Imamat 1:4

1:4 He must lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it will be accepted for him to make atonement ¹  on his behalf.

Imamat 10:10

10:10 as well as ²  to distinguish between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean, ³ 

Imamat 14:49

14:49 Then he ⁴  is to take two birds, a piece of cedar wood, a scrap of crimson fabric, and some twigs of hyssop ⁵  to decontaminate ⁶  the house,

Imamat 19:17

19:17 You must not hate your brother in your heart. You must surely reprove your fellow citizen so that you do not incur sin on account of him. ⁷ 

Imamat 19:25

19:25 Then in the fifth year you may eat its fruit to add its produce to your harvest. ⁸  I am the Lord your God.

Imamat 22:29

22:29 When you sacrifice a thanksgiving offering to the Lord, you must sacrifice it so that it is acceptable for your benefit. ⁹ 

Imamat 23:28

23:28 You must not do any work on this particular day, ¹⁰  because it is a day of atonement to make atonement for yourselves ¹¹  before the Lord your God.

Imamat 25:18

25:18 You must obey my statutes and my regulations; you must be sure to keep them ¹²  so that you may live securely in the land. ¹³ 

Imamat 25:21

25:21 I will command my blessing for you in the sixth year so that it may yield ¹⁴  the produce ¹⁵  for three years,

[1:4]  ¹ tn “To make atonement” is the standard translation of the Hebrew term כִּפֶּר, (kipper); cf. however TEV “as a sacrifice to take away his sins” (CEV similar). The English word derives from a combination of “at” plus Middle English “one[ment],” referring primarily to reconciliation or reparation that is made in order to accomplish reconciliation. The primary meaning of the Hebrew verb, however, is “to wipe [something off (or on)]” (see esp. the goal of the sin offering, Lev 4, “to purge” the tabernacle from impurities), but in some cases it refers metaphorically to “wiping away” anything that might stand in the way of good relations by bringing a gift (see, e.g., Gen 32:20 [21 HT], “to appease; to pacify” as an illustration of this). The translation “make atonement” has been retained here because, ultimately, the goal of either purging or appeasing was to maintain a proper relationship between the Lord (who dwelt in the tabernacle) and Israelites in whose midst the tabernacle was pitched (see R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:689-710 for a full discussion of the Hebrew word meaning “to make atonement” and its theological significance).

[10:10]  ² tn Heb “and,” but regarding the translation “as well as,” see the note at the end of v. 9.

[10:10]  ³ sn The two pairs of categories in this verse refer to: (1) the status of a person, place, thing, or time – “holy” (קֹדֶשׁ, qodesh) versus “common” (חֹל, khol); as opposed to (2) the condition of a person, place, or thing – “unclean” (טָמֵא, tame’) versus “clean” (טָהוֹר, tahor). Someone or something could gain “holy” status by being “consecrated” (i.e., made holy; e.g., the Hebrew Piel קִדֵּשׁ (qiddesh) in Lev 8:15, 30), and to treat someone or something that was holy as if it were “common” would be to “profane” that person or thing (the Hebrew Piel הִלֵּל [hillel], e.g., in Lev 19:29 and 22:15). Similarly, on another level, someone or something could be in a “clean” condition, but one could “defile” (the Hebrew Piel טִמֵּא [timme’], e.g., in Gen 34:5 and Num 6:9) that person or thing and thereby make it “unclean.” To “purify” (the Hebrew Piel טִהֵר [tiher], e.g., in Lev 16:19 and Num 8:6, 15) that unclean person or thing would be to make it “clean” once again. With regard to the animals (Lev 11), some were by nature “unclean,” so they could never be eaten, but others were by nature “clean” and, therefore, edible (Lev 11:2, 46-47). The meat of clean animals could become inedible by too long of a delay in eating it, in which case the Hebrew term פִּגּוּל (pigul) “foul, spoiled” is used to describe it (Lev 7:18; 19:7; cf. also Ezek 4:14 and Isa 65:4), not the term for “unclean” (טָהוֹר, tahor). Strictly speaking, therefore, unclean meat never becomes clean, and clean meat never becomes unclean.

[14:49]  ⁴ tn The pronoun “he” refers to the priest mentioned in the previous verse.

[14:49]  ⁵ tn Regarding these ritual materials, see the note on v. 4 above.

[14:49]  ⁶ tn Regarding the Piel of חָטָא (khata’, cf. v. 52) meaning to “decontaminate” or “perform a decontamination,” see the notes on Lev 8:15 and 9:15.

[14:49]  sn In Lev 8:15, for example, the “sin offering” is used to “decontaminate” the burnt offering altar. As argued above (see the note on v. 7 above), these ritual materials and the procedures performed with them do not constitute a “sin offering” (contrast vv. 19 and 31 above). In fact, no sin offering was required for the purification of a house.

[19:17]  ⁷ tn Heb “and you will not lift up on him sin.” The meaning of the line is somewhat obscure. It means either (1) that one should rebuke one’s neighbor when he sins lest one also becomes guilty, which is the way it is rendered here (see NIV, NRSV, NEB, JB; see also B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 129-30, and J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 303, and the discussion on pp. 316-17), or (2) one may rebuke one’s neighbor without incurring sin just as long as he does not hate him in his heart (see the first part of the verse; cf. NASB, NAB).

[19:25]  ⁸ tn Heb “to add to you its produce.” The rendering here assumes that the point of this clause is simply that finally being allowed to eat the fruit in the fifth year adds the fruit of the tree to their harvest. Some take the verb to be from אָסַף (’asaf, “to gather”) rather than יָסַף (yasaf, “to add; to increase”), rendering the verse, “to gather to you the produce” (E. S. Gerstenberger, Leviticus [OTL], 260, and see the versions referenced in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 306). Others take it to mean that by following the regulations given previously they will honor the Lord so that the Lord will cause the trees to increase the amount of fruit they would normally produce (Hartley, 303, 306; cf. NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

[22:29]  ⁹ tn Heb “for your acceptance” (see the notes on Lev 1:3-4 and 22:19 above).

[23:28]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “in the bone of this day.”

[23:28]  ¹¹ tn Heb “on you [plural]”; cf. NASB, NRSV “on your behalf.”

[25:18]  ¹² tn Heb “And you shall keep and do them.” This appears to be a kind of verbal hendiadys, where the first verb is a modifier of the action of the second verb (see GKC 386 §120.d, although שָׁמַר [shamar, “to keep”] is not cited there; cf. Lev 20:8, etc.).

[25:18]  ¹³ tn Heb “and you shall dwell on the land to security.”

[25:21]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “and it [i.e., the land] shall make the produce.” The Hebrew term וְעָשָׂת (vÿ’asat, “and it shall make”) is probably an older third feminine singular form of the verb (GKC 210 §75.m). Smr has the normal form.

[25:21]  ¹⁵ tn Smr and LXX have “its produce” (cf. 25:3, 7, etc.) rather than “the produce.”