Lev. 5: Good grief, more sins and offerings

I found out a few things that are sin in Leviticus 5. At the time of the writing, it was a sin to not speak up if you hear a public charge to testify regarding something you have witnessed. Makes sense. It's just doing the right thing. It goes hand in hand with Exodus 23:7 about the seriousness of false charges. God will not acquit the guilty of those who shed an innocent man's blood.

Also, uncleanness is transferable. Touching the carcass of an unclean wild or domestic animal, or one that moves along the ground (even if a person doesn't know about it) makes them unclean and therefore guilty. Death is a result of sin, and sin begets death. Sin/death are unclean. Both are inextricably linked together. Its clearly not an issue of "touching a dead thing." It also goes for touching human uncleanness. Maybe someone touches a dead animal and then touches another person. That second person is guilty. They have been infected. Is there anyway to know? These are unintentional unknowing sins.

Scary to think of what I may be guilty of right now. How would I know? Would God come down and say something? Could I depend on that? Would God influence another to let me know? If there is a way in, there must be a way out.

Another thing God won't tolerate is thoughtlessly taking an oath to do something. You know, "I swear to god I'll have this finished by Tuesday." "I swear to god I didn't know I was doing 90, officer." Good or evil, people who do this even unintentionally are guilty.

A guilty person here is told to "confess" in what way he has sinned. I may be wrong, but I believe this is the first instance in the Bible (Lev. 5:5) of having to confess one's sin. Did he have to confess to God or to the priest, who made atonement through the sacrifice? I'm not sure what (if any) direct contact with God's presence the people of Israel had. The priesthood was established for a reason, to mediate between God and man.

The sacrifice here is a lamb, or two doves or pigeons if the person cannot afford a lamb. In case the person can't afford the birds, they can bring a grain offering. The lamb is a sin offering. With the two birds, one is the sin offering (blood, sprinkling, etc) and the other is a burnt offering (sizzle). With the flour, there is the memorial offering (burned) and the rest belongs to the priest. This was how to attain forgiveness.

In previous chapters, we talked about the priesthood and the tabernacle and its effects as being holy and consecrated. Defiling them was a serious sin against God. The penalty for this was a ram without defect. Restitution must be made with the ram in equal value plus 1/5, or 20% for those of you who went to public school, like me. It doesn't say (at least by the end of Leviticus 5) that the ram will be slaughtered, gutted and burned. Good thing the priest was set in place to make atonement as a third party between God and man. He was able to set it right with the offerings.