Leviticus 4:3

For the Priest

4:3 “‘If the high priest ¹  sins so that the people are guilty, ²  on account of the sin he has committed he must present a flawless young bull to the Lord ³  for a sin offering. ⁴ 

Leviticus 5:13

5:13 So the priest will make atonement ⁵  on his behalf for his sin which he has committed by doing one of these things, ⁶  and he will be forgiven. ⁷  The remainder of the offering ⁸  will belong to the priest like the grain offering.’” ⁹ 

Leviticus 7:30

7:30 With his own hands he must bring the Lord’s gifts. He must bring the fat with the breast ¹⁰  to wave the breast as a wave offering before the Lord, ¹¹ 

Leviticus 10:9

10:9 “Do not drink wine or strong drink, you and your sons with you, when you enter into the Meeting Tent, so that you do not die, which is a perpetual statute throughout your generations, ¹² 

Leviticus 10:16

The Problem with the Inaugural Sin Offering

10:16 Later Moses sought diligently for the sin offering male goat, ¹³  but it had actually been burnt. ¹⁴  So he became angry at Eleazar and Ithamar, Aaron’s remaining sons, saying,

Leviticus 11:44

11:44 for I am the Lord your God and you are to sanctify yourselves and be holy because I am holy. You must not defile yourselves by any of the swarming things that creep on the ground,

Leviticus 15:30

15:30 and the priest is to make one a sin offering and the other a burnt offering. ¹⁵  So the priest ¹⁶  is to make atonement for her before the Lord from her discharge of impurity.

Leviticus 17:11

17:11 for the life of every living thing ¹⁷  is in the blood. ¹⁸  So I myself have assigned it to you ¹⁹  on the altar to make atonement for your lives, for the blood makes atonement by means of the life. ²⁰ 

Leviticus 20:4

20:4 If, however, the people of the land shut their eyes ²¹  to that man ²²  when he gives some of his children to Molech so that they do not put him to death,

Leviticus 21:23

21:23 but he must not go into the veil-canopy ²³  or step forward to the altar because he has a physical flaw. Thus ²⁴  he must not profane my holy places, for I am the Lord who sanctifies them.’”

Leviticus 25:35

Debt and Slave Regulations

25:35 “‘If your brother ²⁵  becomes impoverished and is indebted to you, ²⁶  you must support ²⁷  him; he must live ²⁸  with you like a foreign resident. ²⁹ 

Leviticus 25:47

25:47 “‘If a resident foreigner who is with you prospers ³⁰  and your brother becomes impoverished with regard to him so that ³¹  he sells himself to a resident foreigner who is with you or to a member ³²  of a foreigner’s family,

Leviticus 26:6

26:6 I will grant peace in the land so that ³³  you will lie down to sleep without anyone terrifying you. ³⁴  I will remove harmful animals ³⁵  from the land, and no sword of war ³⁶  will pass through your land.

Leviticus 26:17

26:17 I will set my face against you. You will be struck down before your enemies, those who hate you will rule over you, and you will flee when there is no one pursuing you.

Leviticus 26:26

26:26 When I break off your supply of bread, ³⁷  ten women will bake your bread in one oven; they will ration your bread by weight, ³⁸  and you will eat and not be satisfied.

[4:3]  ¹ tn Heb “the anointed priest” (so ASV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV). This refers to the high priest (cf. TEV, CEV, NLT).

[4:3]  ² tn Heb “to the guilt of the people”; NRSV “thus bringing guilt on the people.”

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

[4:3]  ⁴ 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.

[5:13]  ⁵ sn The focus of sin offering “atonement” was purging impurities from the tabernacle (see the note on Lev 1:4).

[5:13]  ⁶ tn Heb “from one from these,” referring to the four kinds of violations of the law delineated in Lev 5:1-4 (see the note on Lev 5:5 above and cf. Lev 4:27).

[5:13]  ⁷ tn Heb “there shall be forgiveness to him” or “it shall be forgiven to him” (KJV similar).

[5:13]  ⁸ tn Heb “and it”; the referent (the remaining portion of the offering) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[5:13]  ⁹ tn Heb “and it shall be to the priest like the grain offering,” referring to the rest of the grain that was not offered on the altar (cf. the regulations in Lev 2:3, 10).

[7:30]  ⁹ tn Heb “on the breast.”

[7:30]  ¹⁰ tc Many Hebrew mss and some versions (esp. the LXX) limit the offerings in the last part of this verse to the fat portions, specifically, the fat and the fat lobe of the liver (see the BHS footnote). The verse is somewhat awkward in Hebrew but nevertheless correct.

[10:9]  ¹³ tn Heb “a perpetual statute for your generations”; NAB “a perpetual ordinance”; NRSV “a statute forever”; NLT “a permanent law.” The Hebrew grammar here suggests that the last portion of v. 9 functions as both a conclusion to v. 9 and an introduction to vv. 10-11. It is a pivot clause, as it were. Thus, it was a “perpetual statute” to not drink alcoholic beverages when ministering in the tabernacle, but it was also a “perpetual statue” to distinguish between holy and profane and unclean and clean (v. 10) as well as to teach the children of Israel all such statutes (v. 11).

[10:16]  ¹⁷ sn This is the very same male goat offered in Lev 9:15 (cf. the note on Lev 10:1 above).

[10:16]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “but behold, it had been burnt” (KJV and NASB both similar).

[15:30]  ²¹ tn Heb “And the priest shall make the one a sin offering and the one a burnt offering.”

[15:30]  ²² tn Heb “And the priest.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.

[17:11]  ²⁵ tn Heb “the life of the flesh.” Here “flesh” stands for “every living thing,” that is, all creatures (cf. NIV, NRSV, NLT “every creature”; CEV “every living creature.”

[17:11]  ²⁶ tn Heb “for the soul/life (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh) of the flesh, it is in the blood” (cf. the note of v. 10 above and v. 14 below). Although most modern English versions begin a new sentence in v. 11, “For the life of the flesh is in the blood” (see, e.g., NJPS, NASB, NIV, NRSV), the כִּי (ki, “for, because”) at the beginning of the verse suggests continuation from v. 10, as the rendering here indicates (see, e.g., NEB, NLT; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 261; and G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 239).

[17:11]  ²⁷ tn Heb “And I myself have given it to you.”

[17:11]  ²⁸ tn Heb “for the blood, it by (בְּ, bet preposition, “in”] the life makes atonement.” The interpretation of the preposition is pivotal here. Some scholars have argued that it is a bet of exchange; that is, “the blood makes atonement in exchange for the life [of the slaughtered animal]” (see R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:694-95, 697 for analysis and criticism of this view). It is more likely that, as in the previous clause (“your lives”), “life/soul” (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh) here refers to the person who makes the offering, not the animal offered. The blood of the animal makes atonement for the person who offers it either “by means of” (instrumental bet) the “life/soul” of the animal, which it symbolizes or embodies (the meaning of the translation given here); or perhaps the blood of the animal functions as “the price” (bet of price) for ransoming the “life/soul” of the person.

[20:4]  ²⁹ tn Heb “And if shutting [infinitive absolute] they shut [finite verb].” For the infinitive absolute used to highlight contrast rather than emphasis see GKC 343 §113.p.

[20:4]  ³⁰ tn Heb “from that man” (so ASV); NASB “disregard that man.”

[21:23]  ³³ sn See the note on Lev 16:2 for the rendering “veil-canopy.”

[21:23]  ³⁴ tn Heb “And.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.

[25:35]  ³⁷ tn It is not clear to whom this refers. It is probably broader than “sibling” (cf. NRSV “any of your kin”; NLT “any of your Israelite relatives”) but some English versions take it to mean “fellow Israelite” (so TEV; cf. NAB, NIV “countrymen”) and others are ambiguous (cf. CEV “any of your people”).

[25:35]  ³⁸ tn Heb “and his hand slips with you.”

[25:35]  ³⁹ tn Heb “strengthen”; NASB “sustain.”

[25:35]  ⁴⁰ tn The form וָחַי (vakhay, “and shall live”) looks like the adjective “living,” but the MT form is simply the same verb written as a double ayin verb (see HALOT 309 s.v. חיה qal, and GKC 218 §76.i; cf. Lev 18:5).

[25:35]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “a foreigner and resident,” which is probably to be combined (see B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 170-71).

[25:47]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “And if the hand of a foreigner and resident with you reaches” (cf. v. 26 for this idiom).

[25:47]  ⁴² tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.

[25:47]  ⁴³ tn Heb “offshoot, descendant.”

[26:6]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.

[26:6]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “and there will be no one who terrifies.” The words “to sleep” have been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[26:6]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “harmful animal,” singular, but taken here as a collective plural (so almost all English versions).

[26:6]  ⁴⁸ tn Heb “no sword”; the words “of war” are supplied in the translation to indicate what the metaphor of the sword represents.

[26:26]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “When I break to you staff of bread” (KJV, ASV, and NASB all similar).

[26:26]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “they will return your bread in weight.”