Leviticus

PREFACE

This book is called Leviticus, namely because in this name the argument of the whole book is made plain. The tribe of Levi obtained by lot the ministry of the tabernacle, in which it was commanded that sacrifices, and firstfruits, and the offerings of the firstborn be offered, because all the sacrifices pertain to the Levites. From these this book has obtained by lot a fitting name, a book which sets all these things in order. In Latin it is called *Offertorius* or *sacrificativus*, because it treats of sacrifices and ceremonies. It is rightly placed here after Exodus: for in that book the tabernacle is ordained, in this are contained the things which the Lord was speaking to Moses concerning the tabernacle, and the ceremonies of the tabernacle. But if anyone should ask why the books of the law were divided, since the history is undivided in time, this must be answered: that the division of the books might take away weariness from the reader, just as a traveller too divides the stretches of the road, so that the labor, being as it were divided, may be lessened. Rabanus gathered many things from Hesychius, bishop of Jerusalem, who expounded Leviticus fully enough, and from other Fathers too, who expounded some of his opinions, he added certain things to his own work, and out of the confused order of the opinions, by alternating the opinions of many doctors, he composed a certain order of exposition. Before all things it is necessary that the interpretation of the law be drawn to anagoge, and that the spiritual understanding be searched out within the letter. For this does not contradict the law, but defends it. That the spiritual understanding is to be diligently sought out Christ himself also shows, who in his parables called the field, the world; the husbandman sowing the good seed, the just; the tares, the wicked; the reapers too, the angels; and the enemy oversowing, the devil. Who then forbids to call him who works justice an ox; as a sheep, the simple; and the innocent, a dove; and a turtledove, those who conduct themselves more loftily and are at leisure for contemplation? Did not Ezekiel call Jerusalem a lioness, and her whelp Eliachim, who was led into Egypt, and another whelp Joachim, led into Babylon? That not only the things which are said in parables, but also the things which are according to the history, are to be led to a loftier understanding, Paul shows, saying: *It is written that Abraham had two sons,* etc.; after which he added: *Which things are said according to allegory: for these are the two Testaments,* etc.. But perhaps the letter, stripped of the spiritual understanding, will be harmful, and liable to various reproaches. Whence through Ezekiel the Lord calls the law both good and not good, saying: *I gave them my precepts, and I showed them my judgments, which if a man do, he shall live in them.* And elsewhere: *I gave them commandments not good, and judgments in which they shall not live.* It is plain, therefore, that they are good and not good; and that there are those in which they live and those in which they do not live: for he who keeps the Holy Spirit lives in them; but he who lives according to the flesh dies, because he does not know the life in them. Then the lawgiver willed the surface of the law to be kept not always, but for a set time, that he might restrain the hard neck of the Jews; whence: *I know that this people is of a stiff neck*; but Hosea calls the Jews a heifer that shies away, one namely that is in no way tamed. And elsewhere: *Ephraim is a heifer taught to love threshing, I passed over the beauty of her neck*; in which obedience is signified. For he imposed the yoke of the law, that being humbled they might willingly take up the light and sweet yoke of the Gospel. If, following certain men even of our own, we were to follow the simple understanding, and were to receive the voice of the lawgiver without any twist of the word (as they themselves are wont to laugh at us) and without the cloud of allegory, then I, a churchman living under the faith of Christ and set in the midst of the Church, am compelled by the authority of the divine precept to sacrifice calves or lambs, and to offer fine flour with frankincense and oil: the Lord himself, therefore, the Holy Spirit himself, is to be entreated, that he may deign to take away every cloud of sin which darkens the sight of our heart, so that we may behold the spiritual understanding, according to that saying: *Open thou mine eyes, and I shall consider the wondrous things,* etc.. Every diversity of victims prefigured the victim of Christ. Whence, *the truth being offered, the shadow ceased*, prefiguring the true sacrifice of the true and eternal priest. And therefore, when the victims of animals were offered for cleansing, the one true victim of Christ was promised, in which there should be made the remission of the sins contracted from flesh and blood, which shall not possess the kingdom of God: because the bodily substance shall be changed into a heavenly quality. Christ was offered in the calf, because of the strength of the cross; in the lamb, because of innocence; in the ram, because of headship; in the he-goat, because of the likeness of the flesh of sin; in the turtledove and the dove, because he is God and man. For the Mediator of God and of men was shown in the conjunction of two substances; in the sprinkling of the fine flour it was shown that the Church, that is, the body of Christ, has been gathered out of believers through the water of baptism. But we morally offer a calf, when we conquer the pride of the flesh; a lamb, when we correct irrational motions; a kid, when we overcome wantonness; a dove, while we are simple; a turtledove, while we are chaste, or while we keep chastity; unleavened loaves, when we feast not in the leaven of malice, but in the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. He says that the several sacrifices, nay almost the several syllables, and the vestments of Aaron, and the whole Levitical order, breathe out heavenly mysteries. Origen too says: That just as in the last days the Word of God, clothed with flesh from the Virgin Mary, went forth into the world, whose flesh was seen by all, while his divinity, known to few and to the elect, was covered over: so the word of God is brought forth to men through the prophets, there covered by the veil of flesh, here by the veil of the letter. The letter is looked upon as flesh: the spiritual sense is perceived as divinity.