Malachi 2:1-4, Judgment on the Priests

The functions of Israel’s priests were (1) ritual – the offering of sacrifices that brought Israelites back into relationship with God, (2) oracular – divine or perceive God’s will using the urim and thummim (Exodus 28:30; Numbers 27:21; 1 Samuel 14:41; Ezra 2:63), (3) therapeutic – diagnosis of skin disease, quarantine, and observation, (4) instructional and judicial – teaching the law and judging, and (5) administrative – managing the temple. Yahweh has evaluated the priests of Malachi’s day as failing in carrying out especially the ritual and instructional functions for which they were responsible.

¹ “And now, priests, this command is for you. ² If you will not listen, if you will not take it to heart to give honor to my name, says Yahweh of hosts, then I will bring a curse upon you and I will curse your blessings you give. Indeed, I have already cursed them, because you do not lay it to heart. ³ Behold, I will rebuke your offspring and spread dung on your faces, the dung of your offerings, and you shall be taken away with it. ⁴ Then you will know that I have sent this command to you, that my covenant with Levi may stand, says Yahweh of hosts.

God has commanded a judgment on the priests if they do not repent and honor His name by offering unblemished sacrifices and teaching the Law in truth. He will bring a curse upon them. The blessings they offer the people will be cursed because they do not honor God in their hearts. The dung that was separated from the sacrificial animals and carried away to be disposed of as useless will be spread on their faces in the ultimate humiliation, and they will be carried away as useless. How this would actually be carried out is not described.

When this occurred the priests would know that it was God who brought this about as a judgment on them. That His covenant with Levi might stand, the stipulations of judgment must be levied against them. They have violated this covenant and covenanted consequences must be imposed.

The covenant with Levi was described in two parts of the Law:

¹¹ And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ¹² “Behold, I have taken the Levites from among the people of Israel instead of every firstborn who opens the womb among the people of Israel. The Levites shall be mine, ¹³ for all the firstborn are mine. On the day that I struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, I consecrated for my own all the firstborn in Israel, both of man and of beast. They shall be mine: I am the Lord.” (Numbers 3:11-13)

¹⁰ And the Lord said to Moses, ¹¹ “Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has turned back my wrath from the people of Israel, in that he was jealous with my jealousy among them, so that I did not consume the people of Israel in my jealousy. ¹² Therefore say, ‘Behold, I give to him my covenant of peace, ¹³ and it shall be to him and to his descendants after him the covenant of a perpetual priesthood, because he was jealous for his God and made atonement for the people of Israel.’” (Numbers 25:10-13)

The tribe of Levi was chosen to be the priestly tribe, Aaron’s family designated as the priests who functioned in the tabernacle and later the temple, the other Levites responsible for the care of the tabernacle/temple and assisting Aaron’s family in their sacrificial duties. The priests in Malachi’s day had failed to fulfill their responsibilities.