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As a result of the revelation of the Scriptures, we now rightly understand
sanctification and holiness as involving moral and spiritual qualities, but we have first to
learn that its primary meaning was that of separation to some specific purpose, whether
good or evil. This statement, especially the suggestion that evil as well as good finds a
place in the primary conception of sanctification, may seem very strange; and we must
not delay an explanation.
We have given the one reference in Genesis of qadesh, translated "sanctify", and
though the subject may be disagreeable, we must give the only other occurrences of the
word as an aid to the understanding of its basic meaning. The next occurrence to be
considered is in Gen. 38: 21, 22, where the noun form, qedeshah, is translated
"harlot". The reader may well ask in what possible way the sanctifying of the seventh
day can be associated with immorality. The answer is that these two apparently opposing
passages have in common some special element of separation. By referring to
I Kings 14: 24, 15: 12, and Hos. 4: 14, with the knowledge that these vile names are
but substantives derived from the verb "to sanctify", it will be realized that the underlying
idea of the Hebrew word is that of separation to any person or service, whether in itself
good or bad.
We may trace this idea of separation in other connections by referring to one or two
other usages. For example, the words of the Lord to Israel in Lev. 20: 24-26:--
"I am the Lord your God which have separated you from other people . . . . . And ye
shall be holy unto Me, for I the Lord am holy and have severed you from other people,
that ye should be Mine."
Again, by comparing Deut. 19: 2 with Josh. 20: 7 the same relationship is
exhibited:--
"Thou shalt separate three cities for thee in the midst of the land" (Deut. 19: 2).
"And they appointed (Margin: Heb. sanctified) Kedesh in Galilee" (Josh. 20: 7).
The translators of the LXX version have boldly translated the Hebrew qadesh in this
verse by the Greek diasteilan, "they severed".
In Gal. 1: 15, where Paul appears to allude to Jer. 1: 5, he uses aphorizein,
"to separate", as an equivalent for the qadesh of Jer. 1: 5. When the Lord in this passage
speaks of Jeremiah being sanctified from before his birth, there is no suggestion that
Jeremiah was thereby cleansed from the pollution of sin that belongs to all until
redeemed, but rather that the Lord had separated him to this work to which in His own
time He called him.
In Numb. 3: 13 God is said to have hallowed all the firstborn in Israel, both of man
and beast, unto Himself. There is the possibility of reading into the "hallowing" of the
sons of men some moral significance, but this is impossible in the case of the animals--
the firstling of a sheep, though "hallowed", could not experience any moral