I'm not overly dogmatic on this because I've come up with my views largely by my own experience and thoughts (hopefully with help from the Lord). I think "intentional sins" under the Law were a form of defiance, and obviously weren't covered by sin offerings, etc. when the person supposedly "repenting" wasn't really "repenting."
Sin offerings and the various forms of purification for uncleanness were designed for those who erred through negligence or by "slipping up" by some form of coercion, duress, brief interlude, etc. "Unintentional" suggests there is a profound regret involved when a person does wrong and wishes to make things right.
Under the Law there were cures and corrections for every kind of failure to keep the Law properly. However, these things are not going to work for someone who is actively campaigning against the Covenant itself. So there is a great difference between someone seeking forgiveness *through* the Law and someone seeking forgiveness for having violated the entire spirit of the Law.
I suggest that Israel was forgiven regularly for all of their failures when they were a nation in the land, keeping the terms of their Covenant. But when they violated the Covenant as an instrument of blessing, forsaking fellowship with just one God and mixing their religion with other religions, they violated the entire spirit of the Covenant and broke the Covenant entirely.
For this they could be forgiven too, though they would have to pursue forgiveness *apart from* the instruments of the Law itself. As you seem to suggest, this requires *mercy.* As Jesus said to those under the Law about to destroy the covenant itself, "Go find out what this means--I desire mercy."
I will add just this, because i just shared it on another forum/thread (see below)*. One can read the early part of Jeremiah and trace this degeneration from God treating Israel's sins as "unintentional" to ultimately as "intentional sins."
At first God appeals to them, as if they may be willing to be forgiven. And after there is great resistance to repentance God begins to treat them as recalcitrant and belligerent--they are beyond repentance, and God is no longer willing to forgive them, even if they apply the so-called legal "cures" to their backsliding. At some point, offering animal sacrifices would just be a religious form of false pacification of Deity and not true repentance.
Other Prophets in the bible called this state of broken Covenant a "broken marriage" between God and Israel. And they were therefore thrown out of their land like a divorced wife. The temple was taken away, which was the symbol of this Covenant--the Law was in the holy of holies, ie in the ark of the Covenant.
And so, Israel was rescued 70 years later *apart from the mechanism of the Law itself," by mercy. And this showed what Christ came to do, to save *apart from the Law* by mercy. We call this, as Christians, a system of Grace.'
*I wrote this on another forum/thread...
1 John 5.16 If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that you should pray about that. 17 All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin that does not lead to death.
A lot of Christians, including myself, have read into this passage a warning that some people who are destined to die are sinners who are Lost. This isn't really saying that. It's saying that some prayers cannot expect to be answered because of the severity of God's judgment, not at all indicating whether someone is Saved or Lost.
In the case of King David's child by adultery, the child was determined by God to die, and David's prayer could not change that. After the child died, David accepted God's judgment, not at all determining that the child "went to Hell." He took responsibility, accepted his judgment, and had to go on embracing God's mercy and hope in Eternity for the child.
The passage indicates that God does make irreversible judgments that do not always involve Eternal Death. People die due to the severity of their rebellion, and not because they have eternally rejected the Lord. Many died in the wilderness when Israel escaped Egypt, and I doubt all of them were lost for Eternity.
Concerning the point reached where God will no longer withdraw His judgment we read this....
Jer 7.16 “So do not pray for this people nor offer any plea or petition for them; do not plead with me, for I will not listen to you.
Jeremiah says this after God has poured out words of warning and calls for repentance, only to have Israel ignore those words. And so, God runs out of patience, and determines that fake shows of repentance will no longer bring compassion from God--the judgments are now determined to come, and there will be no turning back. This is something that can no longer be prayed for!
29 “‘Cut off your hair and throw it away; take up a lament on the barren heights, for the Lord has rejected and abandoned this generation that is under his wrath.
