What follows is a discussion on the interplay between the glory of Elohim, righteousness, atonement for sin, the blood the lamb and the fire of Elohim versus profane fire.

Leviticus 9:2–4, YHVH will appear. It is impossible to appear before YHVH Elohim without the shedding of innocent blood for the atonement of man’s sins. Man is too sinful and unholy to be able to come before his perfect and holy Creator. The sooner human’s realize their sinfulness and unworthiness, and the need to deal with the sorry state their live is in, the sooner they will be able to fill their inner (some say the “God-shaped) void and the unmet need of having an intimate relationship with their Creator.

Leviticus 9:6, This is the thing. When atonement for sin is made, and a person comes to their Creator on that basis, YHVH and his glory will appear in one way or another in that person’s life.

Leviticus 9:6, 23, The glory [kobowd] of YHVH. Kobowd means “glory, honour, glorious, abundance, riches, splendour, dignity, reputation, reverence.” The root word of kobowd is the verb kabad or kabed meaning “to be heavy, be weighty, be grievous, be hard, be rich, be honourable, be glorious, be burdensome and be honoured.” According to The TWOT, the literal meaning of kabad/kabed is rarely used in Scripture; rather, its figurative meaning (e.g. to be heavy with sin) is more commonly used. As such, in Scripture it often refers to a weighty, impressive or prominent person in society who is worthy of honor and respect. The TWOT identifies three main categories of usage

Derivatives of kabed include kabed meaning “great,” kabed meaning “liver,” kobed meaning ­“great,” kabod meaning “glorious” (Ps 45:14; Exek 43:41), kabod meaning “glory,” k’budda meaning “abundance, riches” (Judg 18:21) and k’bedut meaning “heaviness” (Exod 14:24).

In Lev 9:6 and 23, kabod is a noun referring to glory, glorious, honor or honorable and is often used combination with another noun as a noun-adjective (e.g. the glorious king).

Leviticus 9:7, Go to the altar…sin offering…make atonement. For the glory of YHVH to appear in one’s life, one must first go to the altar of the cross one must do two things: lay one’s life down as an offering or living sacrifice (i.e. die to one’s carnal sin man) before YHVH and then receive Yeshua as an atoning sin offering in payment for one’s sins. 

Leviticus 9:12, Sprinkled all around. (Other references to sprinkling of the blood include Exod 24:6; 24:8; Lev 6:27; 8:11; 8:19, 24, 30; 9:12, 18.) This is a prophetic picture of Yeshua’s shedding or sprinkling his blood on the cross. The apostolic writers use the term sprinkling on several occasions to describe what happened on the cross for the atonement of sin (1 Pet 1:2; Heb 9:13–14; 10:22; 12:24).

Leviticus 9:22–23, Aaron lifted his hand…blessed the people…the glory of YHVH…fell on their faces. The acceptance of and the blessings from heaven flow down to us when what we’re doing is lining up with heaven’s word and will. Aaron lifting his arms up and blessing the people pictures the river of life flowing from heaven through him and onto all the people. This river of life occurred because Aaron had followed the instructions Moses had received from YHVH (i.e. the Torah), then he cleansed himself of sin (v. 1), then the spiritual renewal and the river of life and redemption flowed to his immediate family (v. 9), then outward to the people around him (vv. 15 and 18). This done, the people were blessed and “the glory of YHVH appeared to all the people” (v. 23), and their sin offering was accepted resulting in heaven and earth meeting and the people worshipping Elohim (v. 24).

Leviticus 9:24 and 10:1, Fire from heaver versus profane fire. Fire is a biblical metaphor for spiritual light and truth. Divinely revealed truth originates only from heaven. Man, because of his fallen, sinful condition is incapable of originating truth. Whatever religion, philosophy or ideology man originates out of his own carnal mind will, at best, be a mixture of truth and error. This is man feeding from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the fork-tongued two-pathed serpent (i.e. of good and evil or talking out of both sides of his mouth at once) is there lurking in that tree waiting to subvert and deceive man into joining his sinful rebellion against the Almighty Creator. That is why walking away from the divinely revealed instructions—the spiritual light and fire of YHVH is so perilous. This is what Nadab and Abihu did when they offered up strange fire; they followed the inclinations of their sinful and fallen natures instead of walking in the light of YHVH’s truth by following his instructions. Playing with fire is a double-edged sword; fire both enlighten, energizes and purifies, but is also a symbol of divine judgement in that it destroys and consumes the carnal and often sinful works (the wood, hay and stubble, 1 Cor 3:12–15) of rebellious and prideful man.