1And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2“Speak to the Israelites, and you shall say to them: ‘When you come to the land of your settlement that I am about to give to you, 3you shall make a fire offering to the LORD, a burnt offering or a sacrifice to set aside a votive or a voluntary offering, or in your fixed seasons to make a fragrant odor to the LORD from the cattle or from the flock. 4And he who brings forward his offering to the LORD shall bring forward a grain offering of fine semolina, one-tenth measure mixed with one-fourth of a hin of oil. 5And wine for the libation, one-fourth of a hin you shall make with the burnt offering or for the sacrifice for each sheep. 6Or for the ram you shall make a grain offering of fine semolina, two tenth measures mixed with a third of a hin of oil. 7And wine for the libation, a third of a hin, you shall bring forward, a fragrant odor to the LORD. 8And should you make a head of cattle as a burnt offering or a sacrifice to set aside a votive or communion sacrifice to the LORD, 9the person shall bring forward with the head of cattle a grain offering of fine semolina, three-tenths of a measure mixed with half a hin of oil. 10And wine you shall bring forward for the libation, half a hin, a fire offering, a fragrant odor to the LORD. 11Thus shall be done for the one bull or the one ram or the lamb of the sheep or the goats. 12For the number that you do, thus you shall do for each one, according to their number. 13Every native shall do these thus, to bring forward a fire offering, a fragrant odor to the LORD. 14And should a sojourner reside with you, or anyone in your midst for your generations, he shall make a fire offering, a fragrant odor to the LORD, as you do, so shall he do. 15The assembly—one statute for you and for the sojourner who resides, a perpetual statute for your generations, you and the sojourner alike, shall there be before the LORD. 16One teaching and one practice shall there be for you and for the sojourner who resides with you.’”
17And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 18“Speak to the Israelites, and you shall say to them: ‘When you come to the land to which I am about to bring you, 19when it happens that you eat of the bread of the land, you shall present a donation to the LORD. 20The first yield of your kneading troughs, a round loaf, you shall present in donation, like the donation from the threshing floor, thus you shall present it. 21From the first yield of your kneading troughs you shall give to the LORD, a donation for your generations. 22And should you err and not do all these commandments that the LORD spoke to Moses, 23all that the LORD has charged you by the hand of Moses, from the day that the LORD charged and henceforth for your generations, 24and should it happen that it was done as in errancy away from the eyes of the community, the whole community shall make one bull from the cattle as a burnt offering, a fragrant odor to the LORD, and its grain offering and its libation according to fixed practice, and one he-goat for an offense offering. 25And the priest shall atone for all the community of the Israelites and it will be forgiven to them, for it is an errancy, and they will have brought their offering, a fire offering to the LORD, and their offense offering before the LORD, for their errancy. 26And it will be forgiven to all the community of Israelites and to the sojourner who resides in their midst, for the whole people is errant. 27And if a single person errantly offends, he shall bring forward a yearling she-goat as an offense offering. 28And the priest shall atone for the person erring in his offense in errancy before the LORD, to atone for him, and it will be forgiven him. 29And for the native among the Israelites and for the sojourner who resides in their midst, one teaching there shall be for them for him who does in errancy. 30And the person who does it with a high hand, whether from the native or from the sojourner—he reviles the LORD, and that person shall be cut off from the midst of his people. 31For he has spurned the word of the LORD and His commandment he has violated. That person shall surely be cut off, his crime is upon him.’”
32And the Israelites were in the wilderness, and they found a man gathering wood on the sabbath day. 33And those who found him gathering wood brought him forward to Moses and to Aaron and to all the community. 34And they placed him under watch, for it had not been determined what should be done to him. 35And the LORD said to Moses, “The man is doomed to die. Let all the community pelt him with stones outside the camp.” 36And all the community took him outside the camp and pelted him with stones and he died, as the LORD had charged Moses.
37And the LORD said to Moses, saying, 38“Speak to the Israelites, and you shall say to them that they should make them a fringe on the skirts of their garments for their generations and place on the fringe of the skirt an indigo twist. 39And it shall be a fringe for you, and you shall see it and be mindful of all the LORD’s commandments and you shall do them. And you shall not stray after your heart and after your eyes, after which you go whoring. 40So that you will be mindful and do My commandments, and you shall be holy to your God. 41I am the LORD your God, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt to become your God. I am the LORD your God.”
CHAPTER 15 NOTES
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2. When you come to the land. After the incident of the spies, the narrative movement is broken off by the insertion of a miscellany of laws pertaining to the cult, the sabbath, and the mnemonic ritual fringes. The narrative of Wilderness rebellions will resume in the next chapter with the story of Korah’s mutiny. It is not clear why the redactors deemed it appropriate to introduce this legal miscellany here, though the best effort of explanation has been made by Abraham ibn Ezra, with his characteristic alertness to possibilities of continuity in disjunct texts: “This section was juxtaposed to the previous because they [the ten scouts and their followers] had been cut down and people were mourning, to comfort the sons by letting them know that they would come to the land.” Ibn Ezra goes on to say that the emphasis here on forgiveness (verse 25) is also a response to the sin of the ten scouts and their followers, and the reference to a “high hand” (verse 30) looks back to their arrogance in trying to storm the Canaanite heights without divine authorization.
4. one-tenth measure. This is evidently the dry measure ʾephah, roughly a bushel.
15. one statute for you and for the sojourner. Apologetic commentary has made much of the egalitarianism of this reiterated formula. In fact, it was common in the ancient Near East for resident aliens to participate in the cult of the community in which they were, in effect, naturalized citizens. In this early period, no special ceremony of conversion was involved, and as a matter of historical actuality, it is likely that the descendants of resident aliens in the course of time would have become indistinguishable from native Israelites.
22. And should you err. The Hebrew root sh-g-h (here) or sh-g-g (in all the subsequent occurrences in this chapter) denotes an inadvertent offense, because the person either is not aware of the law or is not cognizant of what he is doing.
24. the whole community. A prohibited act performed inadvertently by members of the community incurs guilt on the whole group that must be expiated. (Compare the plagues that descend on Thebes in Oedipus the King and Antigone.)
30. with a high hand. This phrase, which suggests bold defiance, is the obvious legal antithesis to inadvertent transgressing, or erring.
32. And the Israelites were in the wilderness. This clause takes us back from the listing of timeless laws to the narrative setting of the Wilderness tales. The anecdote, however, proves to be a piece of case law indicating what is the sentence of a person willfully violating the sabbath.
35. Let all the community pelt him with stones outside the camp. The death sentence for violating the sabbath offers a grim prospect, which might well make one think of the brutal enforcement of strict theological conformity in certain modern theocracies. Ibn Ezra seeks to provide a palliative by linking this episode with the “high hand” of the immediately preceding passage, suggesting that the wood gatherer had been duly warned but high-handedly went on with his action. The larger narrative context comprises a series of acts of mutiny, threatening both the authority of Moses and the cohesiveness of the community, and this episode is conceived as a grave instance of such mutiny. Israel as a community is in part defined by its adherence to the sabbath. In the harsh reality of the Wilderness setting, he who has broken ranks is taken outside the camp and executed by the whole community.
38. make them a fringe on the skirts of their garments. The “skirts” of the garment are literally “wings” (kenafayim). The garment would typically be a kind of tunic (and so would not have “corners”), and the reference is thus to the hem or bottom edge. The fringe—elsewhere the Hebrew tsitsit refers to a lock of hair—is made up of uncut threads extending down from the hem.
an indigo twist. Though indigo may be a reasonable approximation of the color in question, it should be noted that the dye is not derived from a plant, as is indigo, but from a substance secreted by the murex, harvested off the coast of Phoenicia (see the comment on Exodus 25:4). The extraction and preparation of this dye were labor-intensive and thus made it quite costly. It was used for royal garments in many places in the Mediterranean region, and in Israel it was also used for priestly garments and for the cloth furnishings of the Tabernacle. One may infer that the indigo twist was a token of the idea that Israel should become a “kingdom of priests and a holy nation” and perhaps also that, as the covenanted people, metaphorically God’s firstborn, the nation as a whole had royal status. Remnants of clothing found in the caves inhabited by Bar Kokhba’s men demonstrate that such indigo twists were still worn at the hems of ordinary outer garments in the second century C.E. Eventually, the indigo color was dropped as dye for the authentic hue became inaccessible. The fringes were transferred to the talit, or prayer shawl, though some devout Orthodox men and boys still wear as an inner garment a sleeveless piece of cloth with a large neckhole and fringes at its four corners.
39. be mindful of all the LORD’s commandments. The key Hebrew verb z-k-r means both “to remember” and “to be cognizant of.” There is a continuing concern with mnemonic devices and stories in Numbers. This fringe with the indigo twist is presumably meant to remind the Israelites of their obligation as a holy people and of their quasiroyal status before God: when tempted to look at the objects of desire, they are to look instead upon the mnemonic fringe.
you shall not stray. The Hebrew verb here also has the more neutral meaning of “to go about,” “to explore,” “to scout”; and, as many commentators have noted, it is the very verb used for the expedition of the twelve spies. Perhaps the “straying” is also intended, at least by the redactor, as a glance back at the sabbath wood gatherer.
41. I am the LORD your God, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Throughout the Hebrew Bible, theology is an inseparable part of story. Israel’s fealty to God is not a consequence of abstract theological principle but of its experience of God’s workings in history. The indigo twist—Rashi even seeks to link it with the color of the sky on the night of the Exodus—is thus a reminder not only of the commandments but of the liberation from slavery, prelude to the Sinai epiphany through which Israel took on the obligation to become a kingdom of priests. The once enslaved people is henceforth to wear a constant token of royalty and sanctity.