Keluaran 30:7

30:7 Aaron is to burn sweet incense ¹  on it morning by morning; when he attends ²  to the lamps he is to burn incense. ³ 

Imamat 16:12-13

16:12 and take a censer full of coals of fire from the altar before the Lord ⁴  and a full double handful of finely ground fragrant incense, ⁵  and bring them inside the veil-canopy. ⁶  16:13 He must then put the incense on the fire before the Lord, and the cloud of incense will cover the atonement plate which is above the ark of the testimony, ⁷  so that he will not die. ⁸ 

¹ tn The text uses a cognate accusative (“incense”) with the verb “to burn” or “to make into incense/sweet smoke.” Then, the noun “sweet spices” is added in apposition to clarify the incense as sweet.

² tn The Hebrew is בְּהֵיטִיבוֹ (bÿhetivo), a Hiphil infinitive construct serving in a temporal clause. The Hebrew verb means “to make good” and so in this context “to fix” or “to dress.” This refers to cleansing and trimming the lamps.

³ sn The point of the little golden altar of incense is normally for intercessory prayer, and then at the Day of Atonement for blood applied atonement. The instructions for making it show that God wanted his people to make a place for prayer. The instructions for its use show that God expects that the requests of his people will be pleasing to him.

⁴ tn Heb “and he shall take the fullness of the censer, coals of fire, from on the altar from to the faces of the Lord.”

⁵ tn Heb “and the fullness of the hollow of his two hands, finely ground fragrant incense.”

⁶ tn Heb “and he shall bring from house to the veil-canopy.”

⁷ tn The text here has only “above the testimony,” but this is surely a shortened form of “above the ark of the testimony” (see Exod 25:22 etc.; cf. Lev 16:2). The term “testimony” in this expression refers to the ark as the container of the two stone tablets with the Ten Commandments written on them (see Exod 25:16 with Deut 10:1, 5, etc.).

⁸ tn Heb “and he will not die,” but it is clear that the purpose for the incense cloud was to protect the priest from death in the presence of the Lord (cf. vv. 1-2 above).