Leviticus 4:13-14

For the Whole Congregation

4:13 “‘If the whole congregation of Israel strays unintentionally ¹  and the matter is not noticed by ²  the assembly, and they violate one of the Lord’s commandments, which must not be violated, ³  so they become guilty, 4:14 the assembly must present a young bull for a sin offering when the sin they have committed ⁴  becomes known. They must bring it before the Meeting Tent,

Leviticus 4:21

4:21 He ⁵  must bring the rest of the bull outside the camp ⁶  and burn it just as he burned the first bull – it is the sin offering of the assembly.

Leviticus 16:33

16:33 and he is to purify ⁷  the Most Holy Place, ⁸  he is to purify the Meeting Tent and the altar, ⁹  and he is to make atonement for ¹⁰  the priests and for all the people of the assembly.

Leviticus 16:17

16:17 Nobody is to be in the Meeting Tent ¹¹  when he enters to make atonement in the holy place until he goes out, and he has made atonement on his behalf, on behalf of his household, and on behalf of the whole assembly of Israel.

¹ tn Heb “strays”; KJV “sin through ignorance.” The verb “strays” here is the verbal form of the noun in the expression “by straying” (see the note on Lev 4:2 above).

² tn Heb “is concealed from the eyes of”; NASB, NRSV, NLT “escapes the notice of.”

³ tn Heb “and they do one from all the commandments of the Lord which must not be done” (cf. v. 2).

⁴ tn Heb “and the sin which they committed on it becomes known”; KJV “which they have sinned against it.” The Hebrew עָלֶיהָ (’aleha, “on it”) probably refers back to “one of the commandments” in v. 13 (J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:243).

⁷ sn See the note on the word “slaughter” in v. 15.

⁸ tn Heb “And he shall bring out the bull to from outside to the camp.”

¹⁰ tn Heb “to atone” (also later in this verse); see the note on “purifying the holy place” in 16:20.

¹¹ tn Heb “the sanctuary of the holy place.” Although this is the only place this expression occurs in the OT, it clearly refers to the innermost shrine behind the veil-canopy, where the ark of the covenant was located.

¹² tn Heb “and the tent of meeting and the alter he shall atone.” The repetition of the verb כִּפֶּר (kipper, “to atone”) at the beginning and end of the sequence appears to be strange, but the MT accents suggest that only “the Most Holy Place” goes with the verb at the beginning of the verse. Of course, the purging of “the Most Holy Place” has been the main emphasis of this chapter from the start (see vv. 2-3 and 11-17).

¹³ tn At this point in the verse the verb כִּפֶּר (kipper, “to make atonement”) takes its object with the preposition עַל (’al, “for”; literally, “upon”; contrast the first part of the verse and cf. the notes on Lev 1:4 and 16:20 above).

¹³ tn Heb “And all man shall not be in the tent of meeting.” The term for “a man, human being” (אָדָם, ’adam; see the note on Lev 1:2) refers to any person among “mankind,” male or female.