And Moses diligently sought the goat of the sin-offering, and behold, it was burnt up then he was wroth with Eleazar and Ithamar, the sons of Aaron that were left, saying,
Two of Aaron's sons have just died for offering unauthorised fire. Now Moses finds the goat of the sin offering burnt instead of eaten, and he is angry — why did that meal matter so much?
Why the anger? The priests had a duty with that goat, and the blood decided how each sin offering ended:
Moses was angry with Eleazar and Ithamar because they should normally have eaten the goat in a holy place, to bear the iniquity of the congregation and make atonement for them before the Lord. Sometimes the blood of a victim was brought into the holy place, or into the holiest. That had to do with the standing of the people before God. Then the priests did not eat the sin offering. Its body was burned outside the camp. But in the ordinary sin offering the priests ate of it. They entered into the sin of the people before God, confessing before God sin that was not their own.
So what did the eating stand for? One believer makes another's sin his own — and the alternative is criticism:
But there is such a thing as making my brother's sin my own, and bearing it in spirit before God, as though it were my own. This is pictured by Aaron's sons eating the sin offering in the most holy place. It was the very highest order of priestly service… When a brother has sinned, our tendency is to sit in judgement on him. We take the place of a severe critic. We treat his sin as something we have nothing whatever to do with. This is to fail sadly in our priestly functions. It is refusing to eat the sin offering in the most holy place.
Commentators are careful to fence this off. Bearing a brother's sin in prayer is real service, but it is not what the cross did:
In a certain sense there is a priestly way in which we have to bear the sins and sorrows of our brothers and sisters. Not, of course, as to atonement: that was Christ's alone, and the blood carried inside was Christ's alone. But there is still a true sense in which we have to bear them. And in this, I believe above everything else, we fail.
The work has a name — intercession — and it guards two opposite errors:
Intercession with our God and Father is a precious privilege, and it is our shame to neglect it. It keeps God's rights undiminished, and exercises the heart in saintly love. Never forget that grace condemns evil far more deeply than law did or could. Yet it holds fast Christ in life and death, and by that it holds fast the erring believer's title. It agrees here below with what He is doing on high as Advocate with the Father. It delivers from a hard spirit on the one hand, and from merely human leniency on the other. Neither one fits with Christ. Only He could atone. But He also felt and confessed the evil. Here, as priests, our calling in the presence of God is to carry the burden on our souls and to mourn for a brother's sin as our own.
Moses' anger is not the last word. Aaron points to the deaths in his own house, and his answer stands:
The judgment and feelings of Aaron were right. Such serious failure in his own house had filled his heart with grief. How could he then confess the sins of Israel as his own, bearing them in his own spirit before God? It is the same with ourselves. We need to be very near to the Lord before we can eat the sin offering of others. Our own spirits must be free from anything that dishonours the Lord in ourselves or in our own house.
Going ahead with the meal anyway would have been mere performance:
He asks, then, would his eating of the sin offering outwardly be accepted in the sight of the Lord? In other words, he would be going through the form without any real heart in it. Moses recognised the force of this, and was content.
The chapter opens with one failure and closes with another. God did not treat them alike:
So Leviticus 10 opens with positive sin and closes with negative failure. Nadab and Abihu offered unauthorised fire; Eleazar and Ithamar were unable to eat the sin offering. Divine judgement met the first; divine forbearance met the second… The difference between them is wide. One man deliberately rejects a plain command. The other simply cannot rise to the height of a divine privilege. The first is open dishonour done to God; the second is the loss of one's own blessing.
- Search. Moses hunted for the goat because its blood had not gone inside. That kind of sin offering was for eating, not burning.
- Eat. Eating pictured a priest making another's sin his own and carrying it before God.
- Limit. Only Christ could atone. Our part is intercession — never harsh, never merely soft.
- Condition. Grief at home left Aaron unfit for the work, and Moses accepted his honest answer.
- Contrast. Unauthorised fire met judgement; failing to eat met forbearance. One dishonours God, the other loses your own blessing.
Why have ye not eaten the sin-offering in a holy place? for it is most holy, and he has given it to you that ye might bear the iniquity of the assembly, to make atonement for them before Jehovah.
Two priests had just fallen under God's judgment for offering strange fire, and now Moses finds the goat of the sin offering burned instead of eaten. His question to Eleazar and Ithamar rests on one phrase: God gave them that offering so they might bear the iniquity of the people.
There were two kinds of sin offering, and they were not handled the same way. Where the blood went decided what happened to the body:
Sometimes the blood of the victim was brought into the holy place, or into the most holy place. That had to do with the standing of the people before God. In that case the priests did not eat the sin offering, and its body was burned outside the camp. But of the ordinary sin offering the priests did eat. In doing so they entered into the sin of the people before God. They confessed before God a sin that was not their own.
The verse says the offering "has been given" to the priests. That makes it a provision, not just a duty — though few are in a state to take it up:
Here is food on the table the Lord has spread for those who can eat it. It is for those who can take up the sins of others before the Lord, feeling and confessing them as if they were their own. To feed on this divine provision calls for self-judgment, spiritual power and divine intelligence. Few show that measure before God. This food sustains a priestly service that is of the greatest value to the people of God, and that serves the Lord in work needed for the well-being of His church.
"Bear the iniquity" sounds like the language of the cross, so commentators draw a line. What the priests did was real, but it was not atonement:
In a certain sense there is a priestly way in which we have to bear the sins and sorrows of our brothers and sisters. Not, of course, as to atonement. That was Christ's alone, and the blood carried inside was Christ's alone. But there is still a true sense in which we have to bear them. And in this, I believe above everything else, we fail.
Moses does not only ask why they failed to eat. He also names where they should have eaten. The place shows how near to God this service has to be done:
This goes far beyond the kindest feeling. It comes from a deep sense of what is due to God, and from feeling as if we ourselves had offended. This is to bear the iniquity of the assembly: caring for the things that are Christ's, not for the things of men who would excuse the sin and smooth it over. So it was to be eaten in the holy place, not just in a clean place like the peace offering. Propitiation had its unique moment. But priestly grace also has its own place and season, in nearness to God.
The practical opposite of eating the sin offering is not open sin. It is the habit of standing back from a brother's failure and assessing it:
When a brother has sinned, our tendency is to sit in judgment on him. We take the place of a severe critic. We look on his sin as something we have nothing whatever to do with. This is a sad failure in our priestly duties. It is refusing to eat the sin offering in the most holy place. It is a most precious fruit of grace to identify yourself with a brother who has gone wrong, so fully that you make his sin your own and bear it in spirit before God.
The chapter records two failures, and God does not treat them alike:
Leviticus 10 opens with positive sin and closes with negative failure. Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire; Eleazar and Ithamar were unable to eat the sin offering. The first was met by divine judgment, the second by divine forbearance. There could be no allowance for strange fire — it was flatly defying God's plain commandment. Deliberately rejecting a plain command is one thing. Simply not being able to rise to the height of a divine privilege is another. The difference is obvious. The first is open dishonour done to God. The second is the forfeiting of one's own blessing. Neither should happen, but the difference between the two is easy to trace.
- Given — God handed the sin offering to the priests as their portion, food spread on His table.
- Eaten — eating meant taking another's sin inward and owning it before God, confessing a sin that was not their own.
- Borne — the priests really did bear iniquity, but not as atonement. That belonged to Christ alone.
- Near — the meal belonged in the holy place, so this service cannot be done at a distance from God.
- Forfeited — failing to eat was not defiance like strange fire, and God bore with it. But it cost the priests their own blessing.
Lo, its blood was not brought in within the sanctuary ye should certainly have eaten it in the sanctuary, as I commanded.
Moses has just found the goat of the sin offering burned instead of eaten. His anger has a reason: the blood never went into the sanctuary, so the priests were bound to eat the flesh there — and why God required that eating is the real question.
Moses is not inventing a new demand. There were two ways to handle a sin offering. Which one applied depended on where the blood had gone.
The rule for the sin offering was this. If the blood went inside, to be sprinkled before the Lord, the body went outside the camp to be burned. But in the sin offering for offences, the priest was to eat it, and in this the "sons of Aaron" had a share.
Blood taken inside touched the whole nation's place before God. The ordinary offering touched one particular offence, and there the priest had work to do.
When the blood of a victim went into the holy place, or into the holiest place, it had to do with the standing of the people before God. Then the priests did not eat the sin offering; its body was burned outside the camp. But in the ordinary sin offering, the priests ate it, entering into the sin of the people before God, confessing before God sin that was not their own.
Eating was never a meal only. It was a way of taking something into yourself — here, the sin of someone else.
The eating means the same here as it does elsewhere. It is entering into what makes atonement for God, and so of necessity into the sin itself as before Him… When Daniel confessed his sin and the sin of his people, he was surely eating the sin offering. Just such identification of ourselves with the sins of God's saints is a great need for all of us.
Moses names the place where they had to eat it. Some holy food could be eaten in any clean place; this could not.
This goes far beyond the kindest feeling. It carries a deep sense of what is due to God, and a sense that we ourselves had offended. This is to bear the iniquity of the assembly, caring for the things that are Christ's, not for the things of men who would smooth sin over and excuse it. So it was to be eaten, not in a clean place only like the peace offering, but in the holy place.
Eleazar and Ithamar did not defy God as their brothers had. They simply disposed of the offering instead of absorbing it — and that choice is an easy one to repeat.
It is easier to burn the sin offering than to eat it, since the eating needs a moral state we do not always have. We may have righteous indignation against evil, and deal with it in a harsh and judicial way; but God would have us deal with it as if it were our own.
God gave the offering to the priests to bear the iniquity of the congregation. So what does bearing another person's sin look like in practice?
Suppose I were really walking in the power of the place in which I am set. If I see sin in my brother, and go to pray for him, I find him identified with Christ as represented to the world. The garment of Christ is soiled, the honour of Christ is affected, the joy of Christ is hindered… Well, now, it is to bear the misery and the sorrow of all this, as though I had been in the sin myself. Love gets into the place of the sinner, and his sin becomes the occasion of the outgoings of the heart in intercession to God.
One writer takes this all the way to the cross.
This is what the Lord Jesus did in the fullest way, even taking that guilt upon His own shoulders in going to the cross. Every believer should have this same attitude. It will make us true intercessors rather than critics.
The chapter records two failures, and God does not treat them alike.
Leviticus 10 opens with positive sin, and closes with negative failure. Nadab and Abihu offered "strange fire"; and Eleazar and Ithamar were unable to eat the sin offering. God met the first with judgement; the second He met with forbearance… There is a wide difference between a deliberate rejection of a plain command, and mere inability to rise to the height of a divine privilege.
- Blood decides. Blood carried inside meant the body went outside the camp to burn. Blood not carried in meant the priests must eat the flesh in the holy place.
- Eating is entering. To eat the sin offering was to enter into the sin itself before God — confessing, as Daniel did, sin that was not your own.
- Place matters. Not just any clean place, but the sanctuary — we carry the failure of others near to God instead of excusing it among men.
- Burning is the shortcut. Harsh, judicial handling of evil costs us nothing. Treating the sin as our own needs a moral state we may not have.
- Weakness is met with patience. Deliberate rejection of a plain command brought judgement. Falling short of a privilege brought forbearance.
And Aaron said to Moses, Behold, to-day have they presented their sin-offering and their burnt-offering before Jehovah; and such things have befallen me; and had I to-day eaten the sin-offering, would it have been good in the sight of Jehovah?
Fire from the Lord has just killed Aaron's sons Nadab and Abihu, and now Moses finds that the priests burned the sin offering instead of eating it. Aaron's reply is a father's plea at a funeral, and it raises a hard question: can grief excuse a priest from the work God gave him?
Eating the sin offering was not just a priest's meal. It showed how the priest stood toward the people who had sinned.
This offering was for the people. When the priests ate it, they were showing that they entered into the guilt of the people and felt it as if it were their own. This is what the Lord Jesus did in the fullest way, even taking that guilt upon His own shoulders in going to the cross. Every believer should have this same attitude. It will make us true intercessors rather than critics.
Burning the goat was the easier road.
It is easier to burn the sin offering than to eat it, because eating it needs a state of heart we do not always have. We may feel right anger against evil and deal with it in a hard, judging way. But God wants us to deal with it as if it were our own.
Aaron does not defend his sons or dispute the law. He points to what has happened to him that day.
Aaron explained to Moses that his two sons had died that day. It would be too hard for him to rise above his own distress, so he would not be in a fit state of soul to feel the failure of others as he should. He asks, then: would the Lord accept an outward eating of the sin offering? In other words, he would be going through the form with no real heart in it.
Another writer turns Aaron's question into a test for anyone who carries another person's sin to God.
The judgment and feelings of Aaron were right. How could he confess the sins of Israel as his own and carry them in his own spirit before God? Such serious failure in his own house had filled his heart with grief. It is the same with us. We need to be very near to the Lord, and free in our own spirits from anything that dishonours Him, in ourselves or in our own house, before we can eat the sin offering of others.
Eating the sin offering was the highest form of priestly service. Aaron admits he could not rise to it, and one writer prefers that honesty to a show of strength.
Eating the sin offering was the way a priest showed he was fully one with the person who brought it. That called for the priestly capacity and energy pictured in "the sons of Aaron." But here it is very clear that Aaron and his sons were in no state to rise to this high and holy ground. They ought to have been, but they were not… It is far better to be honest in confessing our failure and shortcoming than to claim a spiritual power we simply do not have.
Moses charged Eleazar and Ithamar, yet Aaron is the one who answers.
When Moses charges Eleazar and Ithamar with the sin, Aaron comes in (v. 19) and answers for them; he lays it all upon himself. So it is with Christ for us: He makes Himself responsible for it all.
The next verse records what came of it.
But Aaron lifts up his voice (v. 19), and it prevails. Moses, who gave the command and made the demand, is "content" (v. 20). So, in hearing the voice of our Aaron, lifted up for us, God is "content."
Commentators differ here. One calls Aaron's judgment right; another warns that neither grief nor natural joy should hold us back from this service.
Grief should not stop us acting this way in priestly service before the Lord. But let us take care that natural joy does not stop us either… Have we not shrunk back from carrying the sin of our fellow believers in prayer before the Lord, from eating the sin offering in the holy place? How little the faults of a dear brother hurt us as if they were our own!
- Eat, don't burn. God gave the sin offering to the priests so they would feel another's guilt as their own. Burning it was the easy escape.
- Eat, and you intercede. Entering into the sin of others before God turns a critic into an intercessor.
- Eat honestly. Aaron admitted he could not eat it with a real heart that day. Moses accepted that honesty instead of an empty performance.
- Eat, or admit you can't. Confessing a lack of spiritual power is better than claiming a capacity you do not have.
- One voice for all. Aaron answered for his sons and took the blame himself. In the same way Christ makes Himself responsible for us, and God is content.
And Moses heard it; and it was good in his sight.
Moses had just demanded to know why Aaron's surviving sons burned the sin offering instead of eating it in the holy place. Aaron pointed to the deaths in his own family that same day. The chapter ends with no punishment. Moses accepts the answer instead. So why did God's servant approve when a plain command went unkept?
The Hebrew phrase behind "he was content" echoes Aaron's own question. One writer's rendering of the exchange makes the link visible:
And Aaron said to Moses, "Look, today they have presented their sin offering and their burnt offering before Jehovah, and such things as these have befallen me! Had I eaten the sin offering today, would it have been good in the sight of Jehovah?" And Moses heard, and it was good in his sight.
Aaron was not excusing carelessness. Grief had left him unable to do the act with any real heart in it:
In this case, however, Aaron explained to Moses that his two sons had died that day. It would be too hard for him to rise above the level of his own distress. So he would not be in a fit state of soul to feel the failure of others as he ought. He asks then: would the Lord accept his eating of the sin offering as an outward act only? In other words, he would be going through the form without any real heart in it. Moses recognised the force of this, and was content.
Aaron and his sons should have eaten that offering. They could not. One writer weighs their failure against a worse fault:
On this occasion, however, it is very clear that Aaron and his sons could not rise to this high and holy ground. They ought to have been, but they were not. "Such things have befallen me," said Aaron. No doubt this was a sad thing. Yet, "when Moses heard it, he was content." It is far better to be honest about our failure and shortcoming than to claim a spiritual power that rests on nothing at all.
Nadab and Abihu, two of Aaron's sons, died at the start of this chapter. Their brothers left a command unkept at its end, and they are spared. One writer sets the two side by side:
So Leviticus 10 opens with a sin committed and closes with a duty left undone. Nadab and Abihu offered "strange fire"; Eleazar and Ithamar were unable to eat the sin offering. God met the first with judgement and the second with forbearance. There could be no allowance for "strange fire." It was a direct breach of God's plain command. There is a wide difference between deliberately rejecting a plain command and simply being unable to rise to the height of a divine privilege. The first is open dishonour done to God; the second is the loss of one's own blessing.
The priests ate the sin offering to take the sin of others on themselves before God. That is why Aaron's own condition mattered so much:
The judgment and feelings of Aaron were right. How could he confess the sins of Israel as his own, carrying them in his own spirit before God? Such serious failure in his own house had filled his heart with grief. It is the same with ourselves. We need to be very near to the Lord before we can eat the sin offering of others. Our own spirits must be free from anything in ourselves or in our own house that dishonours Him. Only then can we take their failure on our hearts in the presence of God and confess it as if it were our own.
One writer turns the test on us:
How little do the faults of a dear brother pain us as our own! Have we really pleaded, as feeling the evil, in the intercession of grace? How seldom do we deal with it this way, standing in the gap! There is a vast deal of failure in all of us as to this.
Aaron's voice prevails with Moses, the man who gave the command. One writer reads Aaron here as a picture of the one who speaks to God for us:
But the voice of Aaron is lifted up (v. 19) and it prevails. Moses, the commander and the one who required obedience, is "content" (v. 20). So, when the voice of our Aaron is lifted up on our behalf and heard, God is "content." And here is our comfort under the sense of it all.
- Content, not careless — Aaron asked what God would accept, not what would look correct. Moses heard him and approved.
- Weakness, not wilfulness — God judged the chapter's first failure and bore with the second. Breaking a command is not the same as falling short of a privilege.
- Real, not impressive — admitting you fell short beats claiming a spiritual power you do not have.
- Near, then bearing — first be clear before God yourself. Only then can you carry another's failure as your own.
- His voice, our comfort — Aaron's voice satisfied Moses; our Aaron speaks for us, and God is content.