“They shall be holy unto their God, and not profane the name of their God: for the offerings of the Lord made by fire, and the bread of their God, they do offer: therefore they shall be holy.”
They must be holy to their God and must not profane the name of their God. Because they present the food offerings to the Lord, the food of their God, they are to be holy. The theological rationale for the priestly holiness requirements: the priests who present the food offerings to the Lord — the offerings that represent the covenant community's approach to God — must themselves embody the holiness they mediate. The profaning of the divine name that the priest's failure would produce is not only a personal failure but a communal one: the priest who is unholy represents the community's God as something other than holy.
COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS
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