Mining the Minors: Malachi (3)

The Lord’s table is a sufficiently important subject that I’ve felt the need to touch on it recently outside this series. Today’s post is probably more effective if you read it in connection with that one.

Our reading in Malachi is the first of five complaints made by the Lord against his people approximately a century after they were allowed to return to their historic homeland by a Persian monarch with respect for Israel’s God. Sadly, all that God had done on their behalf didn’t keep Judah and Israel from going astray in a variety of new ways.

2/ Five Complaints (continued)

Malachi 1:6-14 — Polluted Offerings

“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear? says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests, who despise my name. But you say, ‘How have we despised your name?’ By offering polluted food upon my altar. But you say, ‘How have we polluted you?’ By saying that the Lord’s table may be despised. When you offer blind animals in sacrifice, is that not evil? And when you offer those that are lame or sick, is that not evil? Present that to your governor; will he accept you or show you favor? says the Lord of hosts. And now entreat the favor of God, that he may be gracious to us. With such a gift from your hand, will he show favor to any of you? says the Lord of hosts. Oh that there were one among you who would shut the doors, that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord of hosts, and I will not accept an offering from your hand. For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the Lord of hosts. But you profane it when you say that the Lord’s table is polluted, and its fruit, that is, its food may be despised. But you say, ‘What a weariness this is,’ and you snort at it, says the Lord of hosts. You bring what has been taken by violence or is lame or sick, and this you bring as your offering! Shall I accept that from your hand? says the Lord. Cursed be the cheat who has a male in his flock, and vows it, and yet sacrifices to the Lord what is blemished. For I am a great King, says the Lord of hosts, and my name will be feared among the nations.”

The Father and the Master

With the entire New Testament at our fingertips, we are disposed to think of God as our Father. Modern readers often assume this relationship was understood for generations in Israel, not realizing the fatherhood of God with respect to believers was a new revelation set forth in all its glory by the Lord Jesus in his first advent. The Old Testament scriptures paint God as Father in the corporate sense, and that is the case here. He is the father of the nation (“Israel is my firstborn son”, “I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my firstborn”) rather than to any particular individual in Israel. Malachi’s indictment, then, is of the entire nation through its representative priesthood.

The Hebrew word for “master” here is 'āḏôn, most frequently translated “lord” or “Lord”. The essence of lordship or mastery is that the master calls the shots and the servant responds with obedience. The Old Testament indeed depicts Israel as God’s son, but also his servant. Israel failed in both these roles, demonstrating the need for a Son and Servant who would live out both to perfection. It’s interesting that Israel’s failure in these roles is highlighted in this last book of the Old Testament, again segueing perfectly into the arrival of Messiah, the one for whom the way must be made straight. The first “son” did not honor his Father. The first “servant” failed to fear his Master. In deliberate contrast, Christ would do all things well.

The Great Name of the Lord

The word translated “despise” means literally to trample with the feet. It is the opposite of fear and honor. Judah’s first failing was that it had come to treat the sacrificial system with contempt, despising the name of the Lord, which is to say showing no concern for God’s reputation among the nations.

When believers fail to value their Lord accurately, it is his reputation in the world that is at stake, not his essential character and worth, with which his name is frequently identified. That testimony is the Lord’s primary concern may be seen from three statements later in the chapter that “my name will be great among the nations” and “my name will be feared among the nations”. Here again we have a connection to the New Testament, in which God calls out a people from the nations to worship his Son, and Israel is nationally sidelined. In doing so, God’s stated purpose is to receive the honor and reverential fear Israel did not show him in its privileged role as son and servant.

The New Testament reveals that Jew and Gentile alike may individually be sons and servants of God during the present era.

Polluted Food

The word translated “food” is the normal Hebrew word for bread. In this case, it does not mean literal bread; rather, by the device of metonymy, it stands for the entire meal. In fact, as we can see from the context, it was meat, not bread, that was polluted, and the “table” the Lord refers to is actually the brazen altar where offerings were presented to God. So there is a fair bit of wordplay going on here.

The word translated “polluted” means impure or defiled. The pollution consisted in offering blind, lame and sick animals for sacrifice, the implication being that either the priests or the people were holding back the best for themselves, assuming, perhaps, that God would not know or care. Perhaps those who did this did not really believe at all.

The problem with a polluted sacrifice is not that God despises blind, sick or lame animals, or people for that matter. The Lord Jesus showed that to be far from the case, healing those in need. The problem was that each sacrifice in the Mosaic system spoke of the Lord Jesus Christ and his sacrifice in some metaphorical way, and physical defilement was intended to picture spiritual defilement. That would never do. The New Testament calls Christ “holy, innocent, unstained”, the spotless Lamb of God. Offering defiled sacrifices spoiled the picture and ruined God’s enjoyment of the sacrifice. It also ruined the testimonial aspect of the sacrifices.

Prophetic Tenses

We have discussed prophetic tenses before in this series. The prophetic perfect tense, for example, describes future events in the past tense as if they had already happened, for example, Isaiah’s “Surely he has borne our griefs”. We have another such instance here, where the Lord three times states, “My name is great” or “My name is feared”. Most interpreters supply what they believe to be the sense by inserting the words “will be” for “is”, making this, perhaps, a millennial prediction, or, as some would have it, an allegorical hint about the spreading of the gospel in our present era.

Does it really matter? Both are definitely true. The book of Daniel offers incident after incident by which the Lord made his name great in Babylon, from Daniel’s dream interpretations to Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego’s miraculous deliverance, to Nebuchadnezzar’s humbling, to Belshazzar’s writing on the wall and the fall of Babylon. Likewise, Ezra documents correspondence from the Persian monarchs that demonstrate their reverence for the God of Israel. The book of Esther ends with a whole bunch of Gentiles declaring themselves Jews for fear of a people who had God on their side and who could not be exterminated even by the king’s sworn edict. So then, there is ample evidence in the Old Testament that the Lord’s name was already great among many nations.

Still, I think the translators are probably correct in adjusting the tense to future for English readers. The associated statement is made that “in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering”. There is no evidence whatsoever that offering incense to YHWH was a widespread practice among the nations in Malachi’s day. Quite the opposite. The burning of incense to foreign gods is condemned throughout the Old Testament, and is never associated with Gentile worship of YHWH. Generalized incense offering seems to anticipate a millennial setting, and if “will be” is an adequate translation in verse 11, then we ought to be consistent throughout.

The Priests

It’s interesting that the accusation here is leveled against the priesthood (“O priests, who despise my name”). In one sense, the whole nation of Israel was a “kingdom of priests”, but that extended sense is not the way Malachi is using it here, because he speaks of these priests kindling fire on the altar. That was not a task left to just any Israelite, but restricted to the Levitical priests. Many of the sacrifices offered on the brazen altar were for the sins of individuals, and presumably the offerings brought by the people were accepted by the priests and offered on their behalf despite their inferiority. So the whole nation is condemned, but the priests are singled out as peculiarly responsible for allowing the defilement of the Lord’s table to occur on their watch.

Efforts by the commentators to draw lessons for Christian preachers fall a little flat for me. I don’t think a complaint about a defiled table was intended to teach us lessons about sloppy sermonizing or making tacky jokes from the platform, though these are certainly to be avoided. The image of the Lord’s altar as a feast-table speaks of fellowship between man and God accomplished through worship that points to Christ. If there is an allegory we can legitimately draw for ourselves, it is not for the preacher but for the individual believer as priest. Whether our offering is silent and personal or verbal and public, when we speak or think of Christ, we ought to do so decently and in order, with reverence and fear, honoring him with the language of scripture and in accordance with revealed truth, not our frivolous imaginations. That’s true in church, and it’s true in our private worship.

Anything else is shortchanging God.