Leviticus 10

Le 10:1-20.

NADAB AND

ABIHU

BURNT.

1. the sons of Aaron, &c.--If this incident occurred at the

solemn period of the consecrating and dedicating the altar, these young

men assumed an office which had been committed to Moses; or if it were

some time after, it was an encroachment on duties which devolved on

their father alone as the high priest. But the offense was of a far

more aggravated nature than such a mere informality would imply. It

consisted not only in their venturing unauthorized to perform the

incense service--the highest and most solemn of the priestly

offices--not only in their engaging together in a work which was the

duty only of one, but in their presuming to intrude into the holy of

holies, to which access was denied to all but the high priest alone. In

this respect, "they offered strange fire before the Lord"; they were

guilty of a presumptuous and unwarranted intrusion into a sacred office

which did not belong to them. But their offense was more aggravated

still; for instead of taking the fire which was put into their censers

from the brazen altar, they seem to have been content with common fire

and thus perpetrated an act which, considering the descent of the

miraculous fire they had so recently witnessed and the solemn

obligation under which they were laid to make use of that which was

specially appropriated to the service of the altars, they betrayed a

carelessness, an irreverence, a want of faith, most surprising and

lamentable. A precedent of such evil tendency was dangerous, and it was

imperatively necessary, therefore, as well for the priests themselves

as for the sacred things, that a marked expression of the divine

displeasure should be given for doing that which "God commanded them

not."

2. there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them--rather,

"killed them"; for it appears

(Le 10:5)

that neither their bodies nor their robes were consumed. The

expression, "from the Lord," indicates that this fire issued from the

most holy place. In the destruction of these two young priests by the

infliction of an awful judgment, the wisdom of God observed the same

course, in repressing the first instance of contempt for sacred things,

as he did at the commencement of the Christian dispensation

(Ac 5:1-11).

3. Moses said . . . This is it that the Lord spoke

. . . I will be sanctified in them that come nigh

me--"They that come nigh me," points, in this passage, directly to

the priests; and they had received repeated and solemn warnings as to

the cautious and reverent manner of their approach into the divine

presence

(Ex 19:22; 29:44;

Le 8:35).

Aaron held his peace--The loss of two sons in so sudden and

awful a manner was a calamity overwhelming to parental feelings. But

the pious priest indulged in no vehement ebullition of complaint and

gave vent to no murmur of discontent, but submitted in silent

resignation to what he saw was "the righteous judgment of God"

[Ro 2:5].

4, 5. Moses called Mishael and Elzaphan--The removal of the two

corpses for burial without the camp would spread the painful

intelligence throughout all the congregation; and the remembrance of so

appalling a judgment could not fail to strike a salutary fear into the

hearts both of priests and people. The interment of the priestly

vestments along with Nadab and Abihu, was a sign of their being

polluted by the sin of their irreligious wearers.

6. Uncover not your heads--They who were ordered to carry out

the two bodies, being engaged in their sacred duties, were forbidden to

remove their turbans, in conformity with the usual customs of mourning;

and the prohibition "neither rend your garments," was, in all

probability, confined also to their official costume. For at other

times the priests wore the ordinary dress of their countrymen and, in

common with their families, might indulge their private feelings by the

usual signs or expressions of grief.

8-11. Do not drink wine nor strong drink--This prohibition, and

the accompanying admonitions, following immediately the occurrence of

so fatal a catastrophe

[Le 10:1, 2],

has given rise to an opinion entertained by many, that the two

disobedient priests were under the influence of intoxication when they

committed the offense which was expiated only by their lives. But such

an idea, though the presumption is in its favor, is nothing more than

conjecture.

12-15. Moses spake unto Aaron, &c.--This was a timely and

considerate rehearsal of the laws that regulated the conduct of the

priests. Amid the distractions of their family bereavement, Aaron and

his surviving sons might have forgotten or overlooked some of their

duties.

16-20. Moses diligently sought the goat of the sin offering, and,

behold, it was burnt--In a sacrifice presented, as that had been,

on behalf of the people, it was the duty of the priests, as typically

representing them and bearing their sins, to have eaten the flesh after

the blood had been sprinkled upon the altar. Instead of using it,

however, for a sacred feast, they had burnt it without the camp; and

Moses, who discovered this departure from the prescribed ritual,

probably from a dread of some further chastisements, challenged, not

Aaron, whose heart was too much lacerated to bear a new cause of

distress but his two surviving sons in the priesthood for the great

irregularity. Their father, however, who heard the charge and by whose

directions the error had been committed, hastened to give the

explanation. The import of his apology is, that all the duty pertaining

to the presentation of the offering had been duly and sacredly

performed, except the festive part of the observance, which privately

devolved upon the priest and his family. And that this had been

omitted, either because his heart was too dejected to join in the

celebration of a cheerful feast, or that he supposed, from the

appalling judgments that had been inflicted, that all the services of

that occasion were so vitiated that he did not complete them. Aaron was

decidedly in the wrong. By the express command of God, the sin offering

was to be eaten in the holy place; and no fanciful view of expediency

or propriety ought to have led him to dispense at discretion with a

positive statute. The law of God was clear and, where that is the case,

it is sin to deviate a hair's breadth from the path of duty. But Moses

sympathized with his deeply afflicted brother and, having pointed out

the error, said no more.