Exodus 23:19
in Exodus 23Bring the best of the firstfruits of your soil to the house of the LORD your God. You must not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
The first of the first-fruits of thy ground thou shalt bring into the house of Jehovah thy God. Thou shalt not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.
KJV
The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk.
⋯
This verse in Exodus 23
Commentary
6 notes on this verseOur physical nature rebels against the thought of making the nourishment of the living a garnish for the dead or the cause of life an accessory to the death of the body.
This site's exposition
The first of the firstfruits of thy land
The firstfruits go to the house of the LORD, which names a house that does not yet stand anywhere. The second half of the verse forbids seething a kid in his mother's milk, and it is repeated at 34:26 and at Deuteronomy 14:21 with no reason ever given for it. Jewish law builds the separation of meat and milk on that threefold repetition, in the Mishnah tractate Chullin and the Talmud that follows it, from roughly the second to the sixth century. Readers have also proposed a Canaanite rite behind the ban, and the Ugaritic text offered as evidence for it is disputed.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
Some of the Gentiles, at the end of their harvest, seethed a kid in it's dam's milk, and sprinkled that milk-pottage in a magical way upon their gardens and fields, to make them fruitful. But Israel must abhor such foolish customs. Is not this rather forbidden, as having some appearance of cruelty?
The first of the first fruits of thy land,....
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
The first of the firstfruits of thy land - The “best,” or “chief” of the firstfruits, that is, the two wave loaves described Lev 23:17. As the preceding precept appears to refer to the Passover, so it is likely that this refers to Pentecost. They are called in Leviticus, “the firstfruits unto the Load;” and it is reasonable that they should here be designated the “chief” of the firstfruits. If, with some, we suppose the precept to relate to the offerings of firstfruits in general, the command is a repetition of Exo 22:
Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk - This passage has greatly perplexed commentators; but Dr. Cudworth is supposed to have given it its true meaning by quoting a MS. comment of a Karaite Jew, which he met with, on this passage. “It was a custom of the ancient heathens, when they had gathered in all their fruits, to take a kid and boil it in the milk of its dam; and then, in a magical way, to go about and besprinkle with it all their trees and fields, gardens and orchards; thinking by these means to make them fruitful, that they might bring forth more abundantly in the following year.” - Cudworth on the Lord’s Supper, 4th. I give this comment as I find it, and add that Spenser has shown that the Zabii used this kind of magical milk to sprinkle their trees and fields, in order to make them fruitful. Others understand it of eating flesh and milk together; others of a lamb or a kid while it is sucking its mother, and that the paschal lamb is here intended, which it was not lawful to offer while sucking. After all the learned labor which critics have bestowed on this passage, and by which the obscurity in some cases is become more intense, the simple object of the precept seems to be this: “Thou shalt do nothing that may have any tendency to blunt thy moral feelings, or teach thee hardness of heart.” Even human nature shudders at the thought of causing the mother to lend her milk to seethe the flesh of her young one! We need go no farther for the delicate, tender, humane, and impressive meaning of this precept.
The words behind it
12 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| רֵאשִׁ֗ית | reshit | [the] beginning of | H7225 → | |
| בִּכּוּרֵי֙ | bikurei | [the] first-fruits of | H1061 → | 17 times |
| אַדְמָ֣תְךָ֔ | ʾadmatekha | ground your | H127 → | 225 times |
| תָּבִ֕יא | tavi' | you will bring | H935 → | 2568 times |
| בֵּ֖ית | beit | [the] house of | H1004 → | 2046 times |
| יְהוָ֣ה | yahweh | Yahweh | H3068 → | 6520 times |
| אֱלֹהֶ֑יךָ | ʾeloheikha | God your | H430 → | 2601 times |
| לֹֽא־ | lo'- | not | H3808 → | 5168 times |
| תְבַשֵּׁ֥ל | tevashel | you must boil | H1310 → | 28 times |
| גְּדִ֖י | gedi | a kid | H1423 → | |
| בַּחֲלֵ֥ב | bachalev | in [the] milk of | H2461 → | 44 times |
| אִמּֽוֹ׃ ס | ʾimo | mother its | H517 → | 220 times |
רֵאשִׁ֗ית[the] beginning of
reshitH7225 →
בִּכּוּרֵי֙[the] first-fruits of
bikureiH1061 →17 times
אַדְמָ֣תְךָ֔ground your
ʾadmatekhaH127 →225 times
תָּבִ֕יאyou will bring
tavi'H935 →2568 times
בֵּ֖ית[the] house of
beitH1004 →2046 times
יְהוָ֣הYahweh
yahwehH3068 →6520 times
אֱלֹהֶ֑יךָGod your
ʾeloheikhaH430 →2601 times
לֹֽא־not
lo'-H3808 →5168 times
תְבַשֵּׁ֥לyou must boil
tevashelH1310 →28 times
גְּדִ֖יa kid
gediH1423 →
בַּחֲלֵ֥בin [the] milk of
bachalevH2461 →44 times
אִמּֽוֹ׃ סmother its
ʾimoH517 →220 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Deuteronomy 14:21You are not to eat any carcass; you may give it to the foreigner residing within your gates, and he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner. For you are…
it leads to
- Exodus 34:26
Bring the best of the firstfruits of your soil to the house of the LORD your God. You must not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.”
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Leviticus 22:8
He must not eat anything found dead or torn by wild animals, which would make him unclean. I am the LORD.
- Exodus 34:26
Through
Nehemiah 10:35We will also bring the firstfruits of our land and of every fruit tree to the house of the LORD year by year.
it leads to
- Deuteronomy 26:2
you are to take some of the firstfruits of all your produce from the soil of the land that the LORD your God is giving you and put them in a basket. Then go…
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Deuteronomy 26:2
Through
Exodus 22:29You must not hold back offerings from your granaries or vats. You are to give Me the firstborn of your sons.
it leads to
- Exodus 13:2
“Consecrate to Me every firstborn male. The firstborn from every womb among the Israelites belongs to Me, both of man and beast.”
- Exodus 23:16
You are also to keep the Feast of Harvest with the firstfruits of the produce from what you sow in the field. And keep the Feast of Ingathering at the end of the year,…
- James 1:18
He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we would be a kind of firstfruits of His creation.
- Deuteronomy 26:2–10
you are to take some of the firstfruits of all your produce from the soil of the land that the LORD your God is giving you and put them in a basket. Then go…
- Proverbs 3:9–10
Honor the LORD with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your harvest;
- Exodus 13:2
Where this verse is studied
On this page
Studies1
About Exodus
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata Book 2; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament.