Priest skill set tracker: meat processing, baking, dermatology, and home inspection.

I’ve heard horror stories of people dealing with mold in their houses. Some types of mold can kill you. Mold Toxicity is often mistaken for mental illness.

The Israelites were in a desert yes, but they were (for the foreseeable future) living in tents. I have precious little camping experience but even I know the funky smell of a tent that wasn’t completely dry before it was packed up. If it smells nasty, that white fuzz in the corners probably isn’t pillow stuffing or cobwebs. It’s mold.

They aren’t going to need the instructions about mold in stone structures and plaster for a while, but it’ll be there when they finally get to the promised land.

When a person’s skin disease cleared up or their house is made mold-free there is a strange ritual that the priest would do involving birds and scarlet yarn and a clay jar…

Let’s look at it. 🧶🕊️🕊️🏺🪵

“then the priest shall command, and he shall take two living, clean birds and cedar wood and a crimson thread and hyssop for the one who presents himself for cleansing. Then the priest shall command someone to slaughter one bird over fresh water in a clay vessel.” Leviticus‬ ‭14‬:‭4‬-‭5‬ ‭LEB‬‬

Clay vessels are indicative of humans because man was made of clay – the dust of the ground.

John tells us what the fresh – or “living” – water is: “the one who believes in me. Just as the scripture said, ‘Out of his belly will flow rivers of living water.’ Now he said this concerning the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were about to receive. For the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified.)”
‭‭John‬ ‭7‬:‭38‬-‭39‬ ‭LEB‬‬

Birds were made on day 5 to fill the heavens. They are associated with the sky and heaven because they fly.

So we have something associated with heaven placed inside a human vessel and the presence of the Holy Spirit. And that heavenly something is killed while in the human vessel.

Are you seeing the picture of Jesus yet?

He’s the God-man from heaven, born as a human yet with the fullness of the Spirit. He is killed while in the clay (human) vessel.

Let’s see what happens next…

“He must take the living bird and the cedar wood and the crimson thread and the hyssop, and he shall dip them and the living bird in the bird’s blood slaughtered over the fresh water.” Leviticus‬ ‭14‬:‭6‬ ‭LEB‬‬

The live bird and a bunch of hyssop is likely bound to the plank of cedar with a red cord. This is then dipped into the blood of the bird that was just killed.

I’d be willing to bet that Jesus’ cross was not cut from just any tree. I bet it was cedar.

The crimson cord… there is a whole side-quest here. I’ll try to keep it brief but there is NO skip option on this one.

If you look up “crimson thread” (or in KJV simply “scarlet”) in your trusty Strong’s Concordance, you find it is actually two words in Hebrew:

Maggot?! I thought we were done with those when Job ended. Grub worm? Insect? Dye?

I told you it was a side-quest. Allow me to introduce you to the Crimson Grub or Scarlet Worm, Kermes Vermilio – a scale insect that feeds on the sap of oaks.

There is a very short window of time – about 1 month in the summer – while the Kermes Vermilio is attached to the tree – after the eggs are laid but before they hatch – in which the females may be harvested and a permanent red dye may be extracted. The inside holds a concentrated red dye while the outside is snowy white.

This was the dye used for the “scarlet” woven into the curtains of the tabernacle and the priestly ephod. It’s also the dye used to make the crimson/scarlet thread or cord in this Cleansing of the Leper ritual. It was used to dye the scarlet robe which the soldiers mockingly draped on Jesus.

And – it’s the color of sin.

“Come now, and let us argue,” says Yahweh. “Even though your sins are like scarlet, they will be white like snow; even though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.” Isaiah‬ ‭1‬:‭18‬ ‭LEB‬‬

The word “crimson” in the Isaiah quote is towla. The worm. It’s also used here:

“But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by humankind and despised by people.”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭22‬:‭6‬ ‭LEB‬‬

Who’s calling himself a worm? Psalm 22 was written by King David but it was quoted by Jesus on the cross. Personally, I think He may have quoted the entire Psalm from the cross. It begins with “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” And it ends with the word “Done.”

Why would Jesus call Himself towla, the Crimson Worm?

Well – He was attached to a tree. He was made sin for us. And sin is towla. Scarlet. He seemed to the untrained eye to be just a normal man. (Remember how we said that in the tabernacle wood represents humanity?). The towla seems to be just a knot of the tree. There was about a month in the summer between the time the “eggs” were laid and when they “hatched” at Pentecost. When His offspring came to life (there were about 3000 of them, see Acts 2:41), they fed on His body as He had instructed in John 6:51-58. His crimson blood is a permanent dye that forever alters the one it touches.

Here is an article on a 3,800 year old scrap of fabric that was discovered last year in Israel that had been dyed with this kermes scarlet; still holding its color!!

Whew! That was quite the side-quest! But now you realize how LOADED that single word is here in Leviticus.

The living bird with a bunch of hyssop (we’ve previously looked at the hyssop connection) are bound to a cedar plank with scarlet yarn. And dipped in the blood of the dead bird. It’s the cross. It’s all there.

Why two birds though?

Simple.

Because the High Priest couldn’t resurrect the dead one.

🤓

“And he shall spatter the blood seven times on the one who presents himself for cleansing from the infectious skin disease, and he shall declare him clean, and he shall send the living bird into the open field.”
‭‭Leviticus‬ ‭14‬:‭7‬ ‭LEB‬‬

The blood-dipped bird is released in an open field to fly away. This is picture of the resurrected Jesus ascending back into the heavens to present His blood. Jesus is BOTH the killed AND the living bird.

After this ritual offering, the one to be cleansed from leprosy is to shave his or her entire body. Everything. Completely hairless. And bathe in water.

Why?

I suppose there may have been some dermatological reason, but it strikes me that they would look like a newborn babe. Mature humans have hair in places that babies do not.

And isn’t that what happens when we’re cleansed by Christ? We are born again. Baptized. Brand new. Bathed in water.

But we’re not quite done yet.

On the 8th day, this person experiences a ritual that is basically identical to ordination – even if he or she is not a priest. Just as in the ordination offering, the priest takes the blood and puts it on the cleansed person’s right ear lobe, the right thumb, and their right big toe. This is followed by an anointing with oil on those same spots. It occurs to me that – to my knowledge – this is the only instance where a person who is not a priest, king, or prophet is anointed with oil.

His atonement and anointing cover my hearing, my doing, and my going.

God designed this whole ritual. He gave every detail of it to Moses. How strange it must’ve seemed to those who experienced it or who looked on. All along, it is a prophetic choreography of death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ as well as the new birth of the believer, the cleansing from sin and anointing that would come upon all who would receive Christ by faith.

No longer limited to prophets, priests, and kings, “but this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: ‘And it will be in the last days,’ God says, ‘I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters will prophesy, and your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams. And even on my male slaves and on my female slaves I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.”
‭‭Acts‬ ‭2‬:‭16‬-‭18‬ ‭LEB‬‬

All I can say is…

“This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes.” Psalm‬ ‭118‬:‭23‬ ‭ESV‬‬