Today and tomorrow we'll be looking at something known as a "Nazirite vow". This term is derived from the Hebrew word "nazir" which means "set apart". A person who takes a Nazarite vow will follow certain regulations until the period of time involved in their vow has been completed.
The word "Nazarite" is not to be confused with the word "Nazarene"---a word often applied to Jesus. Jesus was called a Nazarene simply because His hometown was Nazareth of Galilee. We don't know whether Jesus ever took a Nazarite vow in His lifetime but it's unlikely He was under this type of vow during the years of His public ministry. One of the prohibitions of a Nazirite vow was that the person had to abstain from drinking or eating anything that came from a grapevine. If Jesus had been under a Nazirite vow, He would not have been able to drink wine or grape juice, a thing He evidently did at some of the meals to which He was invited, for He stated that He was being accused of being a glutton, a drunkard, and a friend of sinners because He accepted invitations to the homes of anyone who asked Him. (Matthew 11:9, Luke 7:34) He was not a drunkard or a glutton; His enemies just accused Him of that because He sat down to eat with people with whom the other rabbis would not associate. His enemies assumed His host and fellow dinner guests were carousing (by eating too much, by eating non-kosher foods, and by becoming intoxicated) and they either assumed or wanted to make the public think Jesus was carousing too. There's no Biblical proof anything like that was even going on at the dinners to which He was invited and there's certainly no proof He was ever gluttonous or intoxicated. Was He a friend of sinners? Yes, in the sense that He loved them and wanted to show them a better way. He didn't join in with sin; He offered people a way out of sin.
Also Jesus would not have been able to touch the dead if He was under a Nazirite vow. We'll see in our passage from Chapter 6 that a person under a Nazirite vow could not have contact with a dead body, not even if some of his closest relatives died during the time he was under the vow. Jesus touched several dead bodies during His ministry.
It's possible that Jesus took a Nazirite vow prior to beginning the years of His public ministry, but we know very little about His life before He reached about thirty years of age. You may notice a correlation between the age at which He began His ministry and the age at which men were considered, in the book of Numbers, fit for service at the tabernacle. Jesus was not a Levite and did not work at the temple in Jerusalem (though He taught there frequently) but we've talked about how in ancient times it was believed a man's physical, mental, and spiritual prime was when he was between the ages of thirty and fifty. Jesus began His ministry at the age a man was considered to have accumulated enough wisdom and life experience to be a teacher, an encourager, an elder, and an example to others. Jesus may or may not have ever taken a Nazirite vow prior to beginning His public ministry, but we know of at least three other men of the Bible who were under a Nazirite vow: Samson the judge (Judges 13), John the Baptist (Luke 1), and the Apostle Paul (Acts 18). The Nazirite vow was open to both men and women, as we'll see in our text below, but only one woman of the Bible is mentioned as having taken the vow. Her name is not supplied to us, but she was the wife of a man named Manoah of the tribe of Dan and she was the mother of Samson. Her story can be found in Judges 13.
Now let's begin our look at what the Nazirite vow entails. "The Lord said to Moses, 'Speak to the Israelites and say to them: 'If a man or woman wants to make a special vow, a vow of dedication to the Lord as a Nazirite, they must abstain from wine and other fermented drink and must not drink vinegar made from wine or other fermented drink. They must not drink grape juice or eat grapes or raisins. As long as they remain under their Nazarite vow, they must not eat anything that comes from the grapevine, not even the seeds or skins." (Numbers 6:1-4)
The fruit of the grapevine was considered a blessing. This means that to abstain from these products for a time was considered a form of self-denial. We might say a person under a Nazirite vow was "fasting" from the fruit of the vine. When a person undertakes a fast for the purpose of denying the carnal side of human nature in order to focus on the spiritual side of human nature, that person is in a sense "set apart" for a time from those around him. He is "set apart" for the Lord while he is fasting. He may be going to his job every day like usual and fulfilling his normal obligations but while fasting from certain things he feels especially consecrated to the Lord and his thoughts are more fully on the Lord and on the Scriptures and on prayer.
A person under a Nazirite vow could not cut their hair until the time period of the vow has been fulfilled. "During the entire period of their Nazirite vow, no razor may be used on their head. They must be holy until the period of their dedication to the Lord is over; they must let their hair grow long." (Numbers 6:5) It will be apparent to everyone with whom a man associates that he is under a Nazirite vow. The longer the period of the vow, the longer his hair will grow. I assume a woman's vow would be less publicly apparent since women typically wore long hair and since women (at least married women) wore a veil over their hair in public.
Samson is the most notorious of the Nazirites. His hair had never been cut since the day he was born. He broke his Nazirite vow in a number of other ways because he was a spiritually weak and carnally minded man. He drank alcohol, he had contact with the dead, he had sexual relations with prostitutes, he had no interest in an Israelite wife but instead was attracted only to pagan women with whom he should not have associated. But until he fell for the beautiful and seductive Delilah he at least held on to his hair: the outward sign that he was "set apart" by a Nazirite vow. When Samson revealed to Delilah that the secret to his great strength was that he had never cut his hair, he gave up the last shred of his devotion to the Lord, and in losing his hair to the razor he lost the protection of the God who was his strength. Samson repudiated God not in losing the hair itself but in losing what the hair represented: his loyalty and consecration to the Lord. Samson considered the loss of his relationship with the Lord a small price to pay to gain the affections of the object of his lust.
Join us tomorrow as we look at further regulations for fulfilling the Nazirite vow and the ritual that is observed when the vow has been fulfilled.
No comments:
Post a Comment