They Are Not Details

While looking at this past week's Torah portion, Parashat Shmini, I was reminded of a past conversation with a Messianic missionary. The missionary presented Jesus as a sacrifice. I began to go over the laws of sacrifice from Leviticus, demonstrating how Jesus did not match sacrifical law. For instance, Jesus was not sacrificed by the High Priest at the Holy Temple. He was killed by the Romans away from the Temple. The missionary said to me that I was getting caught up in "details." I was infuriated at his statement. I told him, "they are laws, not details."

In Parashat Shmini, we read about the deaths of Nadav and Avihu, the two sons of Aaron. Their tale is told in Leviticus 10. They went and attempted to offer a "strange fire" to G-d, which G-d had not commanded and were killed for this transgression. Surely, we see here that laws are not "details." Nadav and Avihu did not follow the laws of G-d regarding offerings and subsequently died. Not so incidentally, sacrifice is a form of an offering.

The word in Hebrew that we use for Biblical law is "Mitzvah." The root of the word, "Tzav", means "command." The laws of the Bible are not trivial but are G-d's commandments. Each and every law is valuable. By definition, not a single one is a "detail" that can be brushed aside or ignored. Jesus' death could not have been a Biblical sacrifice since it did not follow the Biblical law of sacrifice. As we learn from Parashat Shmini, these laws are of the utmost importance. They are laws, not details.