1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,YHWH tells Moses to tell the young 'uns about the sacrifices they need to make 40 years in the future, after they steal the promised land as He has ordained.
2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land of your habitations, which I give unto you,
3 And will make an offering by fire unto the LORD, a burnt offering, or a sacrifice in performing a vow, or in a freewill offering, or in your solemn feasts, to make a sweet savour unto the LORD, of the herd or of the flock:
4 Then shall he that offereth his offering unto the LORD bring a meat offering of a tenth deal of flour mingled with the fourth part of an hin of oil.
5 And the fourth part of an hin of wine for a drink offering shalt thou prepare with the burnt offering or sacrifice, for one lamb.
6 Or for a ram, thou shalt prepare for a meat offering two tenth deals of flour mingled with the third part of an hin of oil.
7 And for a drink offering thou shalt offer the third part of an hin of wine, for a sweet savour unto the LORD.
8 And when thou preparest a bullock for a burnt offering, or for a sacrifice in performing a vow, or peace offerings unto the LORD:
9 Then shall he bring with a bullock a meat offering of three tenth deals of flour mingled with half an hin of oil.
10 And thou shalt bring for a drink offering half an hin of wine, for an offering made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the LORD.
11 Thus shall it be done for one bullock, or for one ram, or for a lamb, or a kid.
12 According to the number that ye shall prepare, so shall ye do to every one according to their number.
13 All that are born of the country shall do these things after this manner, in offering an offering made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the LORD.
14 And if a stranger sojourn with you, or whosoever be among you in your generations, and will offer an offering made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the LORD; as ye do, so he shall do.
15 One ordinance shall be both for you of the congregation, and also for the stranger that sojourneth with you, an ordinance for ever in your generations: as ye are, so shall the stranger be before the LORD.
16 One law and one manner shall be for you, and for the stranger that sojourneth with you.
17 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
18 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land whither I bring you,
19 Then it shall be, that, when ye eat of the bread of the land, ye shall offer up an heave offering unto the LORD.
20 Ye shall offer up a cake of the first of your dough for an heave offering: as ye do the heave offering of the threshingfloor, so shall ye heave it.
21 Of the first of your dough ye shall give unto the LORD an heave offering in your generations.
22 And if ye have erred, and not observed all these commandments, which the LORD hath spoken unto Moses,
23 Even all that the LORD hath commanded you by the hand of Moses, from the day that the LORD commanded Moses, and henceforward among your generations;
24 Then it shall be, if ought be committed by ignorance without the knowledge of the congregation, that all the congregation shall offer one young bullock for a burnt offering, for a sweet savour unto the LORD, with his meat offering, and his drink offering, according to the manner, and one kid of the goats for a sin offering.
25 And the priest shall make an atonement for all the congregation of the children of Israel, and it shall be forgiven them; for it is ignorance: and they shall bring their offering, a sacrifice made by fire unto the LORD, and their sin offering before the LORD, for their ignorance:
26 And it shall be forgiven all the congregation of the children of Israel, and the stranger that sojourneth among them; seeing all the people were in ignorance.
27 And if any soul sin through ignorance, then he shall bring a she goat of the first year for a sin offering.
28 And the priest shall make an atonement for the soul that sinneth ignorantly, when he sinneth by ignorance before the LORD, to make an atonement for him; and it shall be forgiven him.
29 Ye shall have one law for him that sinneth through ignorance, both for him that is born among the children of Israel, and for the stranger that sojourneth among them.
30 But the soul that doeth ought presumptuously, whether he be born in the land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the LORD; and that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
31 Because he hath despised the word of the LORD, and hath broken his commandment, that soul shall utterly be cut off; his iniquity shall be upon him.
32 And while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man that gathered sticks upon the sabbath day.
33 And they that found him gathering sticks brought him unto Moses and Aaron, and unto all the congregation.
34 And they put him in ward, because it was not declared what should be done to him.
35 And the LORD said unto Moses, The man shall be surely put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones without the camp.
36 And all the congregation brought him without the camp, and stoned him with stones, and he died; as the LORD commanded Moses.
37 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
38 Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of the borders a ribband of blue:
39 And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of the LORD, and do them; and that ye seek not after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring:
40 That ye may remember, and do all my commandments, and be holy unto your God.
41 I am the LORD your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: I am the LORD your God
The Israelites find a man gathering sticks on the sabbath day, and they do the right thing and imprison him until God tells them what to do. He tells them the right thing to do, and that is to stone the sinner to death. And they do the right thing and stone the sinner to death.
I do hope the Secret Service keeps President Bush from clearing that Crawford brush on the Lord's day, because God says what he means and means what he says. (Update: uh-oh!)
Once Yahweh dispensed the valuable moral advice of using stones to break bones, he suddenly turned to the important topic of what color of fringe the Israelites should wear for all eternity.
This is important because the blue trim will remind you to follow the Lord's commandments and "seek not after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring." We wouldn't want spiritual people following their heart or trusting their own lyin' eyes, would we? Fuck no.
3 comments:
"uh-oh!" very funny.
All these rules....kinda makes my head all swimmey.
Well, this chapter is from the priesly code again, and constitutes another modification of the original priestly code by a later priestly writer. They just seem to want to keep modifying the laws...
The writer of these bits is clearly biased, and greedy. They've added a requirement for wine and bread to be "offered" that wasn't there before; despite the claims of the text that its for Yahweh's benefit, its obvious that its really "give the priests wine and bread".
Originally it was "try and sacrifice the animal before eating it". Then it was "make sure the priest gets a bit during the communal meal". Then it was "the priest gets one of the prime cuts". Now its "the priest gets one of the prime cuts AND some bread AND some wine". If this kept on it would eventually be "...and some money, and your house, and your wife, and your children".
There's even a claim that priests should get a portion of any dough that's ever baked anywhere. Traditionally this was 1 part in 24; its known as ''hallah''/''challah''. Modern day fundamentalist Jews throw this portion in the fire, as there aren't any priests to give it to.
The "pick up sticks" law is from a different priestly writer - the one who writes in the style "situation arises...guidance requested...law given", that I've pointed out before. Again, the situation is entirely fictional and only exists to justify the mention of the law. Its a bit like "how can we explain that you must drive less than 20 mph in a dense housing area....lets create an advert about children that get run over and then give the rule at the end".
One thing to note is that the death penalty is ALREADY given in Exodus 31 and 35 for Sabbath violations. So why mention it again as if no-one had a clue what the rules were about it? The answer of course is that its a result of people inserting new laws into older texts.
The blue fringes thing is from a different writer again - the "priestly teacher" that I mentioned several chapters ago. That's the one that's very old, nearly the same age as the original priestly source. They are called "teacher" by scholars due to their writing style.
Firstly, they are not fringes, but tassels - its a slight mistranslation in the KJV. The blue dye is specifically a particular dye developed on the south lebanese coast (ie. Phoenicia). The exact source of the dye has been lost - it may have been some sort of animal shell (eg. the Murex).
They are tassels at the four corners of a garment. Garments used to be sheets of cloth with a hole in them for the head. Fundamentalist Jews still wear garments like this, with the 4 tassels, at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem - you may see them on news.
But really, these ultimately originate from when garments were animal skins - the corners had claws/feet. The feet/claws gradually became mere decoration, and so tassels took their place over time. The "priestly teacher", in its ever so bureaucratic way, is here turning a tradition/fashion into a law. Its a bit like making posters of pre-Raphaelite art compulsory for all students (you are probably familiar with such posters, even if you don't recognise the name "pre-Raphaelite").
I forgot to mention that the tassels are called Tzitzit (if you type that into google, you should get quite a few pictures of contemporary ones).
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