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The Use of Holy Offerings

The L ord spoke to Moses, saying: ²Direct Aaron and his sons to deal carefully with the sacred donations of the people of Israel, which they dedicate to me, so that they may not profane my holy name; I am the L ord. ³Say to them: If anyone among all your offspring throughout your generations comes near the sacred donations, which the people of Israel dedicate to the L ord, while he is in a state of uncleanness, that person shall be cut off from my presence: I am the L ord. ⁴No one of Aaron’s offspring who has a leprous disease or suffers a discharge may eat of the sacred donations until he is clean. Whoever touches anything made unclean by a corpse or a man who has had an emission of semen, ⁵and whoever touches any swarming thing by which he may be made unclean or any human being by whom he may be made unclean—whatever his uncleanness may be— ⁶the person who touches any such shall be unclean until evening and shall not eat of the sacred donations unless he has washed his body in water. ⁷When the sun sets he shall be clean; and afterward he may eat of the sacred donations, for they are his food. ⁸That which died or was torn by wild animals he shall not eat, becoming unclean by it: I am the L ord. ⁹They shall keep my charge, so that they may not incur guilt and die in the sanctuary for having profaned it: I am the L ord; I sanctify them.

¹⁰ No lay person shall eat of the sacred donations. No bound or hired servant of the priest shall eat of the sacred donations; ¹¹but if a priest acquires anyone by purchase, the person may eat of them; and those that are born in his house may eat of his food. ¹²If a priest’s daughter marries a layman, she shall not eat of the offering of the sacred donations; ¹³but if a priest’s daughter is widowed or divorced, without offspring, and returns to her father’s house, as in her youth, she may eat of her father’s food. No lay person shall eat of it. ¹⁴If a man eats of the sacred donation unintentionally, he shall add one-fifth of its value to it, and give the sacred donation to the priest. ¹⁵No one shall profane the sacred donations of the people of Israel, which they offer to the L ord, ¹⁶causing them to bear guilt requiring a guilt offering, by eating their sacred donations: for I am the L ord; I sanctify them.

Acceptable Offerings

¹⁷ The L ord spoke to Moses, saying: ¹⁸Speak to Aaron and his sons and all the people of Israel and say to them: When anyone of the house of Israel or of the aliens residing in Israel presents an offering, whether in payment of a vow or as a freewill offering that is offered to the L ord as a burnt offering, ¹⁹to be acceptable in your behalf it shall be a male without blemish, of the cattle or the sheep or the goats. ²⁰You shall not offer anything that has a blemish, for it will not be acceptable in your behalf.

²¹ When anyone offers a sacrifice of well-being to the L ord, in fulfillment of a vow or as a freewill offering, from the herd or from the flock, to be acceptable it must be perfect; there shall be no blemish in it. ²²Anything blind, or injured, or maimed, or having a discharge or an itch or scabs—these you shall not offer to the L ord or put any of them on the altar as offerings by fire to the L ord. ²³An ox or a lamb that has a limb too long or too short you may present for a freewill offering; but it will not be accepted for a vow. ²⁴Any animal that has its testicles bruised or crushed or torn or cut, you shall not offer to the L ord; such you shall not do within your land, ²⁵nor shall you accept any such animals from a foreigner to offer as food to your God; since they are mutilated, with a blemish in them, they shall not be accepted in your behalf.

²⁶ The L ord spoke to Moses, saying: ²⁷When an ox or a sheep or a goat is born, it shall remain seven days with its mother, and from the eighth day on it shall be acceptable as the L ord’s offering by fire. ²⁸But you shall not slaughter, from the herd or the flock, an animal with its young on the same day. ²⁹When you sacrifice a thanksgiving offering to the L ord, you shall sacrifice it so that it may be acceptable in your behalf. ³⁰It shall be eaten on the same day; you shall not leave any of it until morning: I am the L ord.

³¹ Thus you shall keep my commandments and observe them: I am the L ord. ³²You shall not profane my holy name, that I may be sanctified among the people of Israel: I am the L ord; I sanctify you, ³³I who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God: I am the L ord.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

25. Neither from a stranger’s hand. God here forbids that victims of this sort should be offered to Him, although they might be purchased from foreigners. The Hebrews, however, has invented a different meaning, viz., that not even from foreigners were such sacrifices to be received, as it was unlawful for the children of the Church themselves to offer. But inasmuch as the Law altogether prohibited the unclean nations from making sacred oblations, another solution of this difficulty was still to be discovered. ²⁹⁵²⁹⁵ This is S.M.’s solution; and after him Fonseca. Willet. “Some understand this (says Bonar) as forbidding them to let a stranger supply them with animals for sacrifices, q. d., take it not out of a stranger’s flock or herd: But this is contrary to practice approved of in after days; as when Cyrus gave, and Darius ordered others to supply. But the true meaning is evidently that the same rule shall hold in regard to a strangers offering as in regard to their own. ‘The stranger’ may be a proselyte, as ver. 18; or he may be such an one as Cyrus." They suppose, therefore, that those are called “strangers,” who observe the precepts of the children of Noah, i.e., who honor God, and do not pollute themselves by incest, abstain from the effusion of human blood, and from theft, and who do not worship idols. But the context does not accord with this, for Moses adds at the end that this kind of sacrifice would not be accepted by God from the Jews themselves, which will not agree with their being offered by the Gentiles. This, then, seems to me to be a confirmation of the previous injunction, introduced by way of precaution; for it might have seemed that the offering would have been permissible, if they had purchased the animal, even though it were defective; whereas God declares that what they were not allowed to present from their own stalls, was no more approved of by Him, if it had been purchased, because defectiveness is always displeasing to Him. Nor do I restrict this, as they do, to the foregoing clause, as if it only referred to castrated animals, and such as were wounded in the testicles, but I include with it also warts and eruptions, and other blemishes. In order that the prohibition may have more weight, he again calls the sacrifices “the bread of God,” not because God, who is the fountain of life, has need of food, or eats of corruptible meat, since He is the eternal Spirit; but that men may more diligently take care duly to perform their sacred rites, wherein they familiarly draw nigh to God. Now, if no one would dare to present stale or corrupted food to an earthly prince, much less tolerable is it to contaminate God’s table with anything blemished.

²⁹⁵ This is S.M.’s solution; and after him Fonseca. Willet. “Some understand this (says Bonar) as forbidding them to let a stranger supply them with animals for sacrifices, q. d., take it not out of a stranger’s flock or herd: But this is contrary to practice approved of in after days; as when Cyrus gave, and Darius ordered others to supply. But the true meaning is evidently that the same rule shall hold in regard to a strangers offering as in regard to their own. ‘The stranger’ may be a proselyte, as ver. 18; or he may be such an one as Cyrus."