Should Christians Obey the Levitical Law?

Question 07109

The question of whether Christians should obey the Levitical law comes up whenever a believer notices the rules about diet, clothing, festivals, and ritual purity in Leviticus and wonders if they still apply. The short answer is that the Christian is not bound to obey the Levitical law, because it was part of the Mosaic covenant given to Israel, a covenant that has reached its goal and ended in Jesus. Yet the Levitical law is far from useless to us, for it still reveals God and points to Christ.

To answer well we have to see what the Levitical law was for, and why it no longer binds the New Covenant believer.

What the Levitical law was given to do

The Levitical law formed part of the covenant constitution of Israel, regulating the worship, sacrifices, priesthood, festivals, and purity of the nation. Much of it was deliberately designed to mark Israel out as distinct from the surrounding peoples and to teach the holiness of God through a system of clean and unclean. The Levitical law was not arbitrary, but it was tied to a particular people in a particular era of redemptive history.

A great deal of the Levitical law was also shadow, pointing forward to something greater. The sacrifices, the priesthood, and the Day of Atonement were pictures of the work Jesus would accomplish, and Paul says these things are a shadow of what was to come, while the substance belongs to Christ. The Levitical law was teaching Israel its need and preparing the way for the Saviour.

Why the Levitical law no longer binds

The believer is not under the Levitical law because the whole Mosaic covenant of which it was part has ended in Christ. The New Testament treats the law as a single package, and it declares that package obsolete now that the New Covenant has come. Paul rebukes those who would drag believers back under its food laws and festivals, and he tells us plainly to let no one pass judgement on us in questions of food and drink or festivals or new moons or Sabbaths, which were a shadow of what was to come.

This is why we do not keep the dietary rules, the purity regulations, or the festival calendar of the Levitical law. To return to them would be to rebuild what God Himself has set aside and to act as though the shadow still mattered after the substance has come. The relationship of all this to the wider Mosaic law is explored in the question of how we apply Old Testament law today.

How the Levitical law still speaks

To say we are not bound by the Levitical law is not to say it is silent. It still reveals the holiness of God with a vividness few other parts of Scripture match, showing us how seriously He takes sin and how costly atonement is. Reading Leviticus, the believer meets the God who cannot simply overlook sin but provides a way of cleansing, and that prepares the heart to treasure the cross.

The Levitical law also shines when read as a portrait of Jesus. The whole sacrificial system finds its meaning in Him, our great High Priest and our perfect sacrifice, and the call to be holy because God is holy is taken up and deepened in the New Testament. Read in the light of Christ, the Levitical law becomes one of the richest devotional books in the Bible, as the wider question of the purposes of the Mosaic law shows.

Holiness without the old code

The believer freed from the Levitical law is still called to holiness, but a holiness driven by the moral character of God applied through the Spirit rather than by ritual rules. The New Testament reissues the moral substance of the law, deepens it, and writes it on the heart, so that the Christian pursues purity of life and worship from the inside out rather than through the ceremonies of Sinai.

This keeps us from two mistakes. We do not impose the Levitical law on believers as though the covenant were still in force, and we do not treat freedom from it as freedom from holiness. The God who gave Leviticus is still holy, and His people are still called to reflect that holiness through the power of the Spirit.

The sacrificial system fulfilled in Christ

The heart of the Levitical law was its system of sacrifice and priesthood, and this is where its fulfilment in Jesus shines most clearly. The endless animal sacrifices could never take away sin, but they pointed to the one sacrifice that could. The Day of Atonement, when the high priest entered the most holy place with blood, was a yearly picture of what Jesus did once for all when He offered Himself.

This is why the believer does not keep the sacrificial parts of the Levitical law. To go on offering the shadows after the substance has come would deny that the work of Jesus is finished. The book of Hebrews labours this point, showing that our great High Priest has done away with the old sacrifices by fulfilling everything they foreshadowed. We read Leviticus, then, as a long preparation for the cross.

Clean and unclean, and the coming of Christ

The food laws and purity rules of the Levitical law served to mark Israel out and to teach the difference between holy and common. Jesus Himself signalled their end when He declared all foods clean, and God confirmed it to Peter in the vision at Joppa, opening the way for the gospel to go to the Gentiles. The wall the Levitical law had built between Jew and Gentile was taken down in Christ.

So the believer is free from the clean and unclean distinctions of the Levitical law, not because purity no longer matters, but because the purity God now seeks is of the heart, worked by the Spirit. The outward signs have given way to the inward reality they always pointed toward, and the people of God are now marked out by holiness of life rather than by diet and ritual.

Be holy, for I am holy

At the centre of the Levitical law stands the refrain, be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy, and that call has not been cancelled for the Christian. Peter takes those very words from Leviticus and applies them directly to the church, telling believers to be holy in all their conduct because the God who called them is holy. The standard of God’s holiness outlives the covenant code that once expressed it.

What has changed is the means, not the goal. Under the Levitical law holiness was pursued through ritual separation, clean and unclean, sacrifice and washing, but under the New Covenant it is pursued through the indwelling Spirit who works the character of God into the heart. The believer aims at the holiness Leviticus called for, by the better power the Spirit supplies.

So the Levitical law still summons the Christian upward, even though he no longer keeps its ceremonies. It teaches him that his God is holy, that sin is serious, that atonement is costly, and that a holy God means to have a holy people. Read with the eyes of faith, the book that lists so many old rules turns out to be a sustained call to the holiness that the gospel now makes possible.

The believer can therefore approach the Levitical law with neither guilt nor neglect. There is no guilt in setting aside its diets and rituals, for Christ has fulfilled them, and there is no excuse for neglecting the book, for it reveals the holiness of God as vividly as anywhere in Scripture. Read through the lens of the cross, the Levitical law turns out to be one long preparation for the gospel and one steady summons to the holiness the Spirit now works in God’s people.

The same approach settles the practical questions people raise about the Levitical law, whether about food, clothing, or feast days. We do not weigh each rule to see if it survives, but recognise the whole covenant as fulfilled in Christ while honouring the holiness of the God who gave it. That frees the conscience and still keeps the heart aimed at the holiness the Levitical law was always pointing toward.

So, now what?

Read Leviticus, but read it as a Christian. You are not bound to obey the Levitical law with its diets, purity rules, and festivals, so do not burden your conscience with them, yet do not skip the book either. Let it show you the holiness of God and the meaning of the cross.

Pursue the holiness the Levitical law pointed toward by the better way God has now given. Walk by the Spirit, lean on your great High Priest, and let the moral character of God shape your life from within. The shadow has done its work, and now you live in the light of the substance.

“Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.” Colossians 2:16-17