the bullock for the sin offering; the fat that covereth the inwards, and all the fat that is upon the inwards, And the two kidneys, and the fat that is upon them, which is by the flanks, and the caul above the liver, with the kidneys, it shall he take away, As it was taken off from the bullock of the sacrifice of peace offerings: and the priest shall burn them upon the altar of the burnt offering. And the skin of the bullock, and all his flesh, with his head, and with his legs, and his inwards, and his dung, Even the whole bullock shall he carry forth without the camp unto a clean place, where the ashes are poured out, and burn him on the wood with fire: where the ashes are poured out shall he be burnt.

And if the whole congregation of Israel sin through ignorance, and the thing be hid from the eyes of the assembly, and they have done somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning things which should not be done, and are guilty; When the sin, which they have sinned against it, is known, then the congregation shall offer a young bullock for the sin, and bring him before the tabernacle of the congregation. And the elders of the congregation shall lay their hands upon the head of the bullock before the Lord: and the bullock shall be killed before the Lord.” i

Our Scripture this morning deals with sacrifice; indeed, we shall be considering the first seven chapters of Leviticus briefly this morning. All of them, and a great deal more of the Law of Moses, deals with sacrifice. 

It is customary today to neglect the fact of sacrifice as something that is a relic of our ignorant past, but nothing could be wronger because we find that sacrifice appears in every civilization, in every tribe, in every culture that this world has ever known. There has never been a culture without sacrifice. Moreover, in spite of the cross-current of sin in man’s nature, there is still, however it sometimes takes very perverted fashions, an ingrained desire on the part of man to sacrifice. So that we see on all sides that men do, in spite of their rejection of the concept of sacrifice, perpetually sacrifice to a variety of things. Some men who would give of themselves sacrificially to their calling, and many a man will work sacrificially even when there is no pay or visible reward, he gives himself sacrificially to his calling. Others will sacrifice themselves for all kinds of things that are thoroughly unworthy. But to sacrifice seems to be inescapable in man’s nature. Nothing can be done to escape this aspect.

Psychologists have usually walked around this fact. William James was the only one who recognized that this was almost an overpowering aspect of man, and hoped that something could be done with it to build world peace upon this. But his plan, of course, was futile, because he reckoned without the fact of sin. But suffice it to say, sacrifice is something that cannot be removed from the human scene. It is apparently basic to man’s nature. It is important for us, therefore, to understand what the Bible teaches about sacrifice so that we see sacrifice as God ordained it to be, because everything else is a perversion of that which God ordained. 

Now as we understand sacrifice in the Law of God, the first thing we must recognize is that sacrifice in the Bible requires a doctrine of human sacrifice, while rejecting the physical sacrifice of man as sinful. All Biblical sacrifice rests on the idea of the gift of life to God, the devotion of man’s life to God; either in expiation, expiation for sin, or consecration in the form of service. As a result, sacrifice, human sacrifice, the sacrifice of man in the sense of total devotion to God, is basic to the Bible. 

But we must say, second, the physical sacrifice of sinful man as an offering to God is a fearful offense against Him, and the law tells us it invites the judgment of God. Human sacrifice is an attempt to bypass God’s Law and find man’s way to God, it is humanistic to the core, it is an attempt by man to say that atonement by man on his own terms is sufficient. And what men have done when they have offered human sacrifice is in a sense to try to buy insurance from God.

Now, all sacrifice in antiquity and throughout the modern world, wherever it still exists in various cultures, is anti-Biblical in that it is a form of insurance policy. When men in the ancient world, say in Greece, or in Rome, or in Japan today among those who do go to the temples and offer sacrifices, when they went they were buying insurance. They were saying to the gods or whatever powers existed, “We want to be left alone in this or that venture and we are paying a insurance policy, and if you don’t give us what we want, we’ll shop elsewhere and take our business to another temple.” And this is why you had a variety of competing gods and competing temples, because what you were doing was buying insurance, and if you didn’t get good insurance from one you went to another. It was not the idea that they represented any absolute power to whom you owed total devotion and allegiance. And human sacrifice, therefore, was the supreme way of buying insurance. A monarch offered up his child, or offered up some of his servants, as a way of saying, “Now look, you see how much I’m ready to offer up to you, are you not in return for this gold, and silver, and human lives, going to give me insurance against this or that enemy or this or that peril?”

Third we must say then that the total devotion to God, our total sacrifice to God, because the word ‘devote’ in its origins meant ‘to sacrifice.’ Our total devotion to God in terms of the Bible means obedience to God’s Law, obedience to God’s Law in love and faith. The Ten Commandments are followed by summons to obey the law in total devotion:

“And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.” ii

Sacrifice in the Bible is always linked to obedience, and the prophets again and again denounced sacrifice that was purely formal, that was not linked to obedience to the law. 

But fourth, we must then say that because no man keeps the law perfectly, or ever has, since man is a sinner, and can only keep the law to any degree when he has been redeemed and given a new nature, sacrifice typifies Christ our substitute. The death penalty of God is against all sin, against all rebellion, and man being in rebellion against God has Jesus Christ as His sinbearer – the perfect man who kept the law in perfect devotion and as his substitute, accepted the death penalty from God. And so the sacrificial animals of the Old Testament typified Christ, therefore they had to be clean animals without blemish. As we saw when the animal was offered, the offerer had to lay his hands upon the bullock’s head. The word ‘lay’ can be better translated ‘lean’ his hands,iii as it were to put his weight upon the sacrificial animal to indicate that this was himself, to place the burden of his sin upon it, indicating that he recognized that God was providing a substitute to accept the death penalty, one who was to come, even Jesus Christ, and that through His death the sacrificer had life. 

Thus, fifth, sacrifice requires of all believers that they accept the fact that their life stands in the sacrifice of the innocent one. Those not covered by the sacrifice of Christ are under the sentence of death. When the animal was sacrificed, the blood was sprinkled in part upon the altar, in part upon the people to signify that they were now one blood, that they had a common life, they were brought together. And also to signify that if this bond of peace was violated by flagrant sin, then the penalty was death. 

But sixth, the sacrifice and the laws of sacrifice incorporated into law of basic principle, and the fourth chapter of Leviticus, among others, incorporates this at great length and detail. And this principle is simply this; the greater the responsibility, the greater the culpability, the greater the sin under the law. In other words, the more important a person is, the worse his sin in the sight of God. And the fourth chapter of Leviticus gives us four grades of sin, four levels of sin. And in verses three to twelve it tells us that the greatest sin, the most fearful in the sight of God, is that committed by the priest, by the spiritual leader, and for this a bullock had to be offered. 

The second category was an entire nation, and for them a bullock had to be offered. Consider the implications of that, it means that the sin of a religious leader is equally important in God’s sight as the sin of the entire nation. This means that the sin of a minister, or of a priest, or of a Pope, or a bishop, is in God’s sight as great as the sin of that entire nation wherein he dwells. I think, perhaps, some of you will understand now why I am so hard on the clergy. The Bible requires that I be very hard on them, their waywardness is so fearful in the sight of God. And, you noticed, ignorance as well because it says here, “If he sin through ignorance.” And the sad fact is that even many of the best of our clergy you can sit in church week in and week out and you find that you know more than he does, and that’s a sin through ignorance on his part. 

God says, therefore, “In My sight I equate their sin as the sin of an entire nation,” because if the people are not taught how shall they follow? How shall they know the law? It is a fearful thing then to teach, to preach, to be a spiritual leader and not to recognize the consequences of this office in the sight of God, and we can only say that today there is a fearful responsibility that must be borne by the spiritual leaders of this country. They sin with knowledge, they sin with ignorance, they sin and God will judge them accordingly.

As we’ve already seen, the second level of sin in importance is that of the entire nation and verses thirteen to twenty-one deal with this, it is of equal significance as the sins of the priest, or of the spiritual leader. The third level, or grade of sin, is that of the prince, the rulers, government officials, and a goat, a male, a kid, is to be offered for them. Now, of course, this comes as a shock to some people, perhaps, because they are so used to thinking politically today. They are so used to seeing as the most important in a country the prime minister or a president, or dictator, or whoever is at the top. But the real power is still in the pulpit, if we don’t recognize it, the Communists and the various socialist groups do. This is why, beginning with the Civil War era, the various subversive groups decided that, in order to subvert the United States, as I’ve pointed out to some of you more than once, it was imperative that these subversives subvert the church, because more people go to church every Sunday in the United States then have ever voted in any national election. And so they began the subversion of the clergy, and the clergy has submitted to it. They’ve gone for it like a pig goes to the trough. And is it any wonder then that the politicians today are what they are? I think one could say, and I think everyone here knows my opinion of President Johnson, that he may be better than we deserve as a nation. Politics follows the spiritual climate of a people and the prophet Isaiah said: “the day will come when wise men will refuse to rule over you.” iv

Fourth, on the level of sins, is that of individuals. And here there are a variety of offerings possible. A female kid, which could be a little more important than that of a prince’s offering, or a government official’s; a lamb, which is a cheaper and lesser offering, or two turtle doves, or two pigeons, which are very insignificant offerings. What does this mean? It means that with individuals there are variations, and variations are permitted in terms of their financial circumstances. And it means, therefore, that a wealthy individual has power, and his sin therefore is in a higher level. So that the sin of a tremendously wealthy industrialist, of a Ford or a Rockefeller for example, is equally important and perhaps more important than that of a president or a prime minister, but that the sin of a very simple ordinary person, while still a sin in the sight of God and requiring atonement, in its consequences in the sight of God is on a lesser level. We see, therefore, that all sin is sin in the sight of God, but there are degrees, there are levels of sin, and the greater the responsibility the greater the sin, and the greatest responsibility is with the ministry. After all, as Proverbs 29:18 declares:

Where there is no vision, the people perish:

But he that keepeth the law, happy is he.

As the Berkley version indicates, this can be rendered also:’

“Where there is no [prophetic - footnote] ministry [that is a ministry that truly speaks for God - RJR] the people run wild…” v

A seventh fact that must be drawn from the Biblical Laws of sacrifice is that ignorance of the law is no excuse. This appears clearly from Leviticus 4 where it speaks of sins according to ignorance, and Leviticus 5, sins of inadvertency. These are still sins; we didn’t intend to sin, but we sinned. We didn’t know it was a sin, but it’s still a sin. In other words what the law is making clear here is that it is not what our conscience says but what the law says that constitutes sin. Man may sin with a good conscience, I may drive down a street at 45 thinking that that is legitimate there, but it may now be thirty-five; and I may have done it in good conscience, but I was still violating the law. The criterion therefore of transgression is not man’s conscience, but the Law of God, and many of the most fearful sins are committed sometimes with good conscience. Cannibalism and human sacrifice are performed as matters of conscience. Fallen man’s conscience is fallen also.

Eight, we must then say further, that what the law declares as in Leviticus 5:16, not only was the law given to requiring sacrifice, that is atonement for sin, but it required restitution also. 

“And he shall make amends for the harm that he hath done in the holy thing, and shall add the fifth part thereto, and give it unto the priest: and the priest shall make an atonement for him with the ram of the trespass offering, and it shall be forgiven him.” 

The law of restitution we have dealt with previously and in brief, and we shall deal with it again in greater detail when we come to the commandment, “Thou shalt not steal.” Briefly, if a man stole a $100, he was to restore not only the hundred, but another $100, the exact amount that he had stolen, so that it cost him exactly what he intended that it should cost the person he robbed. But restitution had to be made not only to the individual that he robbed, but to God because he violated God’s law-order. So he owed God a double tithe, $20, because he had broken God’s law-order. The law required restitution. A law-order had been violated, an individual’s property rights had been violated, there had to be restitution to the individual and to the law-order.

Ninth and finally, the law required, as a part of the peace offerings, leaven. And in Leviticus 7:13 we find this. This is an important verse because we are so often told by the Scofieldians that leaven is a type of sin, and leaven is not acceptable to God as an offering, and so on. And I notice that the people who hold to this usually pass over the leavened offerings. But God did requires leaven as an offering, it could not be an offering as a burnt offering, or sin offering, or a trespass offering, anything that involved atonement, because the fact of atonement represented Christ’s work, but the peace offering represented man’s work, and leaven represents corruptibility, something that can pass away. And man’s works are represented by the leavened offering. What we do for God can pass away; the churches we build, the charitable works we do, the books we write, the activities we engage in. In time, these all go, but they are still required by God. They are our peace offering, they represent our communion with him, and God requires them, and so we must render them.

This, then, in brief, is the implication for the law of the sacrificial system. It is a basic part of the law, it lays down the fundamental principles of the law that are valid for all time. For us, Christ is our sacrifice, therefore the old sacrificial system is finished, but the laws of the sacrificial system as they lay down the requirements of responsibility, of restitution, of knowledge of the Law of God, these remain.

Let us pray.

* * *

Our Lord and our God, we give thanks unto thee for this thy Word, and we thank thee that Jesus Christ is our sacrifice and that in Him we have remission of sins and newness of life. Enable us day by day, O Lord, to meet our responsibilities with knowledge, with faith, and with true devotion, that we may serve thee acceptably and be blessed and prospered by thy grace. In Jesus' name. Amen.

* * *

Are there any questions now?

Yes?

[Audience member] What is the symbolism in burning the offering?

[Rushdoony] The symbolism of burning the offering is this; the offering represented the sinful, the condemned person, and it meant that the sin was consumed, that now God saw us no longer as guilty but as innocent in His sight.

Another question?

[Audience member] I’ve heard some Jews say that not all of the offering was consumed, some could be eaten.  vi

[Rushdoony] Yes and no. In the offerings of atonement, in some cases a portion was the priests portion, which meant that after consecration it became sacred unto him, so that it went for the priest and his table. Then in certain other offerings of the first fruit and the like it became a portion that was eaten both by the individual and by the poor, but this was not offerings of atonement, [but] thank offerings and peace offerings. 

Yes?

[Audience member] Could you explain further about Job’s offerings for his children?  vii

[Rushdoony] Yes, yes. He had reference precisely to the kind of thing that I was talking about, sins of ignorance. Job was an exceedingly conscientious man, and as such he not only offered sacrifices for his sins, but when he did, he offered sacrifices for his children, lest they had sinned in ignorance, this is what he had reference too.

[Audience member] There was no sin on his part.

[Rushdoony] What he did was no doubt to instruct his children thoroughly, but when he offered sacrifices, he offered them up for himself and for his children also, lest through ignorance or inadvertency at any time they had done any wrong. This was the thoroughness of his conscientious parenthood. It was an indication of how conscientious a father Job was that it was cited.

Yes?

[Audience member] Did that work? Can one do it for someone else?  viii

[Rushdoony] In the Old Testament it could be done, but you see only if at the same time, he instructed his children, spoke to them. It couldn’t be just a formal ritual, it had no meaning, but with it went instruction. 

Yes?

[Audience member] What is sin?  ix

[Rushdoony] Any want of conformity… it’s any transgression of the Law of God. 

Yes?

[Audience member] Could you speak further on the meaning of peace offerings?  x

[Rushdoony] A ‘peace offering’ was an indication of… Well, apart from the offerings of atonement, there were two types. There was the thank offering, which was an offering of gratitude, then there was the peace offering which was to celebrate the peace and communion with God, it was, in a sense, rejoicing, of gratitude, of thanks, but of a different sort. A ‘thank offering’ was at a particular occasion of gratitude, but the peace offering an expression of joy.

Yes?

[Audience member] A peace offering in the modern sense means something different, it means to make peace.  xi

[Rushdoony] Yes, that’s the modern usage of peace offering, it’s to make peace. But the atonement offerings were what made for peace, the peace offering celebrated the fact of peace. 

Yes?

[Audience member] How can a nation sin and not in an individual way? 

[Rushdoony] Yes, a good question, a very good one, how can a nation sin and not in an individual way? A nation can sin collectively when, as a body, it takes a course of action that is wrong, and it has to bear the consequences of it. For example, one of your number was telling me of the dismay of San Franciscans as they are facing what they are, and he very properly told them, “They asked for it, didn’t they vote in their mayor? Didn’t they vote in their present administration? Are they not responsible?” It’s their sin; they’re going to pay for it, you see. So there is so a thing as a collective sin. 

A congregation as a whole, for example, can call a man as its pastor, knowing what he is. I’ve known cases where congregations were warned of what they did, the kind of man they were calling, they still called him. They have a collective sin you see, there they sinned as a group. Just as a group has a collective entity, they act collectively; therefore they have a sin, a consequence, for their collective action. 

We, as a nation, violated one of the cardinal principles of George Washington when we got involved in a foreign war in 1917 and again 1941 and a couple times since. We’re paying for it. We are guilty as a whole for our involvement. We all bear the consequences of it. We are guilty, collectively, of having violated the Constitution again and again; a compulsory draft for foreign service which is unconstitutional, and so on. Now, the only way we can absolve ourselves individually of this is to witness against it, you see, to make a stand against it.

Our time is almost up and there are a couple of things I’d like to call to your attention. This past week a couple of items appeared in the newspaper which I think were of interest because we discussed, as you recall, the tithe not too long ago. And you recall I pointed out at that time that George Washington believed in a compulsory tithe, collected by the state, to be turned over to whatever church or organization you designated it. He felt that this was the best solution for society.

Now, the problem of income tax payment by the wealthy is beginning to trouble a few people in Congress because a great many wealthy people pay no taxes or very little. 

“Figures compiled by the internal revenue service show that 22 persons with adjusted gross income of $1 million or more per year paid no Federal income taxes during the fiscal year which ended June, 30, 1965. And they cite one case a few years ago where a man made $23 million in one year and paid no taxes.”

Now, consider the implications of that. Indeed, the millionaires who do pay any substantial amount of taxes are few, very few. Socialism is the best system ever devised by the rich to get richer and to make the poor, and the middle classes in particular, pay for it. Now, had we continued in terms of what George Washington wanted us to do, to continue in terms of the compulsory tithe, what would it mean? Well, these millionaires would have paid, those who had a million dollars income in a year, a $100,000 in a compulsory tithe which would have gone to Christian schoolwork, or any kind of schoolwork they designated, or to any church. And the man who paid $23 million, well consider how much he would have paid, ten percent. Think of the schools that would have been supported. These men, you see, then, would have had less government over them, and we would have had less government, and the basic social functions would be maintained by the tithe, the compulsory tithe. And this is why there was so little government during the first two centuries of American existence, because the tithe took care of the basic social functions; education, welfare, and a variety of other things, and it took care of it most economically.

One other thing that I’d like to call to your attention. Some of you saw, so I hardly need to repeat it, the July, 12, 1968 Life magazine with the long article on the Esalen Institute and other psychological organizations or agencies which are very, very favorably treated in this article by a woman, Jane Howard, “Inhibitions Thrown to the Gentle Winds,” in which to give people mental health you have nude sit-ins, you have nude hold-ins and wade-ins and so on. Jump ups, you jump, in other words as it says, you systematically regress to childhood and this movement is sweeping the country. In fact, one grant from a major foundation to apply the basic and counter technique to a whole school system, everybody; teachers, pupils, and administrators, involved in the eight high schools, fifty elementary schools, and one college run by the Immaculate Heart of Mary order in Los Angeles. 

Maybe you didn’t read this in the papers, I’m sure you didn’t, but this is one of the reasons why cardinal McIntyre has been fighting these sisters. But this is only the first step. I have here the seminar, workshop, and symposiums schedule for the Esalen Institute and the title is, “The Value of Psychotic Experience.” And one symposium which is going to be held beginning July the 30th, this week, “The Science of Madness” and the other “The poetry of Madness,” another will be on the, “Psychosis as Personal Transformation.” Another on “Divine Madness.” Another will be a five-day workshop in, “Positive Disintegration,” and so on. So that the next step after regression to childhood will be regression into madness as the big step towards health.

I see we have just about a minute left and I’d like to share with you one further item which amuses me no end, and it is from the Sunday, July 21st, Oakland Tribune. “Ferry Boats May Grace the Bay Again.” After having spent millions, and virtually bankrupted the Bay area to build the bridges and the huge freeways, and to destroyed the ferryboat system and the street car system which was one of the best in the world, now they find that the time table shows it took 44 minutes for the ferry train ride from San Francisco to Corte Madera, and this was consistent at any hour of the day, no matter how many persons traveled at rush hour. In rush hour today commuters cannot make the same trip in one hour. So they’re talking about bringing back the ferry boats with Federal help after with Federal and State help they destroyed them. This is progress in the year of our Lord 1968. 

And with that we stand adjourned. 

i. The Holy Bible: King James Version, Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version. (Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 2009), Le 4:1–15.

ii. The Holy Bible: King James Version, Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version. (Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 2009), Dt 6:5.

iii. Andrew Bonar, Leviticus (London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1846, 1966), p. 15.

iv. See Isaiah 3:7.

v. Proverbs 29:18, Gerrit Verkuyl, trans. The Holy Bible, The Berkeley Version, In Modern English. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1959.

vi.  Question added/modified for clarity and brevity.

vii.  Question added/modified for clarity and brevity.

viii.  Question added/modified for clarity and brevity.

ix.  Question added/modified for clarity and brevity.

x.  Question added/modified for clarity and brevity.

xi.  Question added/modified for clarity and brevity