1And this is the teaching of the guilt offering. It is holy of holies. 2In the place where they slaughter the burnt offering they shall slaughter the guilt offering and its blood shall be cast on the altar all around. 3And all of its fat shall be brought forward, the broad tail and the fat covering the innards, 4and the two kidneys and the fat that is on them which is over the loins and the lobe on the liver, together with the kidneys, it shall be removed. 5And the priest shall turn them to smoke on the altar, a fire offering to the LORD. It is a guilt offering. 6Any male among the priests may eat it; in a holy place it shall be eaten. It is holy of holies. 7The offense offering like the sin offering, a single teaching do they have: the priest who atones through it, his shall it be. 8And the priest bringing forward a man’s burnt offering, the hide of the burnt offering that the priest brought forward is the priest’s, his it shall be. 9And every grain offering that is baked in an oven and everything made in a pan and on a griddle is the priest’s who brings it forward, his it shall be. 10And every grain offering, mixed with oil or dry, shall be for all the sons of Aaron, each man of them alike.
11And this is the teaching of the communion sacrifice that is brought forward to the LORD. 12If in thanksgiving he brings it forward, he shall bring forward with the thanksgiving sacrifice flatcakes mixed in oil and flatcake wafers coated with oil and cakes of semolina soaked through, mixed in oil. 13With cakes of leavened bread he shall bring forward his offering with his thanksgiving communion sacrifice. 14And he shall bring forward from it one kind of each offering, a levy to the LORD; for the priest casting the blood of the communion sacrifice, his it shall be. 15And the flesh of his thanksgiving communion sacrifice shall be eaten on the day of its offering; he shall not leave anything of it till the morning. 16And if his offering is a votive or a freewill offering, on the day he brings forward his sacrifice it shall be eaten, and on the morrow what is left of it may be eaten. 17And what is left of the flesh of the sacrifice on the third day shall be burned in fire. 18And if some of the flesh of his communion sacrifice should indeed be eaten on the third day, it will not be acceptable, he who brings it forth, it will not be reckoned for him, it is desecrated meat; and the person eating of it will bear his guilt. 19And the flesh that touches anything unclean shall not be eaten, in fire it shall be burned. And other flesh, whoever is clean may eat the flesh. 20And the person who eats flesh from the communion sacrifice which is the LORD’s and his uncleanness is upon him, that person shall be cut off from his kin. 21And should a person touch anything unclean through human uncleanness or an unclean beast or any unclean abominable creature and eat of the flesh of the communion sacrifice which is the LORD’s, that person shall be cut off from his kin.
22And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 23“Speak to the Israelites, saying, ‘No fat of ox or sheep or goat shall you eat, 24and the fat of a beast that has died and the fat of a beast torn by predators may be used for any task but it shall by no means be eaten. 25For whoever eats fat from the animal from which fire offering is brought forward to the LORD, the person eating shall be cut off from his kin. 26And no blood shall you consume in all your dwelling places, whether from fowl or beast. 27Any person who consumes any blood shall be cut off from his kin.’”
28And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 29“Speak to the Israelites, saying, ‘He who brings forward his communion sacrifice to the LORD shall bring his offering to the LORD from his communion sacrifice. 30His own hands shall bring the fire offerings of the LORD, the fat together with the breast he shall bring it, the breast to elevate as an elevation offering before the LORD. 31And the priest shall turn the breast into smoke on the altar, and the breast shall be Aaron’s and his sons’. 32And the right thigh you shall give as a levy to the priest from the communion sacrifices. 33He of the sons of Aaron who brings forward the blood of the communion sacrifices and the fat, his shall be the right thigh as a share. 34For the breast of the elevation offering and the thigh of the levy I have taken from the Israelites, from their communion sacrifices, and have given them to Aaron the priest and to his sons as a perpetual portion from the Israelites. 35This is the allotment of Aaron and the allotment of his sons from the fire offerings of the LORD from the day they were brought forward to be priests to the LORD, 36which the LORD charged to give to them from the day they were anointed, from the Israelites, a perpetual statute for their generations. 37This is the teaching for the burnt offering, for the grain offering, and for the offense offering and for the guilt offering and for the installation offering and for the communion sacrifice 38which the LORD charged Moses on Mount Sinai on the day He charged the Israelites to bring forward their sacrifices to the LORD in the Wilderness of Sinai.’”
CHAPTER 7 NOTES
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18. desecrated meat. The Hebrew pigul is a rare term of uncertain etymology and without evident cognates in other Semitic languages. Most interpreters, ancient and modern, assume it means something like “abomination” or “abhorrent thing,” but Milgrom, carefully scrutinizing the other biblical occurrences with an eye to the present context, persuasively argues that the word has the technical sense of “desecrated meat.”
19. And other flesh. The Hebrew says, somewhat obscurely, only “the flesh.” The context compels one to infer that what is meant is the flesh of the communion sacrifice that has not been defiled by contact with something unclean.
21. any unclean abominable creature. The Hebrew noun is sheqets, which usually means “abomination.” Some manuscript versions read sherets, “creeping thing,” which would be the more expected term here.
24. a beast that has died. This is a single word in the Hebrew, neveilah. The basic meaning is “carcass,” but with the necessary implication that the animal has died from natural causes rather than violently.
a beast torn by predators. Again, this is one word in the Hebrew, tereifah, which means “something torn [by ravening beasts].” The taboo on eating torn carcass was felt so strongly that, much later, in Yiddish usage, the word would be adopted as the general term for forbidden foods.
26. in all your dwelling places. This introduction of this term is an indication that the ban on ingesting blood is in no way restricted to animals or even categories of animals sacrificed in the cult but is comprehensively binding on the Israelites wherever they dwell.
30. to elevate. This gesture was a public sign of conveying the part of the animal elevated to the LORD’s jurisdiction or possession.
34. the breast . . . and the thigh. The same two portions of the animal are reserved for the Aaronides in the installation sacrifice about which instructions are given in Exodus 29:26–27. It is a token of how keenly the concrete details of these seemingly dry cultic passages were reflected on by later generations that Moses ibn Ezra (c. 1055–c. 1135) should wittily invoke these body parts in an erotic poem, transposing them from animal to woman, and proclaiming that he will take his due portion as did the priests of old. The ingenious allusion registers a sound exegetical understanding that the breast and the thigh are the choice parts.
35. from the day they were brought forward. As elsewhere, the singular masculine verb (literally, “he brought them forward”) is the equivalent of a passive form. The verb hiqriv, “brought forward,” is equally used for the sundry sacrifices and for the priests. In cultic contexts, it has the sense of presenting or bringing forward into the sacred zone of the sanctuary, into the LORD’s presence (“before the LORD”). Its cognate accusative is qorban, the general term for “offering.” Thus the priests are dedicated to God, brought forward into the divine presence, just as the sacrifices are dedicated.