Leviticus 1:5

1:5 Then the one presenting the offering ¹  must slaughter the bull ²  before the Lord, and the sons of Aaron, the priests, must present the blood and splash ³  the blood against the sides of the altar which is at the entrance of the Meeting Tent.

Leviticus 3:2

3:2 He must lay his hand on the head of his offering and slaughter it at the entrance of the Meeting Tent, and the sons of Aaron, the priests, must splash the blood against the altar’s sides. ⁴ 

Leviticus 3:8

3:8 He must lay his hand on the head of his offering and slaughter it before the Meeting Tent, and the sons of Aaron must splash ⁵  its blood against the altar’s sides.

Leviticus 3:13

3:13 lay his hand on its head, and slaughter it before the Meeting Tent, and the sons of Aaron must splash its blood against the altar’s sides.

Leviticus 9:18

9:18 Then he slaughtered the ox and the ram – the peace offering sacrifices which were for the people – and Aaron’s sons handed ⁶  the blood to him and he splashed it against the altar’s sides.

Leviticus 16:14

16:14 Then he is to take some of the blood of the bull and sprinkle it with his finger on the eastern face of the atonement plate, ⁷  and in front of the atonement plate he is to sprinkle some of the blood seven times with his finger. ⁸ 

¹ tn Heb “Then he”; the referent (the offerer) has been specified in the translation for clarity. The LXX has “they” rather than “he,” suggesting that the priests, not the offerer, were to slaughter the bull (cf. the notes on vv. 6a and 9a).

² tn Heb “the son of the herd”; cf. KJV “bullock”; NASB, NIV “young bull.”

³ tn “Splash” (cf. NAB) or “dash” (cf. NRSV) is better than “sprinkle,” which is the common English translation of this verb (זָרַק, zaraq; see, e.g., KJV, NASB, NIV, NLT). “Sprinkle” is not strong enough (contrast נָזָה [nazah], which does indeed mean “to sprinkle” or “to splatter”; cf. Lev 4:6).

⁴ tn See the remarks on Lev 1:3-5 above for some of the details of translation here.

⁷ tn See the note on this term at 1:5.

¹⁰ tn See the note on Lev 9:12.

¹³ tn Heb “on the faces of the atonement plate toward the east.” Some have taken this to mean that the ark was stationed just behind the veil-canopy on the eastern side of the most holy place. Thus, the high priest would need to enter and walk toward the west end of the most holy place and then turn eastward in order to face the ark and sprinkle the blood in an eastward direction. The rendering here, however, requires that the ark was stationed on the western end, or perhaps in the middle of the area, so that as the priest entered he was already facing the ark and would sprinkle the blood on the eastern face of the atonement plate, in a westward direction (see, e.g., J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 239 versus J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:1032).

¹⁴ sn Presumably in this case the blood was sprinkled seven times on the ground in front of the ark on which the atonement plate was mounted.