I believe Burroughs makes this point (see Gospel Worship):

What is indicated is that the men should have inferred, even if there were no explicit command, that they had no warrant to bring the "strange fire" into the tabernacle. The "fire" they should have brought in 10:1 should have been the fire lit off by God himself in 9:24. This was heavenly fire, a perpetually burning fire (sustained by ordinary means of adding fuel), never supposed to be put out. But even if it was OK that it needed to be relit, in THIS situation, anyway, clearly it was God-given fire that was present already.

And this is further proof of that RPW which we maintain is so vital to true worship. So what if God had yet to spell out (Lev. 16) in so many words the procedure for bringing fire into the Tabernacle? The men were destroyed for DOING something they had not been commanded, and something that was inferential, since God had provided said FIRE.

The notion that drunkenness was involved (v.9) is a possibility, but certainly requires further inference. One could just as easily see the injunction as a warning that the priest must have all his mental faculties about him, i.e. take seriously his duties in worship. Wine would certainly be a "clouding" factor in judgment. But it is a leap to suppose that N&A must have been drunk, then.

__________________
Rev. Bruce G. Buchanan
ChainOLakes Presbyterian Church, CentralLake, MI


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