Hi, this is John at the Bible Project. We've been releasing a series of Q&Rs which stand

for question and response. It's a recording of Tim and I during a YouTube live stream

that we did over a year ago where we answered questions about different books in the Old

Testament. This episode is on the book of Leviticus. Leviticus is one of the strangest books

in the Old Testament or the hardest to read through. It's full of ancient law codes about

how ancient Israel was supposed to live together as a community. All based around the sacrificial

system, the Jewish festivals, it calls them to be a people that are different, set apart

from the neighboring countries and a people who uphold justice and righteousness for themselves

and others. It's pretty confusing for modern people. So we're going to look at questions

like how should modern readers interpret these ancient laws? What's the deal with laws

against tattoos and more? This audio originally came from the YouTube channel so it's not

as high quality as usual so we apologize about that. Thanks for joining us. Here we go.

Today we're going to interact with your questions on the book of Leviticus. Leviticus, the book

you love to hate? The book you hate? The book you give up reading the Bible with? Yes,

that's right. You get to this book and you're like, you know what? I don't think I'm going

to read the Bible this year after all. I'm going to read the Bible in a year and then

late February you get to Leviticus and you're just over it. It's ancient law code. It's

an ancient priestly tech manual. It's not typical summer reading. No, it's good bedtime

reading but anyhow it's really really significant an important book in the Old Testament storyline.

And it doesn't have all the laws, not all the laws in the Torah or in Leviticus. No, a whole

bunch are. But a whole bunch are. It's the narrative of the Pentateuch grinds to a halt actually

once they get to Mount Sinai in the book of Exodus. So the whole book is set with God speaking

...