III.
The turning-point in the history of the sacrificial system was
the reformation of Josiah; what we find in the Priestly Code is
the matured result of that event. It is precisely in the
distinctions that are characteristic of the sacrificial law as
compared with the ancient sacrificial praxis that we have evidence
of the fact that, if not all exactly occasioned by the
centralisation of the worship, they were almost all somehow at
least connected with that change.
In the early days, worship arose out of the midst of ordinary
life, and was in most intimate and manifold connection with it.
A sacrifice was a meal, a fact showing how remote was the idea of
antithesis between spiritual earnestness and secular joyousness.
A meal unites a definite circle of guests, and in this way the
sacrifice brought into connection the members of the family, the
associates of the corporation, the soldiers of the army, and,
generally speaking, the constituents of any permanent or
temporary society. It is earthly relationships that receive
their consecration thereby, and in correspondence are the natural
festal occasions presented by the vicissitudes of life.
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