With one quick action, Phinehas has preserved his place as a hero in the national Israelite psyche. He’s successfully halted a plague, stopped the influence of Balaam from spreading any further, and taken action when, quite frankly, everyone else just sat on their hands.
As such, God sees fit to reward him with one more blessing: a perpetual priesthood (Numbers 25:13).
God doesn’t do this a lot. In fact, there are only four other people that God makes a covenant with inside the Old Testament: Noah (Genesis 9:11), Abraham (Genesis 15:18), Moses and Israel (Exodus 34:15), and David (Psalm 89:39-38). Phinehas is the fifth. Not bad company to be in.
Scholars debate what this covenant actually consists of, though. Does it mean that Phinehas’ line will be that of the High Priest? Or just the regular ole’ priesthood?
It does appear that Phinehas became the High Priest after the death of Eleazar (Joshua 24:33; Judges 20:28), but eventually, the priesthood would rest in the hands of Ithamar (1 Chronicles 24:1-6). Eli was the most famous high priest of that line, serving as Samuel’s mentor.
Unfortunately, it would be Eli’s indifference towards his sons that would eventually deliver the priesthood back to the line of Phinehas (1 Samuel 2:30-35). That was fulfilled in the time of Solomon when he stripped Abiathar of his role and replaced him with Zadok (1 Kings 2:27-35), where it stayed until the time between the Testaments.
So, does the perpetual priesthood mean perpetual High priesthood? Maybe. The line of Phinehas served as high priests for nearly all of the Old Testament period, even if some of that period was spent as a dual high priesthood during the time of David.
What’s more likely is the relationship between Phinehas’ line and the regular priesthood. Even though other clans would serve in or near the Tabernacle and Temple, the actual job of ministering to the people fell to the line of Phinehas—referred to in Scripture as the Zadokites (Ezekiel 44:15).
The Bible makes it plain that this role came about because of the zeal that Phinehas displayed in getting rid of the paganism that erupted during the intervention of Balaam (Psalm 106:30-31). It was the same kind of zeal that the Levites as a whole showed during the golden calf incident (Exodus 32:25-29).
You could argue that this was the main function of the priests (I won’t, but someone could). We know that the most famous job of the priesthood was to offer sacrifices and mediate on behalf of the people. And truthfully, that’s probably what they spent 99% of their time doing.
But there are flashes of this kind of “mediation” in Scripture, too, where someone violates the sanctity of the Temple and the priests lash out to defend God’s righteousness. When King Uzziah tried to offer incense in the Temple, the priests opposed him (2 Chronicles 26:16-21). When Jehoida sets the rightful King Joash on the throne of Israel, the Levites act as his personal protectorate (2 Chronicles 23:1-11).
What does this mean for us? Peter calls us a “royal priesthood” in 1 Peter 2:9; does that mean we need to stab everyone that engages in pagan practices, too?
Not exactly. What Peter has in mind there is the ability for us to approach God through our High Priest, which is Jesus.
But in that same verse, Peter claims that we are a royal priesthood, and a holy nation, and a people for God’s own possession, “so that we may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”
Proclaim. That’s a proactive word. It means to go out, to distribute, to teach, and to share. As priests of God’s holy name, we’re called upon to teach the Word to others in a way that shines the light on Him.
And, when necessary, just like Phinehas, we have to defend it. Not by killing people—that’s the opposite of what we’re saying—but by standing up for truth, even when it’s unpopular. Phinehas was the only person that did that in Numbers 25. We might be the only person that does it in our time.