What is “unauthorized fire,” or, as it is rendered in other translations, “profane fire” or “strange fire”? We use the word profane to refer to that which is less than holy, but the word profane comes from the Latin profanus, which literally means “outside the temple.” So, in a literal sense, Moses, as the author of Leviticus, is saying that the fire that Nadab and Abihu introduced to the altar had not been purified or consecrated. For that, God took their lives.
Leviticus 10
1 Aaron’s sons Nadab and Abihu put coals of fire in their incense burners and sprinkled incense over them. In this way, they disobeyed the LORD by burning before him the wrong kind of fire, different than he had commanded.
2 So fire blazed forth from the LORD’s presence and burned them up, and they died there before the LORD.
While reading this, I was told that this is what many are doing, when they approach the altar. They are trying to deceive the Lord God, with unauthorized fire! The King James Version, calls it unauthorized fire. It was called unauthorized fire because it wasn’t associated with Jehovah! Aaron’s sons thought that they could deceive the Lord God by presenting what looked like a real fire!! Who caught that? You cannot deceive the true and living, Lord God! Nada & Abihu thought that they could approach the altar with any kind of meaningless sacrifice, and figured that the blaze would be unnoticeable to the ALL KNOWING JEHOVAH!!!!
We can be certain, however, that they knew the clear command concerning the altar: “You shall not offer unauthorized incense on it” (Ex. 30:9). Yet for some reason, they shrugged off the warning and paid for it dearly. We must come to the altar, with NOTICEABLE FIRE!!
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