Imamat 3:2

3:2 He must lay his hand on the head of his offering and slaughter it at the entrance of the Meeting Tent, and the sons of Aaron, the priests, must splash the blood against the altar’s sides. ¹ 

Imamat 8:28

8:28 Moses then took them from their palms and offered them up in smoke on the altar ²  on top of the burnt offering – they were an ordination offering for a soothing aroma; it was a gift to the Lord.

Imamat 11:46

11:46 This is the law ³  of the land animals, the birds, all the living creatures that move in the water, and all the creatures ⁴  that swarm on the land,

Imamat 14:18

14:18 and the remainder of the olive oil ⁵  that is in his hand the priest is to put on the head of the one being cleansed. So the priest is to make atonement for him before the Lord.

Imamat 17:11

17:11 for the life of every living thing ⁶  is in the blood. ⁷  So I myself have assigned it to you ⁸  on the altar to make atonement for your lives, for the blood makes atonement by means of the life. ⁹ 

Imamat 18:9

18:9 You must not have sexual intercourse with your sister, whether she is your father’s daughter or your mother’s daughter, ¹⁰  whether she is born in the same household or born outside it; ¹¹  you must not have sexual intercourse with either of them. ¹² 

Imamat 25:31

25:31 The houses of villages, however, ¹³  which have no wall surrounding them ¹⁴  must be considered as the field ¹⁵  of the land; they will have the right of redemption and must revert in the jubilee.

Imamat 26:33

26:33 I will scatter you among the nations and unsheathe the sword ¹⁶  after you, so your land will become desolate and your cities will become a waste.

[3:2]  ¹ tn See the remarks on Lev 1:3-5 above for some of the details of translation here.

[8:28]  ² tn Heb “toward the altar” (see the note on Lev 1:9).

[11:46]  ³ sn The Hebrew term translated “law” (תוֹרָה, torah) introduces here a summary or colophon for all of Lev 11. Similar summaries are found in Lev 7:37-38; 13:59; 14:54-57; and 15:32-33.

[11:46]  ⁴ tn Heb “for all the creatures.”

[14:18]  ⁵ tn Heb “and the remainder in the oil.”

[17:11]  ⁶ tn Heb “the life of the flesh.” Here “flesh” stands for “every living thing,” that is, all creatures (cf. NIV, NRSV, NLT “every creature”; CEV “every living creature.”

[17:11]  ⁷ tn Heb “for the soul/life (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh) of the flesh, it is in the blood” (cf. the note of v. 10 above and v. 14 below). Although most modern English versions begin a new sentence in v. 11, “For the life of the flesh is in the blood” (see, e.g., NJPS, NASB, NIV, NRSV), the כִּי (ki, “for, because”) at the beginning of the verse suggests continuation from v. 10, as the rendering here indicates (see, e.g., NEB, NLT; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 261; and G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 239).

[17:11]  sn This verse is a well-known crux interpretum for blood atonement in the Bible. The close association between the blood and “the soul/life [נֶפֶשׁ] of the flesh [בָּשָׂר, basar]” (v. 11a) begins in Gen 9:2-5 (if not Gen 4:10-11), where the Lord grants man the eating of meat (i.e., the “flesh” of animals) but also issues a warning: “But flesh [בָּשָׂר] with its soul/life [נֶפֶשׁ], [which is] its blood, you shall not eat” (cf. G. J. Wenham, Genesis [WBC], 1:151 and 193). Unfortunately, the difficulty in translating נֶפֶשׁ consistently (see the note on v. 10 above) obscures the close connection between the (human) “person” in v. 10 and “the life” (of animals, 2 times) and “your (human) lives” in v. 11, all of which are renderings of נֶפֶשׁ. The basic logic of the passage is that (a) no נֶפֶשׁ should eat the blood when he eats the בָּשָׂר of an animal (v. 10) because (b) the נֶפֶשׁ of בָּשָׂר is identified with the blood that flows through and permeates it (v. 11a), and (c) the Lord himself has assigned (i.e., limited the use of) animal blood, that is, animal נֶפֶשׁ, to be the instrument or price of making atonement for the נֶפֶשׁ of people (v. 11b). See the detailed remarks and literature cited in R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:693-95, 697-98.

[17:11]  ⁸ tn Heb “And I myself have given it to you.”

[17:11]  ⁹ tn Heb “for the blood, it by (בְּ, bet preposition, “in”] the life makes atonement.” The interpretation of the preposition is pivotal here. Some scholars have argued that it is a bet of exchange; that is, “the blood makes atonement in exchange for the life [of the slaughtered animal]” (see R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:694-95, 697 for analysis and criticism of this view). It is more likely that, as in the previous clause (“your lives”), “life/soul” (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh) here refers to the person who makes the offering, not the animal offered. The blood of the animal makes atonement for the person who offers it either “by means of” (instrumental bet) the “life/soul” of the animal, which it symbolizes or embodies (the meaning of the translation given here); or perhaps the blood of the animal functions as “the price” (bet of price) for ransoming the “life/soul” of the person.

[18:9]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “the daughter of your father or the daughter of your mother.”

[18:9]  ¹¹ tn Heb “born of house or born of outside.” CEV interprets as “whether you grew up together or not” (cf. also TEV, NLT).

[18:9]  ¹² tc Several medieval Hebrew mss, Smr, LXX, and Syriac have “her nakedness” rather than “their nakedness,” thus agreeing with singular “sister” at the beginning of the verse.

[18:9]  tn For a smooth English translation “either of” was added.

[25:31]  ¹³ tn Heb “And the houses of the villages.”

[25:31]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “which there is not to them a wall.”

[25:31]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “on the field.”

[26:33]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and I will empty sword” (see HALOT 1228 s.v. ריק 3).