All I can figure is that the Levities must have either weighed 800 lbs or they were bulimic. What are the qualifications of a priest? They must be of the tribe of Levi and one part butcher, one part glutton, and one part pyromaniac with an aversion for bacon and golden veal. Just think of all the Israelites and all of the sacrifices, these guys had to know how to chow down.
I'm intrigued by the poetic symbolism of the offering for the unknown murderer and murdered and the idea that all of us in a community are libel and in need of atonement for the murder of anyone in our midst.
"If a man is found slain, lying in a field in the land the Lord your God is giving you to posses, and it is not known who killed him, your elders and judges shall go out and measure the distance from the body to the neighboring towns. Then the elders of the town nearest the body shall take a heifer that has never been worked and has never worn a yoke and lead her down to a valley that has not been plowed or planted and where there is a flowing stream. There in the valley they are to break the heifer's neck. The priests, the sons of Levi, shall step forward for the Lord your God has chosen them to minister and to pronounce blessings in the name of the Lord and to decide all cases and dispute and assault. Then all the elders of the town nearest the body shall wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley, and they shall declare: 'Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it done. Accept this atonement for Your people Israel, whom You have redeemed, O Lord, and do not hold Your people guilty of the blood of an innocent man.' And the bloodshed will be atoned for. So you will purge from yourselves the guilt of shedding innocent blood, since you have done what is right in the eyes of the Lord." [Deut. 21:1-9]
Think of the trouble they went to in order to atone for this murder victim -- they sacrificed a valuable piece of property, they had to journey away from the city a good ways to find an unplowed field in a valley and it was the work of the most important people in the community: the elders and the Levities.
How do we atone for the homeless person murdered under an overpass or bridge? What do our elders and Levities do? What do we do? Do we even notice? How often do we watch the news and hear about unsolved murders and don't even consider that we're connected to that death in some way? I remember when our children were young how my wife, Mariana, would stop and pray with them every time an ambulance passed and how she'd pray during the newscast for a victim or family touched by crime. It hurt me to see her pain during the evening news. For I time, I turned off the news and just wouldn't watch it. I have always been awed by her deep sensitivity of heart and her empathy for strangers' pain. I think I see a bit of Jesus' empathy in her. Lord, forgive me my hard heart.
If nothing else, this passage should tell us how sacred every, every, every life is and how we are all connected.
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