Leviticus 9:24--10:1

9:24 Then fire went out from the presence of the Lord ¹  and consumed the burnt offering and the fat parts on the altar, and all the people saw it, so they shouted loudly and fell down with their faces to the ground. ² 

Nadab and Abihu

10:1 Then ³  Aaron’s sons, Nadab and Abihu, each took his fire pan and put fire in it, set incense on it, and presented strange fire ⁴  before the Lord, which he had not commanded them to do.

Leviticus 16:12-13

16:12 and take a censer full of coals of fire from the altar before the Lord ⁵  and a full double handful of finely ground fragrant incense, ⁶  and bring them inside the veil-canopy. ⁷  16:13 He must then put the incense on the fire before the Lord, and the cloud of incense will cover the atonement plate which is above the ark of the testimony, ⁸  so that he will not die. ⁹ 

Isaiah 6:6-7

6:6 But then one of the seraphs flew toward me. In his hand was a hot coal he had taken from the altar with tongs. 6:7 He touched my mouth with it and said, “Look, this coal has touched your lips. Your evil is removed; your sin is forgiven.” ¹⁰ 

Romans 5:9-10

5:9 Much more then, because we have now been declared righteous ¹¹  by his blood, ¹²  we will be saved through him from God’s wrath. ¹³  5:10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, how much more, since we have been reconciled, will we be saved by his life?

Hebrews 7:25-27

7:25 So he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them. 7:26 For it is indeed fitting for us to have such a high priest: holy, innocent, undefiled, separate from sinners, and exalted above the heavens. 7:27 He has no need to do every day what those priests do, to offer sacrifices first for their own sins and then for the sins of the people, since he did this in offering himself once for all.

Hebrews 9:25-26

9:25 And he did not enter to offer ¹⁴  himself again and again, the way the high priest enters the sanctuary year after year with blood that is not his own, 9:26 for then he would have had to suffer again and again since the foundation of the world. But now he has appeared once for all at the consummation of the ages to put away sin by his sacrifice.

Revelation 8:3-5

8:3 Another ¹⁵  angel holding ¹⁶  a golden censer ¹⁷  came and was stationed ¹⁸  at the altar. A ¹⁹  large amount of incense was given to him to offer up, with the prayers of all the saints, on the golden altar that is before the throne. 8:4 The ²⁰  smoke coming from the incense, ²¹  along with the prayers of the saints, ascended before God from the angel’s hand. 8:5 Then ²²  the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and threw it on the earth, and there were crashes of thunder, roaring, ²³  flashes of lightning, and an earthquake.

[9:24]  ¹ tn Heb “from to the faces of the Lord.” The rendering here is based on the use of “my faces” and “your faces” referring to the very “presence” of the Lord in Exod 33:14-15.

[9:24]  ² tn Heb “fell on their faces.” Many English versions and commentaries render here “shouted for joy” (e.g., NIV; cf. NCV, NLT) or “shouted joyfully,” but the fact the people “fell on their faces” immediately afterward suggests that they were frightened as, for example, in Exod 19:16b; 20:18-21.

[10:1]  ³ tn Although it has been used elsewhere in this translation as an English variation from the ubiquitous use of vav in Hebrew, in this instance “then” as a rendering for vav is intended to show that the Nadab and Abihu catastrophe took place on the inauguration day described in Lev 9. The tragic incident in Lev 10 happened in close temporal connection to the Lord’s fire that consumed the offerings at the end of Lev 9. Thus, for example, the “sin offering” male goat referred to in Lev 10:16-19 is the very one referred to in Lev 9:15.

[10:1]  ⁴ tn The expression “strange fire” (אֵשׁ זָרָה, ’esh zarah) seems imprecise (cf. NAB “profane fire”; NIV “unauthorized fire”; NRSV “unholy fire”; NLT “a different kind of fire”) and has been interpreted numerous ways (see the helpful summary in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 132-33). The infraction may have involved any of the following or a combination thereof: (1) using coals from someplace other than the burnt offering altar (i.e., “unauthorized coals” according to J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:598; cf. Lev 16:12 and cf. “unauthorized person” אִישׁ זָר (’ish zar) in Num 16:40 [17:5 HT], NASB “layman”), (2) using the wrong kind of incense (cf. the Exod 30:9 regulation against “strange incense” קְטֹרֶת זָרָה (qÿtoreh zarah) on the incense altar and the possible connection to Exod 30:34-38), (3) performing an incense offering at an unprescribed time (B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 59), or (4) entering the Holy of Holies at an inappropriate time (Lev 16:1-2).

[16:12]  ⁵ tn Heb “and he shall take the fullness of the censer, coals of fire, from on the altar from to the faces of the Lord.”

[16:12]  ⁶ tn Heb “and the fullness of the hollow of his two hands, finely ground fragrant incense.”

[16:12]  ⁷ tn Heb “and he shall bring from house to the veil-canopy.”

[16:13]  ⁷ tn The text here has only “above the testimony,” but this is surely a shortened form of “above the ark of the testimony” (see Exod 25:22 etc.; cf. Lev 16:2). The term “testimony” in this expression refers to the ark as the container of the two stone tablets with the Ten Commandments written on them (see Exod 25:16 with Deut 10:1, 5, etc.).

[16:13]  ⁸ tn Heb “and he will not die,” but it is clear that the purpose for the incense cloud was to protect the priest from death in the presence of the Lord (cf. vv. 1-2 above).

[6:7]  ⁹ tn Or “ritually cleansed,” or “atoned for” (NIV).

[5:9]  ¹¹ tn Grk “having now been declared righteous.” The participle δικαιωθέντες (dikaiwqente") has been translated as a causal adverbial participle.

[5:9]  ¹² tn Or, according to BDF §219.3, “at the price of his blood.”

[5:9]  ¹³ tn Grk “the wrath,” referring to God’s wrath as v. 10 shows.

[9:25]  ¹³ tn Grk “and not that he might offer,” continuing the previous construction.

[8:3]  ¹⁵ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[8:3]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “having.”

[8:3]  ¹⁷ sn A golden censer was a bowl in which incense was burned. The imagery suggests the OT role of the priest.

[8:3]  ¹⁸ tn The verb “to station” was used to translate ἑστάθη (Jestaqh) because it connotes the idea of purposeful arrangement in English, which seems to be the idea in the Greek.

[8:3]  ¹⁹ tn Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation. Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[8:4]  ¹⁷ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[8:4]  ¹⁸ tn The expression τῶν θυμιαμάτων (twn qumiamatwn) is taken as a “genitive of producer,” i.e., the noun in the genitive produces the head noun.

[8:5]  ¹⁹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the vision.

[8:5]  ²⁰ tn Or “sounds,” “voices.” It is not entirely clear what this refers to. BDAG 1071 s.v. φωνή 1 states, “In Rv we have ἀστραπαὶ καὶ φωναὶ καὶ βρονταί (cp. Ex 19:16) 4:5; 8:5; 11:19; 16:18 (are certain other sounds in nature thought of here in addition to thunder, as e.g. the roar of the storm?…).”