Malachi Chapter Two, A Spiritual Exodus

 

Malachi 2:8 But you have departed from the way; You have caused many to stumble at the law. You have corrupted the covenant of Levi,” says the LORD of hosts. [9] “Therefore I also have made you contemptible and base before all the people, because you have not kept My ways but have shown partiality in the law.”

 

In contrast to the sons of Levi that walked with God in peace and equity, Malachi complains that these priests have departed from the way. The Hebrew word for “departed” is “suwr, or soor” and literally or figuratively means, “to turn off, put or take away.” Rather than walking with God, the priests walked by their own power (authority). Recall that excellent passage in Isaiah where the prophet writes, “Your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn to the right hand or whenever you turn to the left,” Isaiah 30:21. God has hedged Israel in, and permits temptation for the sake of trying one’s faith, of what sort it is. Jesus is the Good Shepherd; if He should open the door to the sheepfold, it is to see if we escape or remain. The outcome varies depending on what we think of our Savior. The writer of Hebrews cautions us that after receiving the knowledge of the truth, if we persist in our sin, there remains no longer a sacrifice for us, Hebrews 10:26. To know, to be exposed to what is true and have the clarity of Christ’s gospel presented but turn from it is the sin against the Holy Spirit, of which there is no forgiveness. It is not falling away; in such cases saving faith never existed to begin with.

These priests, for despising Moses’ law, ought already to have been stoned to death for their sacrilege, Hebrews 10:28. They have departed from the way, apostatizing from Judaism. The next course of action, which the Holy Spirit charts as natural for such men, is to take others with them. “You have caused many to stumble at the law.” Peter writes of false teachers among God’s chosen in both the Old Testament and New Testament dispensations who will compel others to follow their pernicious, or destructive ways, 2 Peter 2:1, 2. Jude too sees this mystery of lawlessness permeating the infant church when he writes, “For there are certain men crept in unawares…ungodly men, turning the grace of God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ…these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities,” Jude 4, 8. Departing, then, begins to have a more defined form than merely leaving, or to turn off (the path.) Such people like the false teachers in Jude or the priests officiating in Malachi’s time depart in spirit. Physically they remain, and that is worse. If their apostasy led them out of the temple to form a cult or sect openly opposed to Yahweh, then those who revered the Law could openly oppose them and the division between orthodoxy and heterodoxy would be crystal clear.

 

Instead, these men remain in the temple, in the priestly garb, but likewise in their heart, they have departed from the way. Levi walked in a spiritual sense, in uprightness beside or behind his God. He had life and peace. Satan spoke of such men, who garnered God’s protection because they delighted in Him and their life reflected this truth. “”Have you not made a hedge around [Job], around his household, and around all that he has on every side?” Job 1:10. God jealously guards what is His, and permits the hedge to be lowered only for the interest of testing one’s faith through the adversity of trials, of which all legitimate children endure from time to time. By departing from the law and drawing others after them to do likewise, they have in fact drawn back to perdition, or destruction, Hebrews 10:39. Of such false teachers Jesus condemningly warned, “you travel land and sea to win one proselyte (Jewish convert), and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves,” Matthew 23:15. Peter warns of such men as the priests Malachi berates when he writes, “For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, then, after having known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them,” 2 Peter 2:21, KJV. There is a similarity to the passage in Hebrews the writer employs when he cautions about the punishment meted out upon those that counted the blood of Christ by which they were sanctified an unholy thing, insulting the Spirit of grace, Hebrews 10:29. Peter and the anonymous writer of Hebrews both preach about men who, like Eli’s sons, do not know the Lord. They know of Him, they have been drawn to Him some of the way. In the instance of these priests they minister in the place of Aaron, accepting the sacrifice on God’s behalf. But in their heart they have departed from the way, done despite to the Spirit of grace, and drawn back to perdition.

 

Such souls were never saved. They did not possess saving faith, having chosen, after hearing the message delivered to them, to reproach God’s offer of salvation and turn away from the commandment. Can we know all of this by mere appearance? Not always. Jude writes, “They are spots (stains) in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves,” Jude 12. Eventually those who have departed out of the way will become manifest by either wholly leaving, or revealing their spiritual bankruptcy by their moral character. John entered into a contest of wills with a certain Christian named Diotrephes late in his apostleship. Noting his character and conduct, it would seem even such men have something to teach us. John notes, “Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. He who does good is of God, but he who does evil has not seen God,” 3 John 11. The only way we may know good from evil is by the Bible. Resting in the arms of any human teacher, no matter their reputation, is exceedingly dangerous to say the very least. We are human, prone to error, and subject to faults. But Christians will never know if they are being led away into error by false teaching and apostate leaders if we do not study the word and have the ability to rightly divide it.