Your Daily Pesuk Shabbat, July 14, 2018

Parashat Matot-Masei / פרשת מטות־מסעי

• Sat, 14 July 2018 = 2nd of Av, 5778
• ב׳ בְּאָב תשע״ח

Numbers 35:9-36:13 (39 p'sukim)

maf: 36:11-13 (3 p'sukim)
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The most significant pesuk in our final reading for this week would no doubt be:

28 כִּ֣י בְעִ֤יר מִקְלָטוֹ֙ יֵשֵׁ֔ב עַד־מ֖וֹת הַכֹּהֵ֣ן הַגָּדֹ֑ל וְאַחֲרֵ֥י מוֹת֙ הַכֹּהֵ֣ן הַגָּדֹ֔ל יָשׁוּב֙ הָרֹצֵ֔חַ אֶל־אֶ֖רֶץ אֲחֻזָּתֽוֹ׃

28 The manslayer must stay within the limits of his city of refuge until the kohen gadol dies, and after the death of the kohen gadol, the manslayer may return to his property.

As I have taught many times in the past and repeated countless times: The God of Israel is a God of Perfect Justice/Judgement - tempered with Perfect Mercy/Grace.  There is no one like Him, and He is righteous and perfect when He judges and when He pardons.

Perhaps this is why Franz Delitzsch is one of my favorite scholars, we seem to agree, on this pesuk he says:

"In these regulations “all the rigour of the divine justice is manifested in the most beautiful concord with His compassionate mercy. Through the destruction of life, even when not wilful, human blood had been shed, and demanded expiation. Yet this expiation did not consist in the death of the offender himself, because he had not sinned wilfully.” Hence an asylum was provided for him in the free city, to which he might escape, and where he would lie concealed. This sojourn in the free city was not to be regarded as banishment, although separation from house, home, and family was certainly a punishment; but it was a concealment under “the protection of the mercy of God, which opened places of escape in the cities of refuge from the carnal ardour of the avenger of blood, where the slayer remained concealed until his sin was expiated by the death of the high priest.” For the fact, that the death of the high priest was hereby regarded as expiatory, as many of the Rabbins, fathers, and earlier commentators maintain (see my Comm. on Joshua, p. 448), is unmistakeably evident from the addition of the clause, “who has been anointed with the holy oil,” which would appear unmeaning and superfluous on any other view. This clause points to the inward connection between the return of the slayer and the death of the high priest. “The anointing with the holy oil was a symbol of the communication of the Holy Spirit, by which the high priest was empowered to act as mediator and representative of the nation before God, so that he alone could carry out the yearly and general expiation for the whole nation, on the great day of atonement. But as his life and work acquired a representative signification through this anointing with the Holy Spirit, his death might also be regarded as a death for the sins of the people, by virtue of the Holy Spirit imparted to him, through which the unintentional manslayer received the benefits of the propitiation for his sin before God, so that he could return cleansed to his native town, without further exposure to the vengeance of the avenger of blood” (Comm. on Joshua, p. 448). But inasmuch as, according to this view, the death of the high priest had the same result in a certain sense, in relation to his time of office, as his function on the day of atonement had had every year, “the death of the earthly high priest became thereby a type of that of the heavenly One, who, through the eternal (holy) Spirit, offered Himself without spot to God, that we might be redeemed from our transgressions, and receive the promised eternal inheritance (Hebrews 9:14-15). Just as the blood of Messiah wrought out eternal redemption, only because through the eternal Spirit He offered Himself without spot to God, so the death of the high priest of the Old Testament secured the complete deliverance of the manslayer form his sin, only because he had been anointed with the holy oil, the symbol of the Holy Spirit.”

The reference here is:

Hebrews 9:14-15 - אַף כִּי־דַם הַמָּשִׁיחַ אֲשֶׁר־הִקְרִיב אֶת־עַצְמוֹ לֵאלֹהִים בְּרוּחַ נִצְחִי וּבְלִי־מוּם יְטַהֵר לִבְּכֶם מִמַַּעֲשֵׂי מָוֶת לַעֲבֹד אֶת־אֱלֹהִים חַיִּים׃[15] וּבַעֲבוּר זֹאת הוּא מְתַַוֵךְ לִבְרִית חֲדָשָׁה לְמַעַן אֲשֶׁר־יִירְשׁוּ הַמְקֹרָאִים אֶת־הַבְטָחַת נַחֲלַת עוֹלָם אַחֲרֵי אֲשֶׁר־מֵת לִפְדוֹת מִן־הַפְּשָׁעִים אֲשֶׁר נַעֲשׂוּ בִּימֵי הַבְּרִית הָרִאשׁוֹנָה׃

Hebrews 9:14-15 Tree of Life Version (TLV)

14 how much more will the blood of Messiah—who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God—cleanse our conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

15 For this reason He is the mediator of a new covenant, in order that those called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—since a death has taken place that redeems them from violations under the first covenant.

All of Torah points us to the character and heart and purpose of Messiah.  Yeshua is the great Cohen Gadol who's death has set us all free.

Shabbat Shalom

R' Eric