Cut off
“But the person who does anything defiantly, whether he is native or an alien, that one is blaspheming the Lord; and that person shall be cut off from among the people.” Numbers 15:30
Cut off – If you give it a moment’s thought, you will realize that there is a lot of cutting in the Bible. There are sacrifices where animals are cut into pieces. There are covenant agreements where cuts are made to memorialize the promises. There is the sign of the covenant in circumcision. Cutting and blood are part of the demonstration of God’s promise to men and part of the illustration of the seriousness of the consequences.
These customs are not familiar to us. But they continue today in the Arabic world. A man who is convicted of stealing has his hand cut off. Not just any hand, but his right hand. Why? Because that is the hand he uses to feed himself. To lose your right hand is equivalent to being sentenced to starvation. But there is one ritual that we carry with us that still contains that idea of being cut. It is the ritual of excommunication – being cut off from fellowship. Today the impact of excommunication is significantly reduced because we live in a post-religious society. But in the past, excommunication meant exclusion from vital community. It meant being without protection, without interaction, without provision and without God. It meant death.
This verse in Numbers carries the idea of excommunication. It might even mean a sentence of immediate death. The word karath can mean destruction (see Genesis 9:11) but it also implies exclusion. The important part of this verse is the reason why excommunication and death occur. Do you see that there is no forgiveness for deliberate sin? In this passage in Numbers, Moses lays out the law about unintentional sins and mistakes. For those there are sacrifices for forgiveness. But for deliberate acts of revolt against God the sentence is exclusion. There is no provision for sacrificial forgiveness. There is only “cutting off”.
If you’re like me, you just threw up your hands and said, “Oh, my. What can I do? I have deliberately sinned, over and over. How can you say that there is no forgiveness for me?” God did not abandon us. The Jewish religious system of sacrifices contained no sacrifice for deliberate sin, but God’s compassionate heart did. The sacrifice for our deliberate sin required atonement by the Son. Yeshua became the ultimate scapegoat, the animal that bore all the sins of the people away to death.
Numbers 15:30 tells us something terribly important. Sin is no trivial matter. Sin destroys. It was so critical that the Israelites had no choice but to cut off those who deliberately rebelled against God. That should give us pause. Do you realize how serious your situation really was before God’s compassion rescued you?
Today: Are you included in His fellowship? If you are, it is only because He brought you back from excommunication. Today would be a good day to thank Him.
Skip,
My wife and I have been on a journey back to Torah obedience and have enjoyed your insights into the Hebrew / Greek mindset differences.
As we have been reading through the Torah we hear the term ‘cut off’ after many of the mitzvah. Curious as to the background behind that, I searched for this phrase on your site and came up with this Word of the Day. The concern I have is that it seems to create a OT/NT paradigm. Also, somewhat uncharacteristically, you made the claim that “The Jewish religious system of sacrifices contained no sacrifice for deliberate sin, but God’s compassionate heart did. The sacrifice for our deliberate sin sent Jesus to the cross.” without any scriptural link. Does this mean that prior to Jesus there was NO forgiveness for deliberate sin? How does that work for David’s infractions?
The term ‘cut off’ is one that doesn’t resonate in our culture and is often a sticking point in my conversations with Christians who haven’t come back to obedience. I’d like to fully understand what this means and how this applies and to understand your full intent when you wrote this Word of the Day.
Thanks!
Mike
Dear Mike,
Thank you for pointing out that the Today’s Word I wrote nearly 10 years ago needs correction. I have done that already. My latest book, Cross Word Puzzles, deals with my current thinking on this subject. While there is no Levitical sacrifice for deliberate sin, I now believe that the atonement of Yeshua occurred before the foundation of the earth and therefore all followers of YHVH come through this provision. There is NO opposition between the Old and New testaments.
I am so glad you brought this to my attention. Perhaps I have to go back a decade and review the other writings of the time.
Please read Cross Word Puzzles for a full explanation of the atonement before the creation. Thanks.
Skip,
I did notice the date on the post too and considering my thought evolution over the past two years I can fully relate to the changes. Would you have another resource to direct me to regarding “cut off? I can relate to the excommunication from community, and the nessesity to address deliberate sin but am always curious to flush out a concept.
Thanks for the insights and motivation to keep digging.
Unless it is fully covered in Cross Word Puzzles?
“cut off” is not fully covered in the book, but atonement and forgiveness is (I hope). Obviously, that is background to “cut off.”