Not really. I don't intend to continue posting here continuously. But for an unimportant reason, I was inspired to post something today. So here goes:
In Exodus 20:21, right after the Ten Commandments, God commands the Jews to make an "altar of earth", that is to say, an altar which is made of the ground. "Upon it you shall offer your olot (often translated as elevation-offerings) and your shelamim (often translated as peace-offerings). . ." What I would like to point out is the fact that these offerings are referred to as "your[s]". In what sense do these offerings belong to the Jews?
Perhaps you could answer that they belong to the Jews in the sense that the animals which will constitute them will come from the Jews. Or that they will be effecting expiation on behalf of the Jews (something not unrelated to the first point). I think these answers are valid and true, but I think there's also another layer here.
I don't know of the words olah or shelamim come up earlier in the Torah, but this is the first time we hear that the Jews as a nation will be offering them up. And yet there is no explanation of what exactly they are! How would the Jews know what these terms mean? They must have had some conception of these kinds of sacrifices prior to this commandment. The implication, then, is that God took an institution which already existed, ("your already-existing olot and shelamim") and "appropriated" it.
I think this very much fits with the Rambam's conception of Korbanot as something which represents almost a concession to human nature. Humans are very attached to sacrifice (they are "ours") and have a hard time conceiving of worship without them. Even today, it is hard for us to conceive of tefillah without the framework of it being a substitute for korbanot. That's what "your" means. It means that these institutions, the olah and shelamim, are not instrinsically divine. Rather, they are of you, human in nature. I am providing a divine channel through which you are to direct your earthly actions, says God.
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