Hebrews 13:11 Commentary and Bible Study

Although the worshippers and the priests were allowed to eat part of certain offerings made under the law, there were also other offerings which they were not allowed to eat. The burnt offerings of Leviticus 1 were to be burnt on the altar in their entirety, their blood being sprinkled on the altar. Moreover, there were certain other offerings and the rule was that nobody was allowed to eat the meat of the sacrifice. Instead, apart from the blood and certain selected parts which were burnt on the altar, the animal as a whole was to be burnt outside the camp. Outside the camp meant away from the community of Israel where in the wilderness the tents were pitched, and so these were the clearest possible cases of offerings which nobody was allowed to eat. Chief among these were the offerings made on the Day of Atonement, consisting of a young bullock and one of two goats. This is what is referred to here for the high priest is singled out, and there was only one day in the year when the high priest took blood into the holy of holies (Leviticus 16). He alone was permitted to go into the holy of holies taking with him the blood of the sacrifices. When he came out again, the bullock and the goat on which the lot had fallen were to be burned without the camp. Why did the law have certain sacrifices which the people were forbidden to eat, and others which they may eat? It allowed them to eat some sacrifices to show that this is indeed legitimate. The believer feeds spiritually on Christ, rejoicing in his sacrifice for sin and the amazing love which he has shown to his people. But at the same time the law also had other sacrifices which they were not to eat. This symbolised the fact that the law did not grant full access to God. The writer of Hebrews has deliberately selected this type of offering because he wishes to contrast the limited access granted by the law with the full access available in the new covenant. Although the law set limits on what they were allowed to eat, the new covenant sets no such limits. This highlights another respect in which the gospel is superior to the law. The gospel allows us unfettered access to God, and unrestricted fellowship with him, while the law kept the worshippers at a distance.But why were the bodies of those animals burned outside the camp? Because they were offerings for sin, and sin was a disgrace. The word translated camp refers to the pitching of tents. The idea is that we are supposed to reject our sin, and so the animal, which symbolically paid the price for sin under the law by its death, was burned outside the camp. Now this would be a picture of Christ. When Christ came he was executed outside the camp with criminals; that is what the Jews were taught to do. If in those days of capital punishment somebody had to be executed for their sin, it must be done outside the city. ‘They are rejected; they are a disgrace; we put them away outside the city.’ And so Christ the creator of the world, the Saviour, the man of love, the one who came to atone for us and for our sin, was treated with ignominy and scorn. He was rejected, and executed with criminals outside the city, and God who knew all that his Son would suffer, illustrated and predicted this detail of Christ’s suffering in the ritual of the law ordained so long ago.