Christmas Hampers

Yesterday morning Liz and I went to the extremely poor borough of Patos called Serrote Liso where we distributed lots of Christmas Hampers to the very poor. It was as always a very moving morning and just goes to show how we should always say grace when we eat because we don't know how the other half survives! We gave a hamper to a beautiful 15-year-old mother and her 5 month old little boy. We gave hampers to people who live in mud huts and consider themselves well off if they have a donkey or even have the "luxury" of having a cart too! We gave a hamper to a young couple who are backslidden and have been to our church. They were blessed by their hamper and promised to be in church tomorrow. Please pray for them to come back to the Lord.

Yesterday afternoon Liz and I had an excellent online meeting with Deputy Leader Pastor Wostenes and his wife Gleydice. It was a very productive and blessed meeting.

Leviticus 15 (résumé): Discharges that cause uncleanness

In this chapter it says that male discharges render a man unclean. Many commentators identify the problem here as gonorrhea and anywhere the man lies or sits will become unclean, and just touching such locations would render the person as unclean. In that case the contaminated person would need to wash his clothes and bathe, and he or she would be classified as unclean until the evening. A similar cleansing process would be necessary if someone touches the man with a discharge or if he spits on someone. If the unclean man just touches a clay pot then it has to be broken! But when the man is cured of his discharge he goes through seven days of ceremonial cleansing, washes his clothes and bathes before taking 2 doves or pigeons to the priest as sacrifices.

When a man has an emission of semen he must bathe his whole body and he will remain unclean until the evening. The same applies to a couple that have sex.

In the case of a woman's menstruation she will be classed as unclean for 7 days and anyone that just touches her will be unclean until the evening. Where she lies or sits will be unclean and anyone that touches such objects will be unclean until evening. If a couple have sex when the woman has a period then the man will be unclean for a week.

In the case of a woman having a discharge other than menstruation the woman will be unclean for as long as it continues, and once cured she will offer 2 doves/pigeons as sacrificial atonement. 

Leviticus 14 (résumé): Cleansing from infectious skin diseases

If a person is reported to have recovered from their skin disease then a priest should go outside the camp to check. With the person's cure confirmed the priest will require 2 live birds together with cedar wood, scarlet yarn and hyssop so as to confirm the cleansing. The priest will kill one bird over fresh water and dip the other bird and other ingredients in the dead bird's blood. The priest will then sprinkle the blood mixture on the cured person 7 times, pronouncing him clean, and release the live bird into the wild. Then the person shaves off all his hair, washes his clothes and bathes, but stays outside of his tent for 7 days.

On the 8th day he must go to the tabernacle taking 2 male lambs and 1 ewe lamb, together with fine flour and oil, to offer as sacrifices before God. The priest should put some blood from the guilt offering on the right ear, right thumb and right big toe of the person being cleansed, before putting oil on the person in the same places. If the person is poor their cleansing sacrifices can be replaced with one lamb plus 2 doves or pigeons. Their sacrifices will make atonement before the Lord on behalf of the one being cleansed.

Finally the cleansing of dreaded mildew is prescribed when a priest goes to an affected house for inspection. If he sees that the mildew is greenish and reddish going deep then he will have the house shut up for 7 days. He then will re-inspect and scrape and remove stones as necessary (this is clearly a later addition to the text as the Israelites were living in tents) but if this doesn't fix it the house is unclean and must be destroyed. However if a house clears up the mildew returning it to normal and clean then the same 2-bird ritual will be carried out as a cleansing right seen earlier in the chapter, killing one bird and releasing the other one into the wild. It is a beautiful symbol of freedom and new life away from uncleanliness. 

Leviticus 13 (résumé): Regulations about Infectious Skin Diseases

At the time that Leviticus was written the matter of skin diseases was clearly a great concern as can be seen by the dedication of two long chapters to them. I am sure dermatologists must be delighted. It is also interesting to note that it is the priests who coordinate the skin disease control. It was previously mistakenly thought that this chapter was a discussion of leprosy as can be seen in older translations such as that of Almeida Revista e Atualizada in Portuguese. However as G. J. Wenham points out this is incorrect, as the more modern translations reflect such as NIV. So in this chapter 21 different cases of skin diseases are distinguished as are 3 cases of "diseased" garments with mildew. 

So it was that if anyone had symptoms of skin problems they were to present themselves to the priest who was to examine them and if the hair in the sore had turned white, and the sore was more than skin deep, then the patient would be declared ceremonially unclean and he would be put in isolation. He would have to wear torn clothes, let his hair be unkempt, cover the lower part of his face, cry out unclean and live outside the camp.

However, if the diagnosis was dubious then the patient would be put in quarantine for two weeks and kept under observation every 7 days.

Thus the chapter proceeds to give instructions on how to examine a swollen sore, a boil, a burn, sores in the head, raw flesh, bright spots, skin conditions causing hair loss, itchy diseased skin etc. so as to determine whether the condition is more serious requiring the diagnosis of unclean or not. And when the skin condition cleared up the person could be re-examined by the priest and declared clean again and return to normal life.

Attached to the question of skin disease the latter part of the chapter discusses the problem of mildew which is a mold-like fungus. Quite why the link between skin disease and fungus I don't know, but the concern was about mildew on clothes and leather articles. This matter was also adjudicated by the priest and contaminated articles were defined as unclean and had to be burnt.

School Christmas Service

On Tuesday evening we held our Christmas service at the Pastor Frank Dyer School in the borough of Jatobá on the south side of Patos. The service was held in the street in front of the school as we have nowhere else to fit such a crowd of children and their parents. There were different presentations from classes of children such as a poem, songs, dance etc. It all went off beautifully. At the end head-teacher Gerlania led the giving of presents to the children and served up a snack to them all. We praise God for our Patos school which this year won top place in Patos once again.  

I have finished reading the book 'The Covent Garden Murder' written by my good friend Mike Hollow. As always it was a very good read. This was book number 8 in his Blitz Detective series and I have thoroughly enjoyed them all, find them very relaxing and highly recommend them. Mike might like to learn that I once sang on the Covent Garden Opera House stage when I was a teenager back in the 1960s, so that's the nearest I'll ever get into one of his books! What about a murder in Portobello Road Mike? That would really be my neck of the woods!

Every morning I read the 'Folha de São Paulo' newspaper, which I subscribe to on line for my Brazilian news. I also enjoy watching the commentaries by Brazilian journalist Reinaldo Azevedo on Instagram. For international news I depend on the twice daily BBC news briefing updates. 

Liz went to the Women's Fellowship's end-of-year party last night which went off very nicely she tells me. Parallel to this our Drama group had their end-of-year party too.

3 were baptized at the weekend at our Princesa Isabel church. Praise God!

Leviticus 12 (résumé): Purification after Childbirth

This short chapter of just 8 verses again transmits contrasting cultural concepts difficult to handle in our day and age. For if a woman gives birth to a son she will be considered ceremonially unclean for 7 days plus an extra 33 days before she can go to church (tabernacle). However if she has a daughter then she will be unclean for an initial 14 days plus an extra 66 days before she can go to church (tabernacle)! This chapter also makes it quite clear that the normal woman's monthly period was considered to be a time of impurity.

When the mother's period of purification was completed (7 + 33 days in the case of a boy or 14 + 66 days in the case of a girl) then the mother needed to offer sacrifices at the tabernacle of a lamb plus a pigeon or dove, but if she was poor she could offer just 2 pigeons or doves. 

Leviticus 11 (résumé): Clean & Unclean Food

This is a chapter that at times makes strange reading being from a culture separated by millenniums. Upon defining clean and unclean animals the defining factors were its hoofs and its digestive system. For if an animal had a split hoof and chewed the cud it was deemed eatable, but if it only came under one of these categories, such as the coney, rabbit or pig, then it was classed as unclean.

In the case of aquatic creatures the defining factors were fins and scales so that any creature without these was defined as detestable. 

Understandably birds of prey and scavengers were classed as unclean such as eagles, vultures, kites, owls, cormorant, osprey, hawks, stork, heron, hoopoe and bat.

I personally would not be partial to eating insects, but locusts, crickets and grasshoppers were said to be alright to eat, whereas other winged insects with 4 legs were taboo. 

In all the cases of unclean creatures even contact with their carcasses rendered the person unclean until the evening and they had to wash their clothes. 

Animals that move close to the ground were also deemed unclean such as the weasel, rat, mouse, lizards and chameleon, as were creatures that moved on their bellies such as snakes and worms. 

God therefore requested strict obedience to this food code because the Israelites had to be holy as God is holy.