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15. T H E LIFE OF H O L I N E S S Looking back OVer the ground traversed thus far-, we have seen that the Priestly interpreters imaginatively construe a world in which the holy God, creator of heaven and earth, chooses to be present in the midst of the community of Israel. In the Priestly scheme, we have seen, there are three movements in the story that begins with creation and reaches a climax with the Sinai revelation. First, God creates a world of order and promises that it will never lapse back into chaos, a promise that is guaranteed by the everlasting covenant with Noah. Second, God calls Abraham and Sarah and promises them land and increase, guaranteeing this promise with an everlasting covenant. Finally, God condescends to tabernacle in the midst of the worshiping congregation (edah) and provides in the Sinai covenant, also understood to be an everlasting covenant, the means of grace so that the people may live in the presence of the holy God. A Holy People It follows that if the people are to live in the presence of the holy God, holiness is to characterize their common life. This is the theme of the so-called Holiness Code (Leviticus 17-26): You shall be holy, for I, the Lord [Yahweh] your God, am holy. —Lev. 19:2, etc. Holiness is the quality that belongs solely to God. No thing or being is holy intrinsically,- God alone, the Supreme Being, is (jadosh, "Holy One." Holiness per­ tains to what philosophers call God's aseity—the unconditioned essence or being of God. David Blumenthal maintains that holiness and personality are the two essential attributes of God.1 But to ascribe "personality" to God, as I noted in an earlier connection, is problematic, for this raises the profound question as to where one draws the line between metaphor and reality. In any case, holiness is the fun­ damental reality of the God who is portrayed in, but transcends, metaphorical speech. In a derivative or secondary sense things or creatures may be "made holy" (sanctified, consecrated) when they are drawn into God's sphere of holiness or when they are brought into relationship with the holy God. Thus the tabernacle or temple is holy because God chooses it to be the place of the divine presence. The land of Palestine (Canaan) becomes the Holy Land because God reserves it as the portion for the people of God, Israel. Sacrifices are holy, utensils are holy, 1. See David Blumenthal, Facing the Abusing God: A Theology of Protest (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 1993), "Holiness as an Attribute of Cod," chap. 3. See my discussion above, chapter 4. 122 The Life of Holiness 123 priests are holy because these are drawn into the service of the holy God. Scripture is holy (the "Holy Bible") because it contains "the oracles of God" entrusted to the Jewish people, as Paul put it (Rom. 3:2). These things are, so to speak, taken out of the ordinary, profane realm and drawn into the realm of the sacred, the holy. This view of separation from the ordinary world is presupposed in Numbers 1-10. Here the people of God are portrayed as making an orderly march through the wilderness. When they camp, the tribes are arranged in order around the tabernacle to safeguard its holiness, with the Levites (the priestly tribe) camped immediately around it, to protect it so that no outbreak of divine holiness (wrath) will fall on the people (Num. 1:53; 8:19,- see above, fig. 5, p. 109). When they break camp and move on, the Levites are the bearers of the movable sanctuary and its holy things. In this manner we are given a graphic picture of God at the center of the community, of the Holy One in the midst of Israel (cf. Hos. 11:9b). A Holy Land When we turn to the Holiness Code (Leviticus 17-26), the priestly sense of the holy is extended beyond the tabernacle and its sacred area to the whole land and the people living on the land. This is the fundamental difference between the Priestly writers (P) and the Holiness Code (H, a separate, perhaps earlier source incorporated into the Priestly book of Leviticus). "The priesthood, Israel, and mankind respectively," says Jacob Milgrom, an authority on the book of Leviticus, "form three rings of decreasing holiness about the center, God."2 This view of "rings of decreasing holiness...

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