Monday, May 18, 2015

Leviticus 13: Department Of Public Health

The life of an Old Testament priest wasn't all burnt offerings and incense!  They were also responsible to monitor and determine such public health issues as leprosy and mildew.

Leviticus 13 lays down the rules regarding how a priest ought to make decisions when something is clean or unclean.  Guidelines concerning the appearance of spots, its growth or stability, its color, etc. help to keep the general population of Israelites safe from these problems - and keep panic and mob justice to a minimum.  The priests were the authority charged with being the final arbiter about whether a person needs to be exiled from the community or property needs to be destroyed to keep illness from spreading.

Leprosy may not strike fear into our hearts like it did the ancient Israelites.  Imagine today a plague like Ebola or flesh-eating bacteria.  We would want to do anything we could to stop it and minimize its impact.  Unfortunately, in the ancient world, this meant that life for lepers could be very difficult (vs. 45-46).  It's not surprising that when we reach the New Testament era, people with such unclean diseases were very anxious to seek healing from Jesus.

Which do you think is more important: the need of the public to be safe from contagion and panic, or the right of a diseased individual to live in community?

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