On the road to Emmaus, Yeshua met with two of His disciples and, beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself. (Luke 24:27). For our Torah studies this year, therefore, week by week we will seek to discover how all of Torah prepared the way for the coming Messiah.
11th April 2026 (24 Nisan)
Shemini (Eighth) Leviticus 9:1-11:47
By those who come near Me
I must be regarded as holy;
And before all the people
I must be glorified.
This is the prominent verse in this week’s Torah portion. It is necessary to understand what God required of Aaron, his sons and all the people of God, in those days – and for us today.
There are a number of translations of this verse. The above is from the New King James Version. The Complete Jewish Bible renders the verse as:
Through those who are near me I will be consecrated,
and before all the people I will be glorified.
The Stone Tanach translation is:
I will be sanctified through those who are nearest to Me,
thus I will be honoured by the entire people.
The Hebrew Masoretic text is:
בִּקְרֹבַ֣י אֶקָּדֵ֔שׁ וְעַל־פְּנֵ֥י כָל־הָעָם אֶכָּבֵד
Biq’rovay ekädësh v’al–P’nëy khäl–hääm ekävëd
The key verbs (underlined) are ekadesh and ekaved. They are both in the Hebrew niphal tense, which is a passive tense. This does not mean that God is passive. Indeed, He is very active towards His people in judgement and mercy – His treatment of Aaron’s sons shows this. It is also the case at every era of history. It is simply that the verb forms in this particular passage are passive, for the purpose we shall consider.
The Hebrew roots of these verbs are kadosh, usually translated holy, and kavod, usually translated glory. Let’s study this verse in detail, to ensure that we know just what God requires.
The passive tense implies that God requires His people to actively make Him known as being holy and glorious.
Being holy is being pure, clean, sanctified, consecrated, set apart – all these things.
Being glorified is to be full of splendour, honour and majesty, to be divine – the awesome presence of the most holy God.
Our Bible translations cannot fully convey all that this is. Even those whose original language was Hebrew, also needed to live in the full reality of the meaning of what is said in that language. Words can become shallow by constant use, and fall short of their deeper meaning, in any language.
God must be known in the entire earth by His character of holiness and glory, through the witness of His people, considered as such and approached as such. It is our responsibility that this is so. This is why the verbs are in a passive tense in this verse – it is His people who are to be active in making His holiness and glory known – to themselves and to the world. If we do not honour Him in that way, His wonderful character may remain hidden from the world in our generation, even though the knowledge of His glory and honour willone day come to earth, as it is prophesied:
For the earth will be filled
With the knowledge of the glory of the Lord,
As the waters cover the sea. (Habakkuk 2:14)
What does that mean to us in fulfilling His command in our daily life? Certainly, when we approach God in prayer, offering, praise or worship, we need to have within us a living understanding of whom He really is. We are required to be respectful and not slovenly in approaching Him. We must make it known through word and action who our Mighty God is to us in our lives and, as a consequence, it will be made known to others.
The description of Aaron’s preparation as High Priest in separating him for service, adorning him with his garments of office and responsibility and presenting the awesome sacrifices that were made, teaches us much about this. The way his two sons lost their lives for transgressing the prescribed and ordered way of approaching God, confirm that God meant what He said.
Then we have the list of foods that are clean and unclean for the people of God. We all eat daily. What we eat can separate us from others, an aspect of holiness. God gave the exercise of choosing daily only that which is clean as part of what being holy is, in fulfilment of the command:
I am the Lord who brings you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God. You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy. (Leviticus 11:45)
The Feast of Pesach has just passed. Those with insight will have remembered all that God did for Israel when they came out of Egypt, and also the greater fulfilment of His Covenant with Abraham through the sacrifice of Yeshua. This week, there has been much meditation on holiness – we call it Holy week. Yet, do we remember our holy calling continually throughout the year?
If Yeshua’s sacrifice had not been completely pure, sanctified and holy, it would not have been accepted on our behalf any more than the offerings of Nadab and Abihu. Yeshua opened the way, by His sacrifice, for all who will come by faith to enter the presence of God. As Paul the Apostle wrote, about this amazing privilege:
You did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. (Romans 8:15-16)
Let us not, however, treat this great privilege of personally coming into God our Father’s presence with any less dignity, glory and honour than when Moses inaugurated the priesthood through Aaron. It is the Holy Spirit whom the Father sent to His people.
The same command applies to us today as it did for Aaron and his sons. Let us read it again in the light of our call as New Covenant believers:
By those who come near Me
I must be regarded as holy;
And before all the people
I must be glorified.
Let us realise that in our lives, our actions and our speech as well as our worship, we must actively proclaim the holiness and glory of God. Peter made this clear in his letter:
You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvellous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy. (1 Peter 2:9-10)
Has God sent us a warning exactly parallel to the one He sent when the lives of Nadab and Abihu were taken? The Priesthood of the Old Covenant was inaugurated through Aaron. The royal priesthood, described by Peter was inaugurated in the community of Jerusalem soon after Yeshua’s sacrifice and ascension as High Priest into the Kingdom of Heaven. Offerings were brought to the Apostles of Yeshua, prominent among whom was Peter. A blemished offering was brought by Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-13). They thought that they would not be found out when they pretended to bring the whole offering from the sale of their land, but kept some of it back for themselves. But God knows our heart and, as a consequence, they both died just like Nadab and Abihu.
However, we are not to live in fear, but in the confident expectation of a close walk with the Living God, whom we can now know as Father, because of Yeshua. Yet our hearts are to be pure towards Him and our witness of Him be worthy of the honour He, and our Saviour, is due. The One True God, dwells in the completely pure realm of Heaven. If we saw Him, we too would respond like Isaiah. The angels he saw cried out:
Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
The whole earth is full of His glory!
Isaiah’s response was:
Woe is me, for I am undone!
Because I am a man of unclean lips,
And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips;
For my eyes have seen the King,
The Lord of hosts. (Isaiah 6:1-5)
These are eternal truths. Again, it was Peter the Apostle who walked with Yeshua, saw His transfiguration on the mountain, His crucifixion on the cross and His ascension into Heaven, who reminds us that nothing has changed concerning our call to honour God in holiness, and live lives worthy of His holy calling:
Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance; but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, “Be holy, for I am holy”. (1 Peter 1:13-16)
Aaron was taught a very important lesson that became a lesson for us all. He had seen God take the lives of his sons for trying to come near Him in an unholy manner. Our lesson, like his, is that we are witnesses to the world of God’s holiness and approach Him in the only way that pleases Him. There is no other way to be in God’s presence than that which God has ordained. Once the only way to the presence of God was through the Levitical Priesthood, in the manner prescribed. However, the Tabernacle and Temple are now replaced by a new and living way – the abiding place (John 15) is now the Lord Himself. In fulfilling all the types and shadows of the High Priest, Yeshua made the way known, clearly and wonderfully, but without compromise. He told His disciples what they have passed on to us. Yeshua said of Himself:
I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. (John 14:6)
This, now, is the way of holiness, which we are invited to take by faith, into the very presence of the Father.
