Leviticuschapter 4
35 verses · Moses, by tradition · 15th to 13th century BC · The Law
Key verse
Then the LORD said to Moses,
It stands in When the anointed priest sins, verses 1 to 12.
The chapter
Chapter summary
The sin offering. For sins done unwittingly. The anointed priest, the whole congregation, a ruler, a common person. The gradation of required victims matches the gradation of responsibility. For the priest or congregation, a bullock, with blood carried into the holy place and sprinkled before the veil and put on the horns of the incense altar; the body burned outside the camp. For the ruler, a male kid; for the common person, a female kid or a lamb, with blood only on the horns of the brazen altar. Hebrews 13:11–12 draws on ‘outside the camp’ for its Christology. Sins not foreseen require atonement; there is no sin small enough to leave unconfessed.
Context
Law · Moses · Leviticus overview
The world of this chapter
- Who
- A whole nation ranked from the anointed priest down to the people of the land, each told what their own case would cost
- Where
- The tabernacle at Sinai, the altar of incense inside the tent and the altar of burnt offering in the court, with a clean place outside the camp
- When
- Israel encamped at Sinai, a new speech opening the sin offering. c. 1445 BC on the traditional dating, in the first month of the second year after the Exodus. This site's published dossier carries a second position, that the priestly material was compiled later, with its holders named
Historical context
A new speech opens at verse 1, one of the thirty-three in this book where the LORD speaks to Moses. The subject is a person who sins unintentionally and comes to know it afterwards.
The chapter grades one offering by who sinned. The anointed priest stands at verse 3, the whole congregation at verse 13, a leader at verse 22 and a member of the common people at verse 27.
A first hearer would have followed the blood, because the blood is what moves. For the priest and the congregation it goes inside the tent, sprinkled seven times before the veil and put on the horns of the golden altar of incense. From the leader down it stays in the courtyard.
The altar of incense was where the priest served day by day, so his own sin was answered on the furniture his service touched. The rest of his bull was carried out of the camp to a clean place and burned, which meant the men who brought it received nothing back.
The word rendered leader at verse 22 is nasi, which covers the head of a tribe or of a household as well as a king. Verse 22 is also the one place in the chapter that says the commandments of the LORD his God, where verses 2, 13 and 27 say only the LORD.
Significance
The chapter told Israel that guilt was real before anyone noticed it. A nation could be wrong about something none of it had seen, and the remedy stayed open once the fact came out.
It also told them the price moved with the person. The animal fell from a bull to a female goat as the rank fell. The sentence at the end of each case stayed the same, that the priest makes atonement and the person is forgiven.
Where the chapter sits
Leviticus 4 falls in The five offerings (chapters 1–7). Burnt, grain, peace, sin, trespass, the sacrificial vocabulary of Israel's worship.
After it: Consecration of the priesthood, chapters 8–10.
The whole shape of Leviticus→The structure of this chapter
People1
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
When the anointed priest sins
This verse opens the formula that carries the rest of the book, and thirty-three passages of Leviticus begin with the LORD speaking to Moses from here on. The subject given is a soul that sins through ignorance, a phrase that occurs here for the first time in Scripture and falls in only eight verses of the whole King James Bible, four of them in this chapter. The burnt offering was brought of a man's own voluntary will at Leviticus 1:3, and this one is required of him the moment he learns what he did.
Leviticus 4:1
“And the Lord spake ... Israel - This formula is the commencement of a distinct section of the Law. Lev 4:2 If a soul shall sin - The sin-offering was a new thing, instituted by the Law. The older kinds of sacrifice Lev 2:1; Lev 3:1 when offered by individuals were purely voluntary: no special occasions were prescribed. But it was plainly commanded that he who was conscious that he had committed a sin should bring his sin-offering.”
Leviticus 4:2
“The sins, however, referred to in this law were unintentional violations of the ceremonial laws,--breaches made through haste, or inadvertency of some negative precepts, which, if done knowingly and wilfully, would have involved a capital punishment. do against any of them--To bring out the meaning, it is necessary to supply, "he shall bring a sin offering." Le 4:3-35.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verse
Leviticus 4:2
“If a soul shall sin through ignorance - That is, if any man shall do what God has forbidden, or leave undone what God has commanded, through ignorance of the law relative to these points; as soon as the transgression or omission comes to his knowledge, he shall offer the sacrifice here prescribed, and shall not suppose that his ignorance is an excuse for his sin.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
The chapter grades one offering by who sinned, and it begins at the top. A sin by the anointed priest is described as according to the sin of the people, which Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read as bringing guilt on the nation, since the man who carries Israel in to God cannot sin privately. He brings a young bullock, the costliest animal named anywhere in the chapter, and he lays his own hand on its head and kills it himself.
Leviticus 4:3
“The priest that is anointed - i. e. the high priest. (Compare Lev 8:12; Lev 21:10; Exo 29:7). On the anointing of the other priests see the note at Lev 8:13. The graduation of the sin-offerings is remarkable. It might seem that the distinction addressed itself more pointedly to each individual according to his rank and consequent responsibility (see Lev 4:32). According to the sin of the people - Rather, to bring guilt on the people. The whole nation is concerned in every transgression of its representative.”
The blood of this bullock goes where the blood of the offerings before it never went. Adam Clarke counts its three destinations: sprinkled seven times before the vail with a finger, smeared on the horns of the golden altar of incense inside the tent, and the remainder poured out at the base of the altar in the court. The altar of incense is where the priest himself served day by day, so the blood is put on the furniture his own sin touched.
Leviticus 4:5
“The treatment of the blood was special in the sin-offerings. In the inferior sin-offerings it was smeared on the horns of the altar of burnt-offering Lev 4:25, Lev 4:30, Lev 4:34, while in this offering for the high priest, and in that for the nation, the high priest himself sprinkled the blood seven times within the tabernacle and smeared it on the horns of the altar of incense Lev 4:6-7, Lev 4:17-18. The different modes of sprinkling appear to have marked successive degrees of consecration in advancing from the altar of burnt-offering to the presence of Yahweh within the veil.”
2 more voices on this verse
Leviticus 4:5
“Some of the blood of the high-priest's sin-offering was to be sprinkled seven times before the veil, with an eye towards the mercy-seat, though it was veiled: some of it was to be put upon the horns of the golden altar, because at that altar the priest himself ministered; and thus was signified the putting away of that pollution which from his sins did cleave to his services.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Leviticus 4:5
“He is called by two names, Jesus Christ; Jesus because he is a savior, Christ because he is a priest. With this in mind the divinely inspired prophet Moses gave these two titles to two men eminent above all, changing the name of his own successor in the sovereignty, Auses, to Jesus, and giving his own brother, Aaron, the surname Christ, that through these two chosen men he might represent at once the high priesthood and the kingship of the one Jesus Christ who was to come.”
Cyril of Jerusalem· written before 386· Catechetical Lecture 10.11patristic
Leviticus 4:6
“Seven times - See Clarke’s note on Exo 29:30. The blood of this sacrifice was applied in three different ways: 1. The priest put his finger in it, and sprinkled it seven times before the veil, Lev 4:6. 2. He put some of it on the horns of the altar of incense. 3. He poured the remaining part at the bottom of the altar of burnt-offerings, Lev 4:7.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Leviticus 4:7
“Pour - All the blood that was left after the sprinkling and the smearing should be disposed of in such a manner as to suit the decorum of divine service. It had no sacrificial significance.”
Verse 10 measures this offering against a different one, saying the fat is taken off as it was taken off from the bullock of the sacrifice of peace offerings. The inward fat, the two kidneys and the caul above the liver go up on the altar, and Leviticus 3:3 and 3:4 name those same three portions in the peace offering. What ascends to God off a sin offering and what ascends off the offering a worshipper eats from are the same parts of the animal.
Leviticus 4:8
“By this the intention of the offering and of the atonement made by it was directed to the glory of God, who, having been dishonoured by the sin, was thus honoured by the sacrifice. It signified the sharp sufferings of our Lord Jesus, when he was made sin (that is, a sin-offering) for us, especially the sorrows of his soul and his inward agonies.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Nothing of this animal is eaten. The whole bullock, skin and head and legs and dung, is carried out of the camp and burned on wood, and the ground it is taken to is called a clean place. Hebrews 13:11 describes this verse, that the bodies of beasts whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin are burned without the camp, and Hebrews 13:12 says Jesus suffered without the gate for that reason.
Leviticus 4:11
“But in the expiation necessary for a sin of the high priest, after the fat of the sacrifice was offered on the altar, the carcass was carried without the camp [Le 4:12], in order that the total combustion of it in the place of ashes might the more strikingly indicate the enormity of the transgression, and the horror with which he regarded it (compare Heb 13:12, 13).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Leviticus 4:12
“Without the camp - This was intended figuratively to express the sinfulness of this sin, and the availableness of the atonement. The sacrifice, as having the sin of the priest transferred from himself to it by his confession and imposition of hands, was become unclean and abominable, and was carried, as it were, out of the Lord’s sight; from the tabernacle and congregation it must be carried without the camp, and thus its own offensiveness was removed, and the sin of the person in whose behalf it was offered.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
When the whole congregation strays
A nation can be guilty of something none of it noticed. The verse says the thing be hid from the eyes of the assembly and then says they are guilty in the same sentence, so the guilt stands before the knowledge arrives. John Gill records the reading of Rashi, the eleventh century French commentator, and of Maimonides after him, that the congregation here means the Sanhedrin of seventy one whose ruling led the people wrong, which makes this a court's error rather than a crowd's. The elders lay their hands on the bullock in the place of the whole people.
Leviticus 4:13
“And if the whole congregation of Israel sin through ignorance,.... That is, all Israel, or the greatest part of them, as Gersom interprets it, through the ignorant teaching of the judges, who by their instruction cause the people to err, and commit sins of ignorance, as Baal Hatturim on the place observes, and Maimonides elsewhere (g); wherefore Jarchi, and some others, by the congregation of Israel understand the sanhedrim, or the bench of judges, consisting of seventy one.”
Leviticus 4:14
“When the sin which they have sinned against it,.... Any of the commandments of the Lord forbidding such a thing to be done: is known; is made known to them by the priest, or any other, so that they are convinced that what has been done is wrong, though done through ignorance: then the congregation shall offer a young bullock for the sin, and bring him before the tabernacle of the congregation; the same offering with that of the anointed priest, he being, as Aben Ezra on the place observes, equal to all Israel.”
Leviticus 4:15
“And the elders of the congregation shall lay their hands upon the head of the bullock before the Lord,.... These must be two at least, some say three, and some say five (h); the more generally received notion is, that they were three of the sanhedrim (i); though the Targum of Jonathan makes them to be the twelve rulers of the twelve tribes: and the bullock shall be killed before the Lord; in the court near the altar of burnt offering, either by a priest, or Levite, or by a butcher, as the above Targum expresses it. (h) Misn.”
The congregation's bullock is handled exactly as the priest's was, and the text writes the whole procedure out a second time rather than saying it was done as before. The blood is sprinkled seven times before the vail, put on the horns of the altar inside the tent, and poured out at the bottom of the altar in the court. The price for a whole nation and the price for one man in the priesthood are the same animal and the same rite, which is the one place the graded scale of this chapter stops grading.
Leviticus 4:16
“And the priest that is anointed shall bring of the bullock's blood,.... That is, the chief priest, as the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan explain it: to the tabernacle of the congregation; as he brought the blood of his own bullock, Lev 4:5 from hence to the Lev 4:16 an account is given of the same rites to be observed in the sin offering, for the congregation, as for the anointed priest; See Gill on Lev 4:6, Lev 4:7, Lev 4:12.”
Verse 20 says the priest shall make an atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them. The words atonement and forgiven each fall four times in this chapter, at verses 20, 26, 31 and 35, and neither word appears anywhere in the ten verses given to the anointed priest's own offering. The chapter gives no reason for that silence and does not fill it, and Hebrews 5:3 states the priest's own need plainly, that he ought as for the people so also for himself to offer for sins.
Leviticus 4:20
“The promise of remission is founded upon the atonement. It is spoken here of the forgiveness of the sin of the whole congregation, that is, the turning away of those national judgments which the sin deserved.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
When a ruler sins without knowing
The word rendered ruler is nasi, which John Gill traces to a root meaning lifted up, and it covers the head of a tribe or of a household as well as a king. His animal steps down from a bullock to a male kid of the goats. Verse 22 is also the one place in the chapter that says the commandments of the LORD his God, where verses 2, 13 and 27 say only the LORD, so the man set over other men is the one reminded whose he is.
Leviticus 4:22
“When a ruler hath sinned,.... Or "prince", the "nasi", one that is lifted up above others in honour, power, and authority, or that bears the weight of government: the word comes from one which signifies to lift up, or to bear; it may be understood of a governor of a family, or of a tribe, as Aben Ezra observes; and so in the Talmud (k) it is said, it means the prince of a tribe, such as Nachson the son of Amminadab, prince of the tribe of Judah.”
1 more voice on this verse
Leviticus 4:22
“When a ruler hath sinned - Under the term נשיא nasi, it is probable that any person is meant who held any kind of political dignity among the people, though the rabbins generally understand it of the king. A kid of the goats was the sacrifice in this case, the rites nearly the same as in the preceding cases, only the fat was burnt as that of the peace-offering. See Lev 4:26 and Lev 3:5.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Leviticus 4:23
“Or if his sin - Rather, And if his sin. Come to his knowledge - i. e. when he had become conscious of his sin. A kid of the goats - A shaggy he-goat, in distinction from a smooth-haired he-goat. It was the regular sin-offering at the yearly festivals Lev 16:9, Lev 16:15; Num 28:15, Num 28:22, Num 28:30, and at the consecration of the priests Lev 9:3; while the smooth-haired goat appears to have been generally offered for the other sacrifices Psa 50:9; Isa 1:11.”
From the ruler down, the blood stays in the courtyard. It goes on the horns of the altar of burnt offering instead of the golden altar inside, and Leviticus 6:26 and 6:30 give the working rule, that a sin offering whose blood was carried into the tent is burned and one whose blood was not is eaten by the priest in the holy place. The two halves of this chapter are therefore two different ends for the carcase, burned outside the camp above and eaten by the priesthood below.
Leviticus 4:24
“And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the goat,.... His right hand, as the Targum of Jonathan; See Gill on Lev 1:4. and kill it; not the prince, but the priest after mentioned, or the butcher, as the same Targum: in the place where they hill the burnt offering before the Lord; in the court on the north side of the altar, see Lev 1:11, it is a sin offering: an offering for his sin of ignorance, or "sin"; so Christ our offering is said to be, 2Co 5:21.”
1 more voice on this verse
Leviticus 4:24
“The burnt-offering - So called by way of eminency, to wit, the daily burnt-offering. It is a sin-offering - And therefore to be killed where the burnt-offering is killed; whereby it is distinguished from the peace-offering, which were killed elsewhere.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Leviticus 4:26
“It shall be forgiven - Both judicially, as to all ecclesiastical censures or civil punishment; and really, upon condition of repentance and faith in the Messiah to come.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
When one of the common people sins
The chapter has come down from the high priest to any one of the common people, which the Hebrew calls the people of the land, and the provision is still open at the bottom. His animal is a female kid of the goats, the least valuable of the four the chapter names, and it buys the same word that the priest's bullock bought. Peter uses this chapter's own phrase at Acts 3:17, telling the men of Israel that through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers, and Luke 23:34 has Jesus asking the Father to forgive them on that ground.
Leviticus 4:27
“The common people - literally, as in the margin, “the people of the land.” Compare Lev 20:2, Lev 20:4; 2Ki 11:18. It was the ordinary designation of the people, as distinguished from the priests and the rulers.”
Leviticus 4:28
“A female - Which here was sufficient, because the sin of one of those was less than the sin of the ruler, for whom a male was required.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Verse 31 calls this offering a sweet savour unto the LORD. The phrase falls sixteen times in Leviticus and this is the only sin offering in the book that carries it, and it carries it over the smallest animal brought by the least of the four men named here. The same verse gives the man the whole formula, an atonement made for him and his sin forgiven.
Leviticus 4:29
“And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the sin offering,.... His right hand, as the Targum of Jonathan; not the priest that shall offer it, but the man that has sinned, that brings it, thereby confessing his sin, and transferring it to the sacrifice: and slay the sin offering in the place of the burnt offering; that is, on the north side of the altar.”
Leviticus 4:30
“And the priest shall take of the blood,.... So that all the preceding actions, the bringing the offering, the putting the hand upon the head of it, and slaying it, were done by the man that sinned; of this and what follows here and in the next verse Lev 4:31; see Gill on Lev 4:25, Lev 4:26.”
Leviticus 4:31
“That is certainly a very bad thing to make atonement for which so many innocent and useful creatures must be slain and mangled thus. To value Christ, the great and true sin-offering, whose blood cleanses from all sin, which it was not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away. Now, if any man sin, Christ is the propitiation ( 1 John ii.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
The chapter closes by giving the common man a choice nobody above him is given. He may bring a lamb in place of the goat, and John Gill records the observation from the Babylonian Talmud, in tractates Pesachim and Keritot compiled by about the sixth century, that Scripture usually names the lamb before the goat and names it after here, which was read to mean the two stand equal. The last words of the chapter are the words that closed the two cases before it, that the priest shall make an atonement for his sin that he hath committed, and it shall be forgiven him.
Leviticus 4:32
“And if he bring a lamb for a sin offering,.... As he might if he would; the Jews observe, that in all places a lamb is put before a goat, as being more excellent in its kind; but here it is mentioned after, which shows, they say, that they are equally alike (p): he shall bring it a female without blemish; typical of Christ the Lamb of God, without spot and without blemish, 1Pe 1:19. (p) T. Bab. Pesachim, fol. 57. 2. & Ceritot, fol. 28. 2.”
1 more voice on this verse
Leviticus 4:32
“A lamb - A sheep. See Lev 3:7 note. Three points are to be observed in regard to the victims for sin-offerings. (a) The common people had to offer a female, as the less valuable animaI; they might present either a sheep or a goat to suit their convenience: (b) the rulers had always to offer a male-goat: (c) the goat was preferred to the sheep, unlike the victim for a peace-offering or burnt-offering. The sin-offerings were not accompanied by meat-offerings or drink-offerings. See Num 15:3-11.”
Leviticus 4:33
“He shall lay his hand upon the head of the sin offering,.... On the head of the lamb, as on the head of the goat, even his right hand, as the above Targum, as before: and slay it for a sin offering, in the place where they kill the burnt offering: for if it was not slain for a sin offering, but for something else, or on any other account, as for a burnt offering, it was not right (q). (q) T. Bab. Zebachim, fol. 7. 1. & Menachot, fol. 4. 1.”
Leviticus 4:34
“And the priest shall take of the blood,.... See Gill on Lev 4:25, Lev 4:26.”
Leviticus 4:35
“Burn them - The fat; but he useth the plural number, because the fat was of several kinds, as we saw ver. 8, 9. upon the offerings, together with them, or after them; because the burnt- offerings were to have the first place.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
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Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Alfred Edersheim, The Temple: Its Ministry and Services; Andrew Bonar, A Commentary on Leviticus; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: The Pentateuch; Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Sir Robert Anderson, Types in Hebrews.