Labels

Leviticus on Valentine's Day


Love in Leviticus

The First Reading for today, Valentine's Day which is a Sunday 2/14/2021), is from the Book of Leviticus. It's the last book that one would like to go to find "love".

This third book of the Bible is notorious for its laws on sexual uncleanness (chapter 15) and sexual behavior (chapter 18). Today's Reading  (chapter 13) is on the quarantine of those afflicted with "leprosy" (Hebrew: TSARA`AT), the COVID-19 of antiquity.

But it is also the same Leviticus that has the divine command to "love your neighbor as yourself" (19:18).

It's not incorrect then to think that Jesus, in today's Gospel (Mark 1:40-45) could make that extraordinary gesture to touch the "untouchable" leper to heal him. Jesus, the Jew, was faithful to the Torah. He would, later on, quote Leviticus when asked about the First Commandment: "Love the Lord  your God with all your heart . . . Love your neighbor as yourself." Jesus concludes: "There is no other commandment greater than these" (Mark 12:31).

The Book of Leviticus Explained

A few months ago, during the lockdown,  I started an online Bible course--it's still going on an FB Group (click here to join). 

You can watch below these two lectures of mine on the Book of Leviticus if you're new to the book. Please don't forget to SUBSCRIBE on our YouTube channel.

Topic
Fr. Randy is the current Parish Priest and Rector of the Sacred Heart Parish Shrine in Quezon City, Philippines. He is also the Director of the Biblical Apostolate of the Diocese of Cubao and the coordinator for the Biblical Apostolate of the SVD Philippine Central Province. He teaches Biblical courses at the Divine Word Seminary, Tagaytay City. He holds a doctorate from the Ateneo de Manila University (PhD, 2015) and from the Loyola School of Theology (STD, 2014); Licentiate in Sacred Scripture (SSL, 1999) from the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome); an M.A. in Pastoral Ministry from the Divine Word Seminary  (1995). He served as president of the Catholic Biblical Association of the Philippines (CBAP), chairperson of the Tagaytay Religious Association (TRA), Dean of Studies (Divine Word Seminary), and editor of the academic journal  Diwa: Studies in Philosophy and Theology. He founded the Certificate in Theological Studies (CTS) at the Divine Word Seminary and the SVD Tagaytay Alternative Learning System (SVD-ALS), an educational program for the out-of-school youth. Visit also his YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/c/biblicalapostolateph

Comments

Post a Comment