Posted on : 11 Sep, 2006
Subject : Aaronic Priesthood in the Church?
Aaronic Priesthood in the Church?
There are a number of churches and fraternal lodges who ordain ministers and officers into what they call the Aaronic Priesthood. In one organization, nearly all the preteen and teenaged boys are ‘called’ into the Aaronic Priesthood. In other churches, adult men and women may receive ordination into the Aaronic Order. It definitely is the prerogative of every organization to give their officers any name they like. But when a church makes the claim to be the same ecclesiastical organization that was established by the Messiah and His Apostles nearly two thousand years ago, and claims to be meticulously patterned on the Scriptures, then they invite objective comparison of their practices with the Word. According to the Bible, the only people who were permitted and privileged to be members of the Aaronic Priesthood were males who were borninto the Israelite tribe of Levi. [Numbers 3:6-9, 28] The ‘requirement’ was that one’s parents were Levites. [The Aaronic Priesthood is also called the Levitical Priesthood.] Aaronic priests were first appointed after the exodus of Israel from Egypt. [Exodus 28:1] Prior to the time of Moses brother Aaron, there were no Aaronic Priests.[How could there have been? The Aaronic order was named after Aaron. Likewise, there could have been no Levites before Levi had been born.] Their function was to administer the performances and sacrificial ordinances that were associated with the Altar in the Tabernacle and Temple. [Numbers 3:6-9] The only persons who could serve as Aaronic Priesthood had to literally be born of the ancestral lineage of the tribe of Levi. Anyone who attempted to function as an Aaronic Priest, but whose family lineage was not through Levi, was to be put to death for being imposters and violating the Torah! "You will appoint Aaron and his sons, and they will function as Priests. But anyone else who presumes to take this office will be put to death." [Numbers 1:51; 3:10, 28; 16:40] Even Jesus did not qualify to be a member of the Aaronic Priesthood! The Messiah “belonged to a different tribe, the members of which have never done service at the altar. Everyone knows He came from Judah, a tribe which Moses did not mention at all when dealing with Priests.” [Hebrews 7:13-14] There was Aaronic Priesthood during part of the Old Testament times. There is no mention in the New Testament of Aaronic Priesthood within the Church. There is also no mention of the Aaronic Priesthood in the Church of Christ that is described in the Nephite Record. [The office of Priest is mentioned in the Church, but it is not part of the Aaronic Order.] The Aaronic Priesthood had a beginning and it had an end. It was temporal - meaning temporary and not eternal.That particular order of priesthood began with worship in the Tabernacle - after the Israelites had escaped from Egypt. The Aaronic Priesthood did not exist prior to the Law of Moses. It did not exist in the days of Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob. It started in the wilderness between Egypt and Canaan. It ended with the Atonement - it was finalized with the Sacrifice of the blood of the Messiah. Membership in the Levitical Order was dependent upon who one’s mother and father were. That order of Priesthood was according to the flesh, only. Membership was determined by genetic ancestry, alone. The Aaronic Order ministered in "carnal ordinances" only. In the physical rituals of the Temple. In the physical care of the objects within the Temple walls. The Aaronic Priesthood was temporary, it was according to the flesh, and it ministered in physical things. It related only to the temporal aspects and sacrificial performances of the Law of Moses. It was inextricably linked to service of the ordinances of the Tabernacle and Temple - the rituals and blood sacrifices of the Law of Moses. But those rituals and animal sacrifices came to an end with the Atonement of Christ. So did the temporal function of the Aaronic Order of Priesthood. There is a greater or higher Priesthood within the Church. It is eternal. It is independent of family lineage. It is spiritual. It has "no father, mother or ancestry; it has no beginning or ending; it is forever. [Hebrews 7:3] This higher Priesthood is the Holy Order of God. [Alma 13:1-18; 5:44, 54] It is sometimes called the Melchizedek Order, because Melchizedek was the greatest man to have been called into that Priesthood service. [Hebrews 7:11; Alma 13:14-19] The Priesthood of the Messiah was like that held by Melchizedek. The Priesthood of the Order of the Son of God is eternal [not temporary], is not dependent upon birth into the tribe of Levi, and is spiritual [versus fleshly]. The idea of ordaining twelve-year-old Gentile boys to the Aaronic Priesthood, or 30-year-old Gentile women to the Levitical Order does not follow the Scriptural pattern. That order of Priesthood ended with the Atonement of Christ, and the termination of the offering of sacrifices in the Temple. If the Messiah Himself did not qualify to be an Aaronic Priest because He was not of the lineage of Levi, how can someone of Gentile heritage, or ancestry in an Israelite Tribe such as Ephraim, possibly think to qualify for such an office? The function of the Aaronic Order was temporary. It has expired. Certainly there are living descendants of the Israelite tribe of Levi living in our day who may teach the people of Yahweh, but the function of that particular order of priesthood came to an end. Denominations may do as they like, of course, calling anyone by any title they deem appropriate. But Scripture says there is only one true Order in the Church: the Holy Order of God.
David Bruce Clark PO Box 33 Oak Grove MO 64075 USA www.lionofgod.com
