Leviticus 4:1-20

Sin Offering Regulations

4:1 Then the Lord spoke to Moses: ¹  4:2 “Tell the Israelites, ‘When a person sins by straying unintentionally ²  from any of the Lord’s commandments which must not be violated, and violates any ³  one of them ⁴  –

For the Priest

4:3 “‘If the high priest ⁵  sins so that the people are guilty, ⁶  on account of the sin he has committed he must present a flawless young bull to the Lord ⁷  for a sin offering. ⁸  4:4 He must bring the bull to the entrance of the Meeting Tent before the Lord, lay his hand on the head of the bull, and slaughter the bull before the Lord. 4:5 Then that high priest must take some of the blood ⁹  of the bull and bring it to the Meeting Tent. 4:6 The priest must dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle ¹⁰  some of it ¹¹  seven times before the Lord toward ¹²  the front of the veil-canopy ¹³  of the sanctuary. 4:7 The priest must put some of the blood on the horns of the altar of fragrant incense that is before the Lord in the Meeting Tent, and all the rest of the bull’s blood he must pour out at the base of the altar of burnt offering that is at the entrance of the Meeting Tent.

4:8 “‘Then he must take up all the fat from the sin offering bull: ¹⁴  the fat covering the entrails ¹⁵  and all the fat surrounding the entrails, ¹⁶  4:9 the two kidneys with the fat on their sinews, and the protruding lobe on the liver (which he is to remove along with the kidneys) ¹⁷  4:10 – just as it is taken from the ox of the peace offering sacrifice ¹⁸  – and the priest must offer them up in smoke on the altar of burnt offering. 4:11 But the hide of the bull, all its flesh along with its head and its legs, its entrails, and its dung – 4:12 all the rest of the bull ¹⁹  – he must bring outside the camp ²⁰  to a ceremonially clean place, ²¹  to the fatty ash pile, ²²  and he must burn ²³  it on a wood fire; it must be burned on the fatty ash pile.

For the Whole Congregation

4:13 “‘If the whole congregation of Israel strays unintentionally ²⁴  and the matter is not noticed by ²⁵  the assembly, and they violate one of the Lord’s commandments, which must not be violated, ²⁶  so they become guilty, 4:14 the assembly must present a young bull for a sin offering when the sin they have committed ²⁷  becomes known. They must bring it before the Meeting Tent, 4:15 the elders of the congregation must lay their hands on the head of the bull before the Lord, and someone must slaughter ²⁸  the bull before the Lord. 4:16 Then the high priest ²⁹  must bring some of the blood of the bull to the Meeting Tent, 4:17 and that priest must dip his finger in the blood ³⁰  and sprinkle ³¹  some of the blood seven times ³²  before the Lord toward ³³  the front of the veil-canopy. ³⁴  4:18 He must put some of the blood on the horns of the altar ³⁵  which is before the Lord in the Meeting Tent, and all the rest of the blood he must pour out at the base of the altar of burnt offering that is at the entrance of the Meeting Tent.

4:19 “‘Then the priest ³⁶  must take all its fat ³⁷  and offer the fat ³⁸  up in smoke on the altar. 4:20 He must do with the rest of the bull just as he did with the bull of the sin offering; this is what he must do with it. ³⁹  So the priest will make atonement ⁴⁰  on their behalf and they will be forgiven. ⁴¹ 

[4:1]  ¹ sn The quotation introduced here extends from Lev 4:2 through 5:13, and encompasses all the sin offering regulations. Compare the notes on Lev 1:1 above, and 5:14 and 6:1 [5:20 HT] below.

[4:2]  ² tn Heb “And a person, when he sins in straying.” The English translation of “by straying” (בִּשְׁגָגָה [bishgagah] literally, “in going astray; in making an error”) varies greatly, but almost all suggest that this term refers to sins that were committed by mistake or done not knowing that the particular act was sinful (J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:228-29). See, e.g., LXX “involuntarily”; Tg. Onq. “by neglect”; KJV “through ignorance”; ASV, RSV, NJPS “unwittingly”; NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT “unintentionally”; NAB, NEB “inadvertently”; NCV “by accident.” However, we know from Num 15:27-31 that committing a sin “by straying” is the opposite of committing a sin “defiantly” (i.e., בְּיַד רָמָה [bÿyad ramah] “with a raised hand,” v. 30). In the latter case the person, as it were, raises his fist in presumptuous defiance against the Lord. Thus, he “blasphemes” the Lord and has “despised” his word, for which he should be “cut off from among his people” (Num 15:30-31). One could not bring an offering for such a sin. The expression here in Lev 4:2 combines “by straying” with the preposition “from” which fits naturally with “straying” (i.e., “straying from” the Lord’s commandments). For sins committed “by straying” from the commandments (Lev 4 throughout) or other types of transgressions (Lev 5:1-6) there was indeed forgiveness available through the sin offering. See R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:94-95.

[4:2]  ³ tn This is an emphatic use of the preposition מִן (min; see R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 56-57, §325).

[4:2]  ⁴ tn The “when” clause (כִּי, ki) breaks off here before its resolution, thus creating an open-ended introduction to the following subsections, which are introduced by “if” (אִם [’im] vv. 3, 13, 27, 32). Also, the last part of the verse reads literally, “which must not be done and does from one from them.”

[4:3]  ⁵ tn Heb “the anointed priest” (so ASV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV). This refers to the high priest (cf. TEV, CEV, NLT).

[4:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “to the guilt of the people”; NRSV “thus bringing guilt on the people.”

[4:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “and he shall offer on his sin which he sinned, a bull, a son of the herd, flawless.”

[4:3]  ⁸ sn The word for “sin offering” (sometimes translated “purification offering”) is the same as the word for “sin” earlier in the verse. One can tell which rendering is intended only by the context. The primary purpose of the “sin offering” (חַטָּאת, khatta’t) was to “purge” (כִּפֶּר, kipper, “to make atonement,” see 4:20, 26, 31, 35, and the notes on Lev 1:4 and esp. Lev 16:20, 33) the sanctuary or its furniture in order to cleanse it from any impurities and/or (re)consecrate it for holy purposes (see, e.g., Lev 8:15; 16:19). By making this atonement the impurities of the person or community were cleansed and the people became clean. See R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:93-103.

[4:5]  ⁹ tn Heb “from the blood of the bull” (and similarly throughout this chapter).

[4:6]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew verb וְהִזָּה (vÿhizzah, Hiphil of נָזָה, nazah) does indeed mean “sprinkle” or “splatter.” Contrast the different Hebrew verb meaning “splash” in Lev 1:5 (זָרָק, zaraq).

[4:6]  ¹¹ tn Heb “of the blood.” The relative pronoun (“it”) has been used in the translation here for stylistic reasons.

[4:6]  ¹² tn The particle here translated “toward” usually serves as a direct object indicator or a preposition meaning “with.” With the verb of motion it probably means “toward,” “in the direction of” (J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:234; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 60); cf. NAB, CEV.

[4:6]  ¹³ tn The Hebrew term פָּרֹכֶת (parokhet) is usually translated “veil” (e.g., ASV, NAB, NASB) or “curtain” (e.g., NIV, NRSV), but it seems to have stretched not only in front of but also over the top of the ark of the covenant which stood behind and under it inside the most holy place (see R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 3:687-89).

[4:8]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “all the fat of the bull of the sin offering he shall take up from it.”

[4:8]  ¹⁵ tc The MT has here the preposition עַל (’al, “on, upon” [i.e., “which covers on the entrails,” as awkward in Hebrew as it is in English]), but Smr, LXX, Syriac, and Targums read אֶת (’et), which is what would be expected (i.e., “which covers the entrails”; cf. Lev 3:3, 9, 14). It may have been mistakenly inserted here under the influence of “on (עַל) the entrails” at the end of the verse.

[4:8]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and all the fat on the entrails.” The fat layer that covers the entrails as a whole (i.e., “that covers the entrails”) is different from the fat that surrounds and adheres to the various organs (“on the entrails,” i.e., surrounding them; J. Milgrom, Leviticus [AB], 1:205-7).

[4:9]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “and the protruding lobe on the liver on the kidneys he shall remove it.”

[4:10]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “taken up from”; KJV, ASV “taken off from”; NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV “removed.” See the notes on Lev 3:3-4 above (cf. also 3:9-10, 14-15).

[4:12]  ¹⁹ tn All of v. 11 is a so-called casus pendens (also known as an extraposition or a nominative absolute), which means that it anticipates the next verse, being the full description of “all (the rest of) the bull” (lit. “all the bull”) at the beginning of v. 12 (actually after the first verb of the verse; see the next note below).

[4:12]  ²⁰ tn Heb “And he (the offerer) shall bring out all the bull to from outside to the camp to a clean place.”

[4:12]  ²¹ tn Heb “a clean place,” but referring to a place that is ceremonially clean. This has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[4:12]  ²² tn Heb “the pouring out [place] of fatty ash.”

[4:12]  ²³ tn Heb “burn with fire.” This expression is somewhat redundant in English, so the translation collocates “fire” with “wood,” thus “a wood fire.”

[4:13]  ²⁴ 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).

[4:13]  ²⁵ tn Heb “is concealed from the eyes of”; NASB, NRSV, NLT “escapes the notice of.”

[4:13]  ²⁶ tn Heb “and they do one from all the commandments of the Lord which must not be done” (cf. v. 2).

[4:14]  ²⁷ 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).

[4:15]  ²⁸ tn Heb “and he shall slaughter.” The singular verb seems to refer to an individual who represents the whole congregation, perhaps one of the elders referred to at the beginning of the verse, or the officiating priest (cf. v. 21). The LXX and Syriac make the verb plural, referring to “the elders of the congregation.”

[4:16]  ²⁹ tn Heb “the anointed priest” (so ASV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV). This refers to the high priest (cf. TEV).

[4:17]  ³⁰ tn The words “in the blood” are not repeated in the Hebrew text at this point, but must be supplied in the English translation for clarity.

[4:17]  ³¹ tn The Hebrew verb וְהִזָּה (vÿhizzah, Hiphil of נָזָה, nazah) does indeed mean “sprinkle” or “splatter.” Contrast the different Hebrew verb translated “splash” in Lev 1:5 (זָרָק, zaraq).

[4:17]  ³² tc The MT reads literally, “and the priest shall dip his finger from the blood and sprinkle seven times.” This is awkward. Compare v. 6, which has literally, “and the priest shall dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle from the blood seven times.” The MT appears to be corrupt by haplography (i.e., assuming v. 6 to be the correct form, in v. 17 the scribe skipped from “his finger” to “from the blood,” thus missing “in the blood”) and metathesis (i.e., this also resulted in a text where “from the blood” stands before “sprinkle” rather than after it; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 47).

[4:17]  ³³ tn See the note on v. 6 above.

[4:17]  ³⁴ tn See the note on v. 6 above.

[4:18]  ³⁵ sn See v. 7, where this altar is identified as the altar of fragrant incense.

[4:19]  ³⁶ tn Heb “Then he”; the referent has been specified in the translation for clarity. Based on the parallel statement in 4:10 and 4:31, it is the priest who performs this action rather than the person who brought the offering.

[4:19]  ³⁷ tn Heb “take up all its fat from it”; NASB “shall remove all its fat from it.”

[4:19]  ³⁸ tn Heb “it”; the referent (the fat) has been specified in the translation for clarity. Only the fat is meant here, since the “rest” of the bull is mentioned in v. 21.

[4:20]  ³⁹ sn Cf. Lev 4:11-12 above for the disposition of “the [rest of] the bull.”

[4:20]  ⁴⁰ sn The focus of sin offering “atonement” was purging impurities from the tabernacle (see the note on Lev 1:4).

[4:20]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “there shall be forgiveness to them” or “it shall be forgiven to them.”