Scripture Daily

Context No. 1899 of 4322 · 1 Maccabees

Context · Reflection

1 Maccabees 10:34-45: in context

34“All the feasts, the Sabbaths, new moons, appointed days, three days before a feast, and three days after a feast, let them all be days of immunity and release for all the Jews who are in my kingdom. 35No man shall have authority to exact anything from any of them, or to trouble them concerning any matter. 36“Let there be enrolled among the king’s forces about thirty thousand men of the Jews, and pay shall be given to them, as is due to all the king’s forces. 37Of them, some shall be placed in the king’s great strongholds, and some of them shall be placed over the affairs of the kingdom, which are positions of trust. Let those who are over them and their rulers be of themselves, and let them walk after their own laws, even as the king has commanded in the land of Judah. 38“The three districts that have been added to Judea from the country of Samaria, let them be annexed to Judea, that they may be reckoned to be under one ruler, that they may not obey any other authority than the high priest’s. 39As for Ptolemais and its land, I have given it as a gift to the sanctuary that is at Jerusalem, for the expenses of the sanctuary. 40I also give every year fifteen thousand shekels of silver from the king’s revenues from the places that are appropriate. 41And all the additional funds which those who manage the king’s affairs didn’t pay as in the first years, they shall give from now on toward the works of the temple. 42Besides this, the five thousand shekels of silver which they received from the uses of the sanctuary from the revenue year by year is also released, because it belongs to the priests who minister there. 43Whoever flees to the temple that is at Jerusalem, and within all of its borders, whether owing money to the king, or any other matter, let them go free, along with all that they have in my kingdom. 44For the building and renewing of the structures of the sanctuary, the expense shall also be given out of the king’s revenue. 45For the building of the walls of Jerusalem and fortifying it all around, the expense shall also be given out of the king’s revenue, also for the building of the walls in Judea.”

Among the many concessions the king grants the Jews is a provision about the temple: whoever flees to the temple at Jerusalem, or within its borders, whether owing money to the king or in trouble over any other matter, shall go free, along with all they have. The sanctuary is made a place of refuge, where the endangered and the pursued could flee and find safety, protected within its bounds from what threatened them outside.

The temple as a place of refuge, where the pursued could flee and be safe, is an old idea in Scripture, and a rich one. The one being hunted, the debtor, the endangered, could run to the sanctuary and find protection there, safe within its bounds from what pursued them outside. And this points beyond the physical temple to a truth about God himself: that he is the refuge to whom we can flee for safety. The sanctuary was a place of refuge because it was God's house, the place of his presence; and God himself is our true refuge, the one to whom we run when we are pursued, threatened, or afraid. What pursues us may be many things: guilt that hunts us, fears that chase us, troubles and dangers we cannot escape by our own strength. And the invitation, pictured in the sanctuary's refuge, is to flee to God, to run to him as to a stronghold, and find in his presence the safety we cannot find outside it. The name of the LORD is a strong tower, the proverb says; the righteous run to him and are safe. There is something to learn about where we run when we are afraid or pursued. We are tempted to flee to lesser refuges, to our own devices, to distraction, to whatever seems to offer safety; and the picture of the sanctuary calls us to a better refuge, God himself, to whom we may run and be safe. We have fled for refuge, Hebrews says, to take hold of the hope set before us. When guilt hunts us, we flee to the God who forgives; when fear pursues us, we flee to the God who is our stronghold; when danger threatens, we run to the God who is our refuge. The sanctuary's asylum was a shadow of this: that there is a refuge we can flee to and be safe, and that refuge, finally, is God himself, the strong tower to whom the endangered run and find safety.

When I am pursued or afraid, by guilt, by fear, by troubles I cannot escape by my own strength, where do I flee, to lesser refuges that cannot finally protect me, or can I run, as to the sanctuary's asylum, to God himself, the strong tower to whom the endangered run and are safe, and find in his presence the refuge I cannot find outside it?

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