The Lord said to Moses, “Say to
Aaron: ‘For the generations to come none of your descendants who has a defect
may come near to offer the food of his God. No man who has any defect may come near: no
man who is blind or lame, disfigured or deformed; no man with a crippled foot or hand, or who is a hunchback or a dwarf, or who has
any eye defect, or who has festering or running sores or damaged testicles.” Leviticus 21:16-21
If you look at this passage out of context, then it
appears God doesn’t approve of handicapped or disfigured people, but this stipulation
only applied to the Levites, the priests.
The offerings presented to God needed to be from a male without
defect. That meant that the priests
needed to not have a defect also. God
wanted the people to give their best and the priests needed to be the best
themselves.
In the story of Mephibosheth, King David showed love and
mercy to a handicapped person and said he would eat at the king’s table all his
life. Jesus even healed those who were
lame, mute and blind.
Jesus would come as a sacrifice, fulfilling the
requirement “without defect” which in that case meant without sin. The priest had to symbolically represented
Christ in a physical manner.