Read the Bible with Me!

Welcome to the Pauline Family's "Year of the Bible"! I'm reading the Bible clear through this year, and I invite you to read along with me. But first, let us pray: 

I praise you, my God, with all people.
May they thank and adore you!
You have written your greatness in creation,
your Law in consciences,
your eternal promises in the Bible.
You are eternally faithful and always lovable!
As I read Sacred Scripture today, open my mind to hear your voice and understand your loving message.
Amen.

Today's three chapters are Leviticus 14-16.

The first two chapters make for uncomfortable reading. What is so bad about bodily secretions that they make one "unclean" for up to seven days?! The footnotes (required in Catholic Bibles!) are helpful here. For one thing, the notion of "clean/unclean" is ritual, not ethical. There is no sense of a moral judgment whatever in these rules. The value pursued in these regulations seems to be more along the lines of making sure that the Temple/Tabernacle manifests God as a giver of life: anything that hints at the "escape" or diminution of life (especially the loss of blood) could not be associated even remotely with worship of God, the source of life. 

In Chapter 16 we find the introduction of the Day of Atonement. To this day, it is the most solemn observance of the Jewish liturgical year, a day of strict fasting. The term "scapegoat" comes from the rituals appointed for the Day of Atonement. Doctors Bergsma and Pitre make a good case for the importance of the Book of Leviticus for the New Testament and for Christian theology in general because of its introduction of themes like sin, worship, sacrifice, "cleanness," holiness, atonement, priesthood.

Start reading here.

If you are looking for a solid but approachable companion to the Bible, I can wholeheartedly recommend A Catholic Introduction to the Bible: The Old Testament by John Bergsma and Brant Pitre. Although the authors are top-level Scripture scholars, they write for "real" readers. Notes include recent findings from archaeology and ancient manuscripts, and how each book of the Bible has been understood by the Church Fathers and used in Liturgy.