069. Aaron--Death of Nadab and Abihu
Aaron--Death of Nadab and Abihu
Num 20:23-29. And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in mount Her, by the coast of the land of Edom, saying, Aaron shall be gathered unto his people: for he shall not enter into the land which I have given unto the children of Israel, because ye rebelled against my word at the water of Meribah. Take Aaron and Eleazer his son, and bring them up unto mount Hor: and strip Aaron of his garments, and put them upon Eleazer his son: and Aaron shall be gathered unto his people, and shall die there. And Moses did as the Lord commanded: and they went up into mount Hor, in the sight of all the congregation. And Moses stripped Aaron of his garments, and put them upon Eleazer his sort: and Aaron died there in the top of the mount. And Moses and Eleazer came down from the mount. And when all the congregation saw that Aaron was dead, they mourned for Aaron thirty days, even all the house of Israel. Were it not that life and immortality have been brought to light by the gospel, human life must appear in the eye of sober reason, a trifling scene of vanity and impertinence. Wherefore drops that babe into the grave its soon as he is born? Why was the wretched mother torn with anguish to bring him into the world? Was it only to be torn with more cruel anguish, to behold him prematurely snatched out of it again? Why is that old offender permitted to live, a burden upon the earth, the derision, hatred, and score of mankind? Why does that minion “fret and strut his hour upon the stage,” arrayed in the glitter of royalty? Wherefore strides that barbarian from conquest to conquest, from continent to continent? Why pines modest worth in indigence and obscurity, find wherefore, at length perishes it on a dunghill? Those, and a thousand such questions that might be asked, the doctrine of immortality, and of a judgment to come, resolves in a moment. “We know but in part, we see in a glass darkly.” What the great Lord of nature, providence, and grace doth, we know not now, but we shall know hereafter. The brevity and extension of life, difference of rank, talent, office, and condition, variety of fortune and success, acquire for importance not their own by their influence off character and moral conduct, by the changes which they produce on the soul of a man, by their reaching forward into eternity, and by producing effects which no length of duration can ever alter.
Men die, offices pass from hand to hand, dispensations change, but, the purposes of Heaven are permanent, the plans of Providence are ever going forward, and while one generation of men removes to that world of spirits from whence no traveller returns, another rises up to contemplate the wonders of that which now is, and to carry on the business of it. Hence wise and good men become not only concerned about their own future and eternal happiness, but about the prosperity and happiness of the world, after they have ceased to see and enjoy it. Hence they cheerfully engage in schemes which they cannot live to execute, and justly soothe their souls to peace, in the prospect of a kind of immortality upon earth. Hence among the other motives to excel in goodness, this has a pleasing and a powerful influence, “the righteous shall be had in everlasting remembrance,” “while the memory of the wicked shall rot.”
It is as difficult to make the proper estimate of death as of life. Death is an undoubted mark of the divine displeasure against sin, and is inflicted as a punishment upon the guilty. But like all the punishments of heaven, it is upon the whole, and in the issue, an unspeakable benefit to good men. The just estimate of death, then, must depend upon what we are, and upon the consequent change which death shall produce in our internal character, or outward condition. It is a light evil to be stripped of priestly robes, the work of man’s hands; and to return naked into the earth as we came from it; it is a light thing to feel the earthly house of this tabernacle dissolving, and the head which wore the miter or the crown sinking into the dust; while the promise of Him who is faithful and true, rears for us “a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens;”[*]2Co 5:1 while the eye of faith contemplates that “crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge shall give at that day: and not to one only, but unto all them also that love his appearing,”[*]2Ti 4:8 assured that “to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.”
If ever there was an enviable domestic situation, it was that of Aaron elevated to the priesthood. Think of the honest pride of honorable alliance: and who would not have been proud of such a brother as Moses? Reflect on an office of the highest dignity and respect, procured not by cabal and intrigue, but bestowed by the voluntary appointment of Him who is the source of all honor. A suitable provision likewise made for the support of that dignity, and an external habit annexed to it, that could not fail to attract notice find reverence. The sacred office was entailed upon him and his family forever, and that family built up by four hopeful sons, his coadjutors and successors: and, to crown the whole, these pleasing, flattering circumstances were crowned with an open, unequivocal, indubitable mark of the divine approbation. The fire of heaven caught hold of their burnt-offering, and kindled a flame never to be quenched. But alas, how short lived was this tranquillity! The sons of Aaron are hardly consecrated to their office, when the two eldest profane and disgrace it. Celestial fire has scarcely proclaimed the favor and acceptance of God, when with unhallowed fire, which he commanded not, they defile his altar and his service: and thereby call down a second time fire from above, to avenge a holy and righteous God, as before to display the grace of Him who is good and merciful. The notoriety of the late transactions, the sacredness of their character, and the distinguished regard of Heaven expressed toward them, greatly enhance the atrociousness of their guilt, and justify the severity of their punishment. This tragic event is thus recorded by Moses, whose method it is neither to extenuate, nor to set down aught in malice. “And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not. And there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them, and they died before the Lord.”[*]Lev 10:1-2 The words are few, but they convey a full and distinct idea of the guilt of the parties: though by attending to the context, we shall have reason to conclude their crime was of a very complex nature. And sure it could be no common transgression which drew down a judgment so dreadful. Bishop Patrick is of opinion that Nadab and Abdul had rendered themselves incapable of doing their duty by intemperance: that they indulged in the delicacies of the sacrifice to a criminal excess, till they were incapable of putting a difference between holy and unholy, and between clean and unclean. This conjecture is founded upon the injunction which immediately follows the narration of this dismal story in the ninth and tenth verses. “Do not drink wine nor strong drink, then nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: it shall be a statute for ever, throughout your generations; and that ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean.” If there be truth in this conjecture, it is a melancholy proof, that the best things are most liable to abuse, that the brutal part of our nature is ever ready to run away with the rational: that as God is continually employing himself in bringing good out of evil, so men are for ever perversely employing themselves in bringing evil out of good.
Others have charged upon these two sons of Aaron, the criminality of attempting to enter the most holy place, which was not permitted but to the high priest, and that only at certain stated times. This charge is established in the following manner. In the passage we have quoted, it is said, that it was before the Lord that Nadab and Abihu offered incense with strange fire. Upon comparing this with what is recorded in the sixteenth chapter in the first and second verses, where Moses recapitulates this soul event, we find it added, “The Lord said unto Moses, Speak unto Aaron thy brother, that he come not at all times into the holy place, within the veil before the mercy-seat, which is upon the ark; that he die not: for I will appear in the cloud upon the mercy-seat.” Hence it has been inferred that the two young men, uncalled, unauthorized, presumed to enter that august department of the tabernacle, assuming to themselves privileges that belonged only to the supreme priesthood, which in their father’s life time it was unlawful to intermeddle with and which even he himself durst not at all times exercise. But though neither of these suppositions be improbable, we have no occasion to go so far for a discovery of their crime, nor to account for the severity with which it was punished. The sin of Nadab and Abihu consisted simply in this, they burnt incense with strange fire. Now the meaning of this expression we shall be able easily to collect, by comparing together a few passages that have an obvious connection, and serve to illustrate and explain each other. First, in Lev 9:24, it is said that “fire from the Lord,” that is, either fire immediately descending from heaven, or issuing out of the cloud that covered the tabernacle, consumed the first victims which Aaron offered for a burnt-offering. Again,--This sacred fire, once miraculously kindled, was by a special ordinance to be kept for ever alive; as we read, Lev 6:12-13. Thus the vigilance, attention, and care of man, was to preserve and continue what Providence had begun. By another ordinance it was enjoined, that the incense to be offered on the day of atonement, should be kindled by it portion of that perpetual fire. This we read in Lev 16:11-13. This then was the fire which the Lord commanded to be used; and of course, every other kind of fire, however produced, and though in all other respects adequate to the purpose, was unlawful, forbidden, or strange. This accordingly constituted the guilt, they took upon them to kindle the incense, which their office obliged them to burn every evening and morning, with a fire different from that which burnt continually on the altar of burnt-offering; every other being strange fire, which the Lord commanded not. Now it was certainly fit and necessary that such a crime should be punished in the most exemplary manner. The sanctity of the whole institution was over at once, if the ministers of it might with impunity, in the very setting out, presume to dispense with its most august, ceremonies. The rank and station of the offenders was a high aggravation of their offence. It was their duty to have set an example of scrupulous regard to the known will of God. They had been admitted to more intimate communion with God than others; had seen more of the terrors of his power, more of the wonders of his grace. Unhappy men! how had they been betrayed into an error so fatal? Ignorance it could not be, the voice of the law was yet sounding in their ears. Dared they to be careless in any thing that related to the service of a holy God? They had seen the exactness of their pious uncle, in terming everything according to the pattern showed him in the mount. Was it indeed a willful and deliberate violation of the law? I fear, I fear it was; and dreadful was the expiation. The unhallowed fire of their own kindling was quickly absorbed in a hotter flame: “they died before the Lord:[*]Lev 10:2 for there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them.” Neither their sacred character, the sacredness of the place, nor the sacredness of the employment, can protect them from the keen stroke of avenging justice. “Let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably, with reverence and godly fear: for our God is a consuming fire.”[*]Heb 12:28-29 Unhappy father! what were now thy feelings; bereaved in one sad day of half thy children, of thy first, thy darling hopes: to behold them thus immaturely cut off, taken away in anger! The bitterness of death is not relieved by one consolatory circumstance. What is the loss of children in infancy, and falling by the stroke of nature, compared to this? To heighten the old man’s affliction, he is expressly forbidden to mourn, or to assist in the last sad offices of humanity towards his deceased sons. Behold him in mute dejection and distress, ministering in the duties of his charge, attentive to the calls of the living, leaving to others the care of burying the dead. How severely must his own offences now have been brought to his remembrance! He had been guilty of a crime of equal or greater magnitude: he had led the worship in idolatry, and presided in the worship of a thing of his own fabrication; but justice suffered him to live, to live to see his own sons dying for a crime similar to his own. Alas, what is prolonged life but lengthened anguish! As the giving of the law was fenced round with fire, and the sanctity of the tabernacle worship guarded by a flaming sword, so the meeker, gentler institution of the gospel, fortified its first beginnings by executing judgment on presumptuous sinners. Severity is the soul of a law, especially when it is notified to those who are obliged to submit to it; indulgence, or the appearance of feebleness, are of the most dangerous consequence, especially in the commencement of a new constitution. One of the heralds of the Savior of mankind began his ministry by a clap of thunder; the first rays he shot from his eyes were mortal, and the sudden death of two false and perfidious disciples was the seal of his apostleship.[*]Acts 5 The second coming of the Lord himself is to be “in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.”[*]2Th 1:8
Aaron had now arrived at an advanced period of life, and at the possession of an office and rank in life, which rendered him an object of envy to some, and of veneration to others. He had oftener than once been corrected by his own folly, and be was “the man who had seen affliction by the rod of God’s anger;” but neither the fire of calamity, nor the frost of age; neither the counsels of experience, nor the sanctity of office, have been able to subdue indwelling corruption; for we immediately find him in a plot, with Miriam his sister, to disturb the peace, diminish the respect, and distress the government of their brother Moses. Their pretence was his marriage with an “Ethiopian woman,” an event which had taken place forty years before; an union which had no immorality in it: which transgressed no law, for the law was not then given; and against which God himself had not expressed any displeasure; but had crowned it with the blessing of children, who were justly admitted to rank in Israel. The real cause was their envy of the preeminence, which their, younger brother had obtained over them in all things, civil and sacred. For this, in spite of all their art, breaks out in the malicious whispers which they scatter abroad to blacken their brother’s reputation. “Hath the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses? Hath he not spoken also by us?”[*]Num 12:2 If Moses indeed erred by marrying Jethro’s daughter, he had severely smarted for it: for being induced, by an improper compliance with her humor, to neglect the circumcision of his son, he had nearly paid the forfeit of that neglect with his life, by the hand of God himself; and now his good name is bleeding on Zipporah’s account, by the envenomed tongues of his own brother and sister; and “who can stand before envy?” Who can think to escape, if Moses remain not unhurt? This attack upon his fame and comfort, gives Moses occasion to deliver his own eulogium: and I believe it just, for he gives it with that lovely simplicity, which characterizes all that he relates of himself or of others. “Now the man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.”[*]Num 12:3 He either had not heard the scandalous speeches which were propagated to his disadvantage by Aaron and Miriam; or he pitied and neglected them. Who knows what length the mischief might have gone, had it not been heard and avenged by the Protector of injured innocence. “The Lord heard it” Let the slanderer hear this and tremble. The two brothers and their sister are now summoned to present themselves together at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and the glory of the Lord appears: and a voice from that glory pronounces aloud and at full length, the praise of the man who had spoken so modestly of himself, and who had been so wickedly maligned by his own nearest relations. “And he said, Hear now my words; if there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house. With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold: wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?”[*]Num 12:6-8 In many respects Moses was “the figure of him who was to come,” and in both were peculiarly verified the words of Christ, “a man’s foes shall be they of his own house,” and, “a prophet is not without honor, save in his own country, and in his own house.”[*]Mat 13:57 With God to resent is to avenge; having reproved the transgressors he withdraws in anger, and lo, the punishment is already inflicted. “The cloud departed from off the tabernacle, and behold, Miriam became leprous, white as snow: and Aaron looked upon Miriam, and behold she was leprous.”[*]Num 12:10 A shocking example of divine displeasure against one of the most odious of crimes. My fair hearers, let me whisper an advice in your ears. I am no commonplace declaimer against your sex; I honor it, and I wish to improve it; you must hear me with the greater attention, and mark what I say. You lie under a general imputation, respecting the vices of the tongue; but general imputations are for the most part ill-founded. I do not mean, however, to insinuate that you are totally innocent, or more so than the other sex: for your affections are eager, and what the heart feels, by the eyes or the tongue you will express; and that expression is sometimes too strong for either piety or prudence. I mean to caution you at present, on a particular fault of the tongue, which affects my own profession, which is far from being foreign to the subject, and on which I deem myself both qualified and entitled to advise you.
Women, among other favorite objects, have their favorite systems of religion, and their favorite preachers; and, following the impulse of an honest affection, they are for establishing their favorite object on the ruins of every competitor. What is the consequence? In the event of difference of opinion, or of attachment, one man is unmercifully, unrelentingly run down, and another is, with equal want of reason, magnified and exalted. Women, young women, good young women, think they are only yielding to the impulse of a pious affection, when they applaud or censure this or the other public character. But what are they doing indeed? Blowing up one poor vain idol of straw into self-consequence and importance; and piercing through, on the other hand, an honest heart with anguish unutterable; perhaps robbing a worthy, happy family of its bread, or, what is more, of its peace and comfort. I am no stranger to what is by some termed religious conversation, and I am seriously concerned about the topics of it. It generally turns upon persons, not things. Now, it ought to be just the reverse. Persons always mislead us, for no one is wholly impartial; but truth is eternal and unchangeable. Apply then the test--Does the conversation dwell upon this man or his neighbor, his rival or his enemy--check it, away with it; what have the interests of piety to do in the case? Had he never been born, “the foundation of God” would have stood as it does, without his feeble aid. Call no man master in sacred things, but Christ; and take care that you measure neither orthodoxy, sense, nor virtue, by the imperfect, fluctuating standard of your own caprice, affection, or understanding. Were similar punishment instantly to follow the vices of the tongue, as in the case of Miriam, I shudder to think how many a fair face now lovely to the sight, must by tomorrow morning stand in need of a veil; but not for the same reason that the face of Moses did on his descending from the mount, to temper its luster; but to shroud its loathsomeness and deformity. Consider what hath been said, and “set a watch on the door of your lips,” and “keep the heart with all diligence.”