If You Will Not Redeem Him

I tend to find that seemingly archaic and useless laws from the Old Covenant tend to have great depth of meaning if we will take the time to think about them and appreciate them. One such law was that the firstborn offspring of any livestock had to be either sacrificed to God or paid for by a sacrifice:

Exodus 34:19-20
All that open the womb are Mine, and every male firstborn among your livestock, whether ox or sheep.  But the firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb. And if you will not redeem him, then you shall break his neck. All the firstborn of your sons you shall redeem. And none shall appear before Me empty-handed.

Why did the donkey have to be redeemed instead of sacrificed like the ox or sheep?
Because, according to the Leviticus 11 laws of clean and unclean animals, ox and sheep were "clean" and therefore fit for sacrifice, but donkeys were "unclean." Unclean animals were unfit for human consumption as well as for sacrifice (i.e. Godly consumption.)

Why was it required that the firstborn sons had to be redeemed with a clean animal? It's actually for the exact same reason as the donkey: human beings are inherently "unclean" according to the definition of Leviticus 11. We are land animals that don't chew cud or have split hooves, which are the two requirements for being clean. Furthermore, God would obviously never allow for a human sacrifice, since He frequently denounces this practice among the pagan cultures.

Let's think about how this applies in the context of the New Covenant that we are now under.

We are born to this earth unclean because of sin. Just as the parents who would have made the sacrifice for their firstborn did it regardless of whether the child would grow up to accept God's way of life or not, so also has Jesus Christ offered himself as a sacrifice for all of our sins before we were born, "while we were still sinners" (Romans 5:8). Christ took the parents' role as our Redeemer. Unlike us, being the only person to ever live a life completely free from sin, Jesus was clean; therefore, He was eligible to be the sacrifice that was made for our redemption - our Lamb.

Notice also what had to be done if the firstborn of a donkey was not redeemed - God said, "you shall break his neck." God required that an unclean animal must have a clean one die in its place or else it must be killed. Did God want the donkey to be killed? No! If the donkey were killed, then this was a total loss since it was neither eligible to be offered to God or available to do work for the person it belonged to. God wanted it to be redeemed! In the same way, God wants us to be redeemed, and we must submit to God's will, accepting the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, in order to avoid death, which is the penalty for sin, our uncleanness.

If we refuse to submit to God's law, then we are in effect refusing the redeeming sacrifice of Christ. If we refuse to be redeemed, then we must suffer the consequence of death. I find it particularly interesting that God chose to use donkeys as the example for this law - this also applied to horses and other unclean livestock. Perhaps He wanted to point out how stubborn we can be.