Plan
Num. 18–19
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Chapter

18

1Yahweh said to Aaron, “You and your sons and your fathers’ house with you shall bear the iniquity of the sanctuary; and you and your sons with you shall bear the iniquity of your priesthood. 2Bring your brothers also, the tribe of Levi, the tribe of your father, near with you, that they may be joined to you, and minister to you; but you and your sons with you shall be before the Tent of the Testimony. 3They shall keep your commands and the duty of the whole Tent; only they shall not come near to the vessels of the sanctuary and to the altar, that they not die, neither they nor you. 4They shall be joined to you and keep the responsibility of the Tent of Meeting, for all the service of the Tent. A stranger shall not come near to you.

5“You shall perform the duty of the sanctuary and the duty of the altar, that there be no more wrath on the children of Israel. 6Behold, I myself have taken your brothers the Levites from among the children of Israel. They are a gift to you, dedicated to Yahweh, to do the service of the Tent of Meeting. 7You and your sons with you shall keep your priesthood for everything of the altar, and for that within the veil. You shall serve. I give you the service of the priesthood as a gift. The stranger who comes near shall be put to death.”

8Yahweh spoke to Aaron, “Behold, I myself have given you the command of my wave offerings, even all the holy things of the children of Israel. I have given them to you by reason of the anointing, and to your sons, as a portion forever. 9This shall be yours of the most holy things from the fire: every offering of theirs, even every meal offering of theirs, and every sin offering of theirs, and every trespass offering of theirs, which they shall render to me, shall be most holy for you and for your sons. 10You shall eat of it like the most holy things. Every male shall eat of it. It shall be holy to you.

11“This is yours, too: the wave offering of their gift, even all the wave offerings of the children of Israel. I have given them to you, and to your sons and to your daughters with you, as a portion forever. Everyone who is clean in your house shall eat of it.

12“I have given to you all the best of the oil, all the best of the vintage, and of the grain, the first fruits of them which they give to Yahweh. 13The first-ripe fruits of all that is in their land, which they bring to Yahweh, shall be yours. Everyone who is clean in your house shall eat of it.

14“Everything devoted in Israel shall be yours. 15Everything that opens the womb, of all flesh which they offer to Yahweh, both of man and animal, shall be yours. Nevertheless, you shall surely redeem the firstborn of man, and you shall redeem the firstborn of unclean animals. 16You shall redeem those who are to be redeemed of them from a month old, according to your estimation, for five shekels of money, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, which weighs twenty gerahs.

17“But you shall not redeem the firstborn of a cow, or the firstborn of a sheep, or the firstborn of a goat. They are holy. You shall sprinkle their blood on the altar, and shall burn their fat for an offering made by fire, for a pleasant aroma to Yahweh. 18Their meat shall be yours, as the wave offering breast and as the right thigh, it shall be yours. 19All the wave offerings of the holy things which the children of Israel offer to Yahweh, I have given you and your sons and your daughters with you, as a portion forever. It is a covenant of salt forever before Yahweh to you and to your offspring with you.”

20Yahweh said to Aaron, “You shall have no inheritance in their land, neither shall you have any portion among them. I am your portion and your inheritance among the children of Israel.

21“To the children of Levi, behold, I have given all the tithe in Israel for an inheritance, in return for their service which they serve, even the service of the Tent of Meeting. 22Henceforth the children of Israel shall not come near the Tent of Meeting, lest they bear sin, and die. 23But the Levites shall do the service of the Tent of Meeting, and they shall bear their iniquity. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations. Among the children of Israel, they shall have no inheritance. 24For the tithe of the children of Israel, which they offer as a wave offering to Yahweh, I have given to the Levites for an inheritance. Therefore I have said to them, ‘Among the children of Israel they shall have no inheritance.’”

25Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, 26“Moreover you shall speak to the Levites, and tell them, ‘When you take of the children of Israel the tithe which I have given you from them for your inheritance, then you shall offer up a wave offering of it for Yahweh, a tithe of the tithe. 27Your wave offering shall be credited to you, as though it were the grain of the threshing floor, and as the fullness of the wine press. 28Thus you also shall offer a wave offering to Yahweh of all your tithes, which you receive of the children of Israel; and of it you shall give Yahweh’s wave offering to Aaron the priest. 29Out of all your gifts, you shall offer every wave offering to Yahweh, of all its best parts, even the holy part of it.’

30“Therefore you shall tell them, ‘When you heave its best from it, then it shall be credited to the Levites as the increase of the threshing floor, and as the increase of the wine press. 31You may eat it anywhere, you and your households, for it is your reward in return for your service in the Tent of Meeting. 32You shall bear no sin by reason of it, when you have heaved from it its best. You shall not profane the holy things of the children of Israel, that you not die.’”

19

1Yahweh spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying, 2“This is the statute of the law which Yahweh has commanded. Tell the children of Israel to bring you a red heifer without spot, in which is no defect, and which was never yoked. 3You shall give her to Eleazar the priest, and he shall bring her outside of the camp, and one shall kill her before his face. 4Eleazar the priest shall take some of her blood with his finger, and sprinkle her blood toward the front of the Tent of Meeting seven times. 5One shall burn the heifer in his sight; her skin, and her meat, and her blood, with her dung, shall he burn. 6The priest shall take cedar wood, hyssop, and scarlet, and cast it into the middle of the burning of the heifer. 7Then the priest shall wash his clothes, and he shall bathe his flesh in water, and afterward he shall come into the camp, and the priest shall be unclean until the evening. 8He who burns her shall wash his clothes in water, and bathe his flesh in water, and shall be unclean until the evening.

9“A man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and lay them up outside of the camp in a clean place; and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for use in water for cleansing impurity. It is a sin offering. 10He who gathers the ashes of the heifer shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until the evening. It shall be to the children of Israel, and to the stranger who lives as a foreigner among them, for a statute forever.

11“He who touches the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days. 12He shall purify himself with water on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean; but if he doesn’t purify himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean. 13Whoever touches a dead person, the body of a man who has died, and doesn’t purify himself, defiles Yahweh’s tabernacle; and that soul shall be cut off from Israel; because the water for impurity was not sprinkled on him, he shall be unclean. His uncleanness is yet on him.

14“This is the law when a man dies in a tent: everyone who comes into the tent, and everyone who is in the tent, shall be unclean seven days. 15Every open vessel, which has no covering bound on it, is unclean.

16“Whoever in the open field touches one who is slain with a sword, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.

17“For the unclean, they shall take of the ashes of the burning of the sin offering; and running water shall be poured on them in a vessel. 18A clean person shall take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle it on the tent, on all the vessels, on the persons who were there, and on him who touched the bone, or the slain, or the dead, or the grave. 19The clean person shall sprinkle on the unclean on the third day, and on the seventh day. On the seventh day, he shall purify him. He shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water, and shall be clean at evening. 20But the man who shall be unclean, and shall not purify himself, that soul shall be cut off from among the assembly, because he has defiled the sanctuary of Yahweh. The water for impurity has not been sprinkled on him. He is unclean. 21It shall be a perpetual statute to them. He who sprinkles the water for impurity shall wash his clothes, and he who touches the water for impurity shall be unclean until evening.

22“Whatever the unclean person touches shall be unclean; and the soul that touches it shall be unclean until evening.”

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