Priests Just Got Real

The return to Jerusalem brought with it many emotions. In class, we discussed how potent these emotions were, as demonstrated with the building of the second temple under the Messiah King Cyrus II's Persian rule. While these heightened emotions towards the temple’s physical building process were clearly evident, the emotions of the people also caused changes to the religious institution’s internal structure. 

These sprouting changes of the internal religious system of the budding Abrahamic religions can most notable be seen with Ezekiel redefining priesthood within society (89). Prior to Ezekiel, there was little structure to the priest caste as it was led by David and Solomon respectively during the time of their reigns (89). Now, in an age that lacked a Davidic king to lead religious rituals as a priest, Ezekiel recognized there was now a need to institutionalize priesthood. Following God’s will, Ezekiel defined the new roles of priests and how priests should conduct themselves when in the presence of God (89). 

One of the more interesting instructions God gives Ezekiel is having Ezekiel define the difference between those of the Tribe of Levi and those who are direct descendants of Zadok as seen within the book of Ezekiel: “And the chamber whose prospect is toward the north is for the priests, the keepers of the charge of the altar: these are the sons of Zadok among the sons of Levi, which come near to the LORD to minister unto him” (Ezekiel 40:46). It was imperative for Ezekiel to define the roles of each of these groups as each was instructed to carry out different tasks for the second temple as their temple duties correlated to their relationships with God. For the members of the Levi tribe, due to allowing idolatry to occur in the original temple, they failed their duty to God. As punishment, the tribe of Levi could now only serve the new temple by performing menial tasks. While for the sons of Zadok, although they were a subsect of the Tribe of Levi, they had not failed God with their duties and, as a reward, were given the task of performing liturgy in the new temple.