Immanuel Lutheran Church Study Forum

Hello Everyone,
Let year I asked Pastor about the state of modern-day Judaism—how can the Jews continue to find meaning in a faith that calls for sacrifice at the temple in Jerusalem when they no longer have a temple or access to any other place of sacrifice? His answer was that Judaism is in a very sad state because they no longer have any means of carrying out the O.T. commands. Animal sacrifice more or less ended when the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 AD. I have a general understanding of the three major strains of Judaism and the main scriptures, with the Tanach corresponding to our Old Testament and the Torah to the first 5 books of the O.T., but I was wondering where the Jewish response to God's commands to sacrifice stands today and decided to do a search online. I found an interesting NPR article from 2017:
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandso ... -jerusalem

Although the command to pray seems to have replaced the former command to sacrifice, apparently some Jews living near Jerusalem have been trying to reestablish animal sacrifice by transporting baby goats or lambs close to the Temple Mount with the intention of sacrificing them. One family, the Federmans, attempted this for 10 years, but were stopped by Isaraeli police and the animals turned over to animal welfare organizations. If they could make it to the Temple Mount with the animal(s), the intention was to use a portable altar and "priests" dressed in priestly garb. Then in 2017, Israeli police actually allowed an animal sacrifice about 1/4 mile from the Temple Mount. However, all of this is totally against the very specific instructions given to Moses by Yahweh himself, and of course, as Christians we believe there is an ultimate reason for the inability to sacrifice today—Jesus removed the need for it once and for all. Long live the animals! They, like we, have been released from bondage.

How bloody the tabernacle must have been!
As blood hitting the ground was unclean, and anyone touching blood was unclean, how did the tribe of Levi avoid the blood spilled? The Levites camped on all four sides of the Tabernacle, so where did all the blood go that was spilled?

Huge amount of blood. Especially reading in Numbers about the total amount of animals to be slaughtered for the various seasons and offerings.

Blood everywhere.

During the 40ish years of Numbers the only way to eat meat (other than the quail from God) was to offer an animal as a sacrifice, then your family would get to eat most of it. Today in Deuteronomy we read that this rule is about to change. The Israelites will soon be able to kill/eat from their own flocks/herds at home, but a new restriction is coming to only sacrifice at a single place to be named in the future (Jerusalem/Temple once God identifies it).

This solves one problem in that local sacrifices could easily move toward local pagan customs. This centralized control will also allow the Levites to ensure the sacrifices are done correctly and make sure the Levites are paid via the tithe system.

It also creates one problem. If you don't live near the Temple, you have a more limited opportunity to sacrifice and a more limited opportunity to have your sins absolved. So if you can only make the trip to the Temple a couple times a year (Moses names 3 mandatory feasts) and you sin on your way home (even inadvertently), you may have to carry that sin for months. What does that do for your chances at Heaven? Maybe that's why eventually the heaven believers (Pharisees) would become so rule obsessed and the Sadducees would deny an afterlife. Jesus solves this problem!