translation_id: net-engnet

book_id: LEV

label: NET translator note

text: The complex wording of vv. 3-4 requires stating “blood guilt” at the beginning of v. 3 even though it is not mentioned until the middle of v. 4 . The Hebrew text has simply “blood,” but in this case it refers to the illegitimate shedding of animal blood, similar to the shedding of the blood of an innocent human being ( Deut 19:10 , etc.). In order for it to be legitimate the animal must be slaughtered at the tabernacle and its blood handled by the priests in the prescribed way (see, e.g., Lev 1:5; 3:2, 17; 4:5-7; 7:26-27 , etc.; cf. vv. 10-16 below for more details).


text: Heb “Man man.” The reduplication is way of saying “any man” (cf. Lev 15:2; 22:18 , etc.). See the note on Lev 15:2 .


text: The original LXX adds “or the sojourners who sojourn in your midst” (cf. Lev 16:29 , etc., and note esp. 17:8, 10, and 13 below).


text: Heb “or who slaughters from outside to the camp.”


text: Smr and LXX add after “tent of meeting” the following: “to make it a burnt offering or a peace offering to the Lord for your acceptance as a soothing aroma, and slaughters it outside, and at the doorway of the tent of meeting has not brought it.”


label: NET textual note

text: Smr includes the suffix “it,” which is needed in any case in the translation to conform to English style.


text: Heb “So that which.”


text: Heb “on the faces of the field.”


text: For the translation “splash” see the note on Lev 1:5 .


text: The LXX adds “all around” (i.e., Hebrew סָבִיב [ saviv , “all around”]), which is normal for this overall construction (see, e.g., Lev 1:5; 3:8 , etc.).


text: Heb “sacrifice.” This has been translated as “offer” for stylistic reasons to avoid the redundancy of “sacrifice their sacrifices.”


text: On “goat demons” of the desert regions see the note on Lev 16:8 .


text: Heb “which they are committing harlotry after them.”


text: Heb “for your generations.”


text: Heb “Man, man.” The repetition of the word “man” is distributive, meaning “any [or “every”] man” (GKC 395-96 §123. c ; cf. Lev 15:2 ).


text: Heb “and.” Here the Hebrew conjunction ו ( vav , “and”) has an alternative sense (“or”).


text: Heb “from the sojourner who sojourns.”


text: The LXX, Syriac, and Vulgate have “your” (plural) rather than “their.”


text: Heb “causes to go up.”


text: Heb “to make it,” meaning “to make the sacrifice.”


text: For remarks on the “cut off” penalty see the note on v. 4 above.


text: Heb “And man, man.” The repetition of the word “man” is distributive, meaning “any (or every) man” (GKC 395-96 §123. c ; cf. Lev 15:2 ).


text: Heb “I will give my faces against [literally “in”] the soul/person/life [ נֶפֶשׁ , nefesh , feminine] who eats the blood and I will cut it [i.e., that נֶפֶשׁ , nefesh ] off from the midst of its people.” The uses of נֶפֶשׁ in this and the following verse are most significant for the use of animal blood in Israel’s sacrificial system. Unfortunately, it is a most difficult word to translate accurately and consistently, and this presents a major problem for the rendering of these verses (see, e.g., G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 244-45). No matter which translation of נֶפֶשׁ one uses here, it is important to see that both man and animal have נֶפֶשׁ and that this נֶפֶשׁ is identified with the blood. See the further remarks on v. 11 below. On the “cutting off” penalty see the note on v. 4 above. In this instance, God takes it on himself to “cut off” the person (i.e., extirpation).


text: 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.”


text: 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). 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. 11 a) 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. 11 a), 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. 11 b). See the detailed remarks and literature cited in R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:693-95, 697-98.


text: Heb “And I myself have given it to you.”


text: 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.


text: Heb “all/any person from you shall not eat blood.”


text: Heb “and the sojourner, the one sojourning in your midst, shall not eat blood.”


text: A few medieval Hebrew mss , Smr, and Tg. Ps.-J. have “from the house of Israel” as in vv. 3, 8, and 10 , but the LXX agrees with the MT.


text: The LXX, Syriac, Vulgate, and certain mss of Smr have “your” (plural) rather than “their” (cf. v. 10 above).


text: Heb “[wild] game of animal.”


text: That is, it must be a clean animal, not an unclean animal (cf. ).


text: Heb “for the life/soul ( נֶפֶשׁ , nefesh) of all flesh, its blood in its life/soul ( נֶפֶשׁ ) it is.” The LXX, Syriac, and Vulgate leave out “in its life/soul,” which would naturally yield “for the life of all flesh, its blood it is” (see J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 261, 263). The present translation is something of an oversimplification, but the meaning is basically the same in any case. Cf. NRSV “For the life of every creature – its blood is its life.”


text: Heb “of all flesh” (also later in this verse). See the note on “every living thing” in v. 11 .


text: Heb “And any soul” ( נֶפֶשׁ , nefesh ).


text: Heb “carcass,” referring to the carcass of an animal that has died on its own, not the carcass of an animal slaughtered for sacrifice or killed by wild beasts. This has been clarified in the translation by supplying the phrase “of natural causes”; cf. NAB “that died of itself”; TEV “that has died a natural death.”


text: Heb “in the native or in the sojourner.”


text: The words “his clothes” are not in the Hebrew text, but are repeated in the translation for clarity.


text: Heb “and he shall bear his iniquity.” The rendering “bear the punishment for the iniquity” reflects the use of the word “iniquity” to refer to the punishment for iniquity. This is sometimes referred to as the consequential use of the term (cf. Lev 5:17; 7:18; 10:17 ; etc.). sn For the interpretation of this verse reflected in the present translation, see the remarks on Lev 5:1 in J. Milgrom, Leviticus (AB), 1:292-97.