Episode 1: Leviticus: Why Leviticus is better than you think: A conversation with Jay Sklar

Leviticus might be the most avoided book in the Bible—but what if it's actually one of the most important? Join us as we chat with Jay Sklar, professor of Old Testament at Covenant Theological Seminary, about the value of getting into this Bible book together.

• Questions to Dig into over a Cup of Tea

  1. What's been your experience of Leviticus up to this point?

  2. How did our conversation with Jay Sklar whet your appetite to dig into this book?

  3. Spend some time over the next week either reading or listening to the whole of Leviticus.

• A Thanks to our Listeners

  This episode has been made possible because of you — our wonderful listeners!

  A little while ago, we invited you to help us keep the kettle on by donating the cost of a cuppa, so that we could continue creating this podcast. This season is the result of the incredible generosity of so many of you who joined our ‘Keep the Kettle On’ campaign.

  We are so thankful for the many ways you support Two Sisters and a Cup of Tea — through praying for us, listening along, sharing episodes with others, engaging with us, and giving financially. Your encouragement means so much & enables us to keep encouraging, equipping and modelling what it can look like to open up the Bible in everyday life.

  Thank you for being part of this journey with us!

• Episode Transcript

  The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.

  Felicity: Welcome to Two Sisters in a Cup of Tea, the Bible study podcast for everyday life. Pop the kettle on, grab a cup of tea, and enjoy an English style biscuit because we're starting a new season and we can't wait to get going. Each season we journey through a book of the Bible not just to understand it better, but to let God's word shape our hearts. This season we're diving deep into the Old Testament as we seek to get our heads and hearts around the book of Leviticus together. Now, whether you've been with us from the beginning, or you're joining us for the first time right now, we're so glad you're here. I wonder what you think when we mention the word Leviticus, perhaps a whole heap of irrelevant laws, a ton of goat's blood, and some priestly antics thrown in. What we've learnt over the years is the more a Bible book feels foreign and unfamiliar to us, the more important it is to delve into it and discover what's going on beneath the surface. That's what we're wanting to do this season, and we really hope you'll join us for the journey.

  Sarah: We can't promise a lot of answers, but we can assure you of our deep desire to wrestle with what's there in scripture and work out how we live in light of it as Christians today. To help us on the journey, we're starting our season with a conversation with Jay Sklar, a professor in Old Testament biblical studies and someone who has spent many years soaking in Leviticus. Friends, this conversation is gold. It's going to stir your heart for the truths of Leviticus and it's going to whet your appetite for all that's to come. Before we get there though, we want to share our deep gratitude to every listener who has helped to make this season happen. Earlier this year we shared our need with you and you blew us away with your gospel partnership cheerfully giving towards the podcast to help us keep the kettle on. Thank you. Without further ado, let's get to our conversation with Jay.

  Felicity: We're delighted to be joined by Dr. Jay Sklar as we kick off this season in Leviticus. Jay, thank you so much for being with us. Before I try and describe all the things that you do, could you just tell us a bit about yourself, what you're doing at this moment? What does life look like?

  Jay Sklar: Yeah, sure. Thanks so much. It's such a delight to join you all. so I am a professor of Old Testament studies. I teach things like Hebrew and book studies in the Old Testament, especially Genesis through Deuteronomy. I've been at Covenant Seminary in St. Louis since 2001, more importantly, I'm married to Ski. We've been married almost 30 years now, which has been 30 years of blessing for me and sanctification for her. And I guess finally I'd say I love all things French. I I'm not a native speaker, but can speak French well enough that sometimes I get invited to teach at a seminary in the south of France in Aix-en-Provence called Faculté Jean Calvin. And so that's just a delight for me to to engage with brothers and sisters from other countries and other places.

  Sarah: Amazing, so wonderful and on top of that is you are a Leviticus enthusiast, we've been so encouraged by you already, but it sounds like you're enthusiastic for tea and Leviticus together, tell us a bit more Jay.

  Jay: You know, I I have thought about this question since I've known I've been coming on this podcast. And what kind of tea do you drink with Leviticus? And it seems to me that it really depends on what chapter you're in. And so I've not done a full scope, but I've got three different suggestions depending on the chapter. So if you're in tabernacle texts, like chapters one through ten, then I think you'd probably want something that's perfumey, like an a nice Earl grey, because it would complement the sense of incense that's going up in the tabernacle. if you're in the purity texts, like chapters 11 through 15, then you probably want something like 100% Ceylon, something pure, crisp, clean. Mixtures are not a good thing when it comes to purity. So, Felicity, I'm sorry, like the Yorkshire tea. A no-go when you're in chapters 11 through 15. You need a cleansing. 

  Sarah: You need a cleansing tea

  Jay: And then if you're in a place like Leviticus 26, where you have all these blessings of the covenant in the first part of the chapter, lots of those blessings focus on the land just producing all this, all these crops and vegetation. And so you'd probably want your favorite fruity tea there. And and my most recent favorite fruity tea, I do not make any money for naming this, but there's a a company called Damon Frere, it's a French company and they have this tea that's called Bali. And it's a green tea that has hints of or actually strong notes of grapefruit and peach and jasmine. It's absolutely lovely. So it's something to to drink when you're reading about fruitfulness and fecundity and all these things.

  Felicity: What? It's like the most thorough tea answer we've ever had. And you're even using terms like the notes that sound within that tea. There's a certain tea expertise. So not only Leviticus expertise, but tea. Very impressive. I mean, do you have a biscuit choice that goes with that? Or is that a stretch too far?

  Jay: You know, I hadn't thought too much about how biscuits would complement a book like Leviticus.

  Sarah: I think we've hit the Tea peak, I think it's okay to stay there.

  Felicity: But you, so Jay, you've spent a lot of time studying Leviticus, writing on Leviticus, teaching Leviticus. You've been digging into this book for a long time, over 15 years as far as I can make out. What are some of the main lessons that you've been learning after studying Leviticus for this length of time?

  Jay: Well, there have been some really important ones along the way. First of all, if you are at a dinner party and you're wanting to get out of a conversation, if you just mention to people you've been studying Leviticus for more than 15 years, it works flawlessly. Every single time. In fact, if you mention that, I found that you get two types of smile. Some people smile and and they're they're genuinely excited. They love the Old Testament, they know Leviticus, helps you understand Jesus better. So that so they get excited. But more often than not, the type of smile is the type of smile that says, well, at least he's not hurting anyone. There have been tons of other positive lessons, and I'm sure we'll get to some of those as we go along with the questions today.

  Sarah: But you've hit, as you say that, you've hit on something that we all kind of feel, think, there's trepidation when we come to a Leviticus, isn't there? Why do so many people struggle with it? Why is it something that kind of just kind of feels a bit, oh, I'm just not sure I can go there? What is it, do you think?

  Jay: It seems to me there are multiple reasons why many of us struggle today with Leviticus. Whenever I teach on it, I actually ask my class, for anyone here, is Leviticus their favorite book? And I tell them this is a serious question. And about once every two to three years, someone raises their hand. But it's not very often because most people they actually struggle with Leviticus. I think there are multiple reasons. Let me give you three or four. One. The genre of the book. Leviticus is almost entirely law. And there are very few people that think, well, let me just go home tonight and cuddle up with, you know, 27 chapters of law. That's not how most of us think. So the genre makes it difficult. there's the whole issue of Leviticus feeling so culturally foreign to us today. If you think about, a worship service in Leviticus. Animals are being slaughtered. There's blood flying everywhere. You know, and I compare that with my church. We can't even throw rice at a wedding, right? So there, I mean, so many of these things, there's just cultural distance. And related to that, some of the things that we find in Leviticus seem so impractical for us today. So there are a lot of regulations about how do you offer certain sacrifices. And especially for Christians today who are thinking, well, we have Jesus, the final sacrifice. We're thinking, how does this relate to us? Yeah, very few of us lose sleep at night thinking, now with the burnt offering, do I put one hand on the the head of the animal or two hands? I mean, these things seem very unrelated to life. Another reason is that some of the laws as we read through seem to us not just strange. Don't wear clothing of two different types of material. Some of them feel even wrong. When you read through Leviticus 12, and a woman has a baby and she's ritually impure, she's impure twice as long when she's had a girl compared to when she has had a boy. And so those kinds of things, you know, we trip over and we stumble because we're like, this feels unfair to us. So all of these things combined together to make Leviticus often a pretty challenging book for us to read today.

  Felicity: I think that's true and I'm sure a number of our listeners will be in the habit of reading through the Bible over the course of a year or trying to do that and often Leviticus can be the of the graveyard of that attempt. Sarah and I have been really enjoying getting into Leviticus in preparation for these conversations. Why is it though that we should overcome or seek to overcome these barriers, these things that make it difficult? Why is it that Leviticus is worth it? Why is it still important, even though we're not in those sacrificing bulls, cultural, contextual situations that are described there?

  Jay: Yes, and there are several reasons. The first I would say is that the New Testament authors thought it was important. What's fascinating, if as you're reading through the New Testament, you'll see it's often quoting from the Old Testament. There are 39 books in the Old Testament. And if you were to ask the question, when the New Testament quotes Old Testament books, if you were to line up those books from most quoted Old Testament books to least quoted Old Testament books, where might you guess that Leviticus shows up in the list? In fact, sometimes I'll ask my class, if we were writing the New Testament, where would Leviticus show up in the list? You know, the answer is it would be between 38 and 39, you know, struggling with Chronicles. That's where. But in actuality, it is the sixth most quoted book in the New Testament. The New Testament writers, Christians, thought it was important. That's already showing us, Leviticus, we should probably view it as important as well. A second reason is that the topics that it deals with, things like sacrifice and atonement, these are all central to understanding who Jesus is and what Jesus came to do. And so understanding Leviticus better actually helps us understand Jesus better. And there's a story here that just to me illustrates this so beautifully. There were some missionaries that went to Papau New Guinea, and they went and lived with a tribe and spent a year learning the tribe's language, and they got to a point where they were ready to teach this tribe about God. They knew they couldn't start in the New Testament because this tribe knew nothing about the Bible. And they the missionaries knew the New Testament doesn't make sense without the Old, so they started back in Genesis 1 and they marched through the Old Testament. Every time they got to a story about sacrifice, they made sure to explain: God in his love has made a way to deal with our wrongs so that we might be made right with him. And he does that through the blood of a spotless lamb. Well, they finally get to the New Testament, and for a week, Jesus is the village hero. The tribespeople are just overwhelmed by the kindness of Jesus and the power of Jesus and the teaching of Jesus. Well, at the end of the week, they get to the story of the crucifixion. And what the missionaries did was they invited another tribe in that had converted to Christianity to to act out the story of the crucifixion. And the character, the man who was playing the Jesus figure, he had a t’shirt on and under his t’shirt he had a bag of red dye. And as the the trial of Jesus starts and he's being beaten, you can see that the tribespeople are so confused. It does not make sense to them why people would treat Jesus this way. And then they get to the point where the Christ figure is on the cross, and you might remember that a soldier comes along and puts a spear in Jesus' side. And and so when that happened, they're acting this out, it happens, and the bag of dye breaks. And the shirt begins to soak red as though with blood. And at that moment, on the face of some of the tribespeople, you could see the dawn of comprehension. And as the story finished, and the Christ figure went into the tomb and then came out resurrected, and the missionary stood forward and said, It's because of Jesus that your sins could be forgiven. All of a sudden, this man, a village elder, jumps up. And he shouts out, I Tao, which means in his language, like, I believe. And he goes on to say, I believe that Jesus is the Lamb of God, and because of him, my sins are forgiven and I'm right with God. And now a village elder lady jumps up and she starts yelling, I Tau. And and pretty soon everyone is standing. And in this tribe, the way they showed joy was by jumping up and down. And there comes this tipping point where the whole tribe is jumping up and down this mosh pit of praise. And they understood what Jesus had done because they understood the things in Leviticus. And so understanding Leviticus is so helpful for understanding who Jesus is.

  Sarah: So powerful that, it? And yeah, wow, that really does stir our hearts to want to kind of get into this to see how we're going to see Jesus. Before we get there though, Jay, can you give us a flavor of where Leviticus shows up in the story? Can you give us some context? We're landing here, we see in verse one that the Lord called to Moses and spoke to him from the tent of meeting. Can you just give us a bit of the bigger picture as we launch into it?

  Jay: Yes, and this is so important because it's so easy to lose the narrative thread by the time you get to Leviticus. So imagine before, during, and after here. So before, you're an Israelite. What have you been doing? What's going on? And the answer is: well, you were enslaved in Egypt. The Lord sends Moses. He delivers you, he brings you to Mount Sinai. So we're in the book of Exodus here. You get to Mount Sinai in Exodus chapter 19. And now for the rest of the book of Exodus, what you have is the Lord giving Israel entering into covenant relationship with Israel. He tells Israel, you are going to be my kingdom of priests and a holy nation. And then he gives them the Ten Commandments, other commands, and has them build this tabernacle, this huge tent, like think wedding-sized tent, that's going to be in their midst. And that's because he wants to come and dwell among them. And Exodus ends, you see the cloud of glory descending on the tabernacle. And now Yahweh is there, dwelling in the midst of Israel. And at this point, if you're an Israelite, you've got some burning questions. You are wondering: okay, we've entered into covenant relationship with this God. We're to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. What does that mean? What does that look like? Answer. Leviticus. You're wondering, we have this God of absolute burning purity in our midst. How can we have him in our midst without his holiness liquefying us in our sin and in our impurity? Answer Leviticus. We're going into a promised land, and in that land, we're to establish what God's kingdom on earth looks like. How are we supposed to do that? What's that going to look like? Answer Leviticus. So, in other words, we often look at Leviticus as a burden, but for the Israelites, they were to look at it as a blessing. Because at this point in the story, it's answering these key questions for them that were so important. How do we live as a kingdom of priests? How do we enter into relationship and maintain relationship with this God who's now in our midst? What will it look like for us to set up his his kingdom, if you will, here on earth?

  Felicity: I was like, wow, just being able to even begin to put ourselves into the shoes of the people at that time. And it's just really profound that this, what you were saying there, that it seems to us like it's just something that we need to get through as we read the Bible sometimes, especially if you're doing a kind of Bible over-through kind of thing. But this, actually that this would be a blessing that would enable the means by which the people can be who, well, God's people can be who we're supposed to be. That is, I think, as we've been, Sarah and I have been talking about it and studying it, that's been a profound shift in how we've been thinking about this. I think though, we're going to be encouraging our listeners to spend as much time kind of reading Leviticus, rereading it, kind of spending some time in this book. We still will get to those bits where we're thinking, well, how is this actually relevant to us? So that big picture is really helpful. But how is it that we can determine, especially in relation to all these laws and the different purity, impurity, clean, unclean, these sins that are intentional and unintentional, there's so much of that in it. How do we determine which are relevant to us today as we kind of get into this?

  Jay: Yes, that that's such an important question. And it on the one hand, it could be there's a lot of complicated discussion that's gone into how do we figure how do we figure this out? And I think there's a way of simplifying some of that discussion. And and so in my mind, here here's how I think through this question of how do we know which laws apply today and how they apply and this sort of thing. So if we think of the big picture of the whole biblical story, and I asked the question, well, Leviticus was part of what covenant? And the answer is, well, it's part of the covenant from Sinai. It's part of the old covenant. Well, as believers, what covenant are we under today? Well, we're we're under the new covenant. So we're not under the old covenant, we're under the new, and that means on the one hand, that the laws of Leviticus don't necessarily apply to us today. Why? Because we're under a new covenant. But you hear that word necessarily. They don't necessarily apply. And that is such an important word for for at least two reasons. And the first is that lots of laws in Leviticus are repeated today. So love your neighbor as yourself. I was watching a clip once and and a person said, You know, I'm not a a Leviticus person, I'm a love your neighbour as yourself person. And I thought, Well, surprise, surprise, you know, Leviticus ch19 v18, that's where that comes from. And that's repeated several times in the New Testament. Right? So you've got some laws in Leviticus that are repeated today. And so that's fairly obvious. Those are ones we keep. But even when a law is not repeated, and this is one of the most important things I find that my students grab a hold of when we're in Leviticus. Laws represent the values of the lawgiver. Laws represent the values of the lawgiver. So I'll ask my students, so why do we have laws today against murder? What's the underlying value? And they say, Well, life. Why do we have laws against stealing today? What's the underlying value? Well, we value the right to private property. Why do we have laws against speeding? And the answer is, well, our our municipalities need the income, right? No, no, it's again the the answer is, well, it's life. We with the value of life. And so once we understand that, that laws represent the values of the lawgiver, and once we understand these are the Lord's laws. Now all of a sudden we're in a point to at a point to say, well, if this is a book full of the Lord's laws, it means that Leviticus is actually a window into what the Lord values. And so when you're reading Leviticus, and there are some laws where it's much easier to do this than with other laws, but you want to be asking the question: well, what's an underlying value here? So for example, Leviticus nineteen. This is the Sermon on the Mount of the Book of Leviticus. And in Leviticus nineteen, we read these well-known verses. When you're harvesting your field, do not harvest to the very edge of your field. Leave a portion unharvested, so that the resident alien and the orphan and the widow can come and they can glean in the field and so in class we'll talk about this and I'll say, you know, awesome, what kind of values are on display here? And the students very quickly see, well, compassion, compassion for the unfortunate. The Lord in fact values compassion more than he values you, maximizing personal profit. As we continue to discuss it, the conversation often turns to the fact, do you notice how in the law it lets those who do not have go in and and work for the food that they have? You know, it's not just, hey, harvest your whole food, your whole field and then give out some. It's no, it leaves some so that and students begin to recognize, there's an underlying value here in terms of the dignity of work. And how we're created to work, and that dignifies. And so the the poor here are able to come in and and when they eat their bread, able to say, Yeah, I I harvested that, I worked for that. And so you have all these values. Is a farmer today under the new covenant supposed to leave one strip of his field? No, we're under the new covenant. But there's an underlying set of values there that are to play out in our lives. So understanding that is perhaps one of the most important pieces for understanding what's going on in Leviticus. There's a whole nother, I'm not sure we'll have time, there's a whole nother way to answer the question when it comes to things like ritual purity and impurity, which are such a big part of Leviticus, but understanding the values is a really helpful starting point.

  Sarah: So helpful, Jay. Thank you. So helpful. And I think in your commentary, you particularly draw out the Lord's Prayer and the beginning of the Lord's Prayer as a way of just seeing it fleshed out as well in terms of the hallowed be your name, your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. And just that the idea that actually as we seek to see the value of these laws reflecting the lawgiver, we're actually given a taste of his kingdom coming, aren't we? We're giving a taste of Eden restored, which again is a big theme that's going to come out in Leviticus, it? And that's just so, so helpful to kind of just see the structure behind the scenes and yeah, the underneath, what undergirds it.

  Jay: Yeah, I mean you come to the end of a chapter like chapter nineteen, which has all scores of laws that talk about things like justice in the courts, honesty in human relationships, compassion for the poor, respect for the elderly. And if you think of all of those things lived out, I mean, tell me what postal code or zip code that is. I want to move there, right? Because what you would see would be this society the kind of society that we dream for and that we long for. And that shouldn't surprise us because these are the Lord's values and He's created us to experience those things.

  Sarah: Yeah, we would, as we were kind of thinking through these things, just talking it through, we were just, we were lamenting the fact that the subtitles are so unhelpful because they can be the things, you the headings that put in because at some points they just say other laws and you're like, no, it should be the beauty of the Lord and his kingdom. Like there's just so much that's missed just by those kind of those headings. So much to explore. Jay, tell us a bit about what still kindles your heart for Jesus as you continue to sit in Leviticus, what really stirs your love for Jesus?

  Jay: So my wife and I lived in England for three and a half years, and I was doing my PhD there in the book of Leviticus. And so I was getting up in the morning, I'd walk my wife into work, ski into work, and then come home, and then really from nine to five would be studying Leviticus. And at the end of a year of doing that. And I was focused especially on understanding the sacrificial system and what atonement means. And at the end of a year, I found that I'd be in church and a song would go up on the screen and it would mention atonement, or it would mention ransom, Jesus being the ransom for us. And it was really hard for me not to cry because studying Leviticus and what it says about atonement and what Jesus has done in sacrifice, I understood or what what happens in sacrifice, I understood so much more deeply the how much more of what Jesus has done. And so I'd put it this way: the New Testament, book of Hebrews, it at one point it talks about the how much more when it comes to Jesus, you know, it's it talks a lot about Leviticus, but it keeps saying, How much more when it comes to Jesus? So I think of things like the priesthood. So in Leviticus, these priests play such an important role, but they're sinful, they need atonement and sacrifice for themselves, and they they keep on dying. And then you get to Hebrews and it says, and look at Jesus, this priest, who is how much more? He is sinless, he doesn't make sacrifices for his sin. He is the sacrifice for our sin, and he is interceding alive for us right at this very moment. How much more. Or you think about something like God in our midst. So Leviticus focuses on the fact that God is now dwelling in the midst of the people, but as you read through, you realize but there's a separation. He's in the most holy place, and no one goes in there except the high priest, and then only once a year. So God's here and yet separate. And then you get to Jesus. How much more is He present and with us? I mean, He comes in the flesh, John 1:14, in the Greek where it says that it's often translated and He dwelt among us. But the Greek verb there is the same one used to talk about the tabernacle in the Greek version of the Old Testament. So it's it's really the the King James Version gets it well that he tabernacled among us. Now he's you have God rubbing shoulders with us, holding our babies in his arms and blessing them, reaching out his hand and touching the leper and saying, be clean, breaking bread with us. I mean, it staggers belief. How much more? And then you think of something like atonement. Every time I take communion, I repeat to myself Leviticus 17:11. Leviticus 17:11 says this for the life of the flesh, it's talking about sacrifice and what happens in sacrifice. It says for the life of the flesh is in the blood. And I and it's hard to capture in the in English translation, but there's an emphasis, there's an extra I in the Hebrew, the ani nutativ lachem, and I, I myself have given this to you upon the altar. In other words, we often think of sacrifice as something we give to God, which in a certain sense is true. But when it comes to atonement, the Bible emphasizes sacrifice is something God gives to us. And so every time, like it's just totally reversing this. You can't earn it. God has to give it to you. And when it comes to Jesus, like in the Old Testament, I still had to bring the sacrificial animal. What happens with Jesus? Now you have God, the offended party, providing in his love the atoning sacrifice on our behalf. God demonstrates his own love for us in this. While we were sinners, Christ died for us and so understanding that, and that's why I'm repeating Leviticus 17:11, every time I take communion, because it just reminds me of what God has done in his love to make a way that we might be made right with him, because that's his heart's deepest longing.

  Felicity: Wow. just thank you, Jay. That is such a, what a tantalizing kind of just treasure that we have as we spend some time in this book and that Jesus would, that we would see him to be how much more. That is just so good. So good. Well, I wonder, Jay, whether we're going to have to wrap up our conversation, but I wonder whether you might pray for us, pray for our listeners as we kick off. I mean, I'm just, I just can't wait to get into this Leviticus season now, but maybe you could pray for us as we finish. Thank you.

  Jay: I'd be delighted to do so. Heavenly Father, we thank you for a book like Leviticus, which, though to us it's often so strange and confusing and hard to read, yet in your love, you were speaking to your people, helping them to know some of the most important things about what it meant to be in relationship with you, what it meant to love one another, and Lord, providing it so that we might more deeply, clearly, better understand one day who it is that Jesus is and what it is that He came to do. Lord Jesus, we thank you that you are the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, our perfect high priest, now, even this very moment, interceding for us. We give you glory and ask that through your Holy Spirit you would use this study in Leviticus to help many people understand more deeply and clearly and sweetly who you are and what it is you've done, we pray this in Jesus' name, amen.

  Sarah: Amen. Amen. Jay, thank you so much for your generosity of time, your enthusiasm just for serving us and our listeners. We are so appreciative and we look forward to getting stuck in. So next Friday, tune back in. We will be in chapters one to three to kick off season in Leviticus properly and we can't wait and we will see everyone then. Goodbye.

  Felicity: See you then, goodbye.

  Jay: Bye Bye.

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