Leviticus 7:8 - On the noun אִישׁ

(The above rendering comes from the RJPS translation, an adaptation of the NJPS translation. Before accounting for this rendering, I will analyze the plain sense of the Hebrew term אִישׁ, by employing a situation-oriented construal as outlined in this introduction, pp. 11–16.)

Prototypically, the situating noun אִישׁ labels an essential party whose involvement defines the situation of interest. At the same time, by regarding its referent in terms of the overall situation, אִישׁ directs our attention to that situation.

Here, the presence of אִישׁ carries out its prototypical function. It clarifies that this burnt offering is someone else’s, rather than the priest’s own. This additional participant is essential for the reason given by the commentator Arnold Ehrlich (מקרא כפשוטו 1899:218):

להוציא כהן המקריב עולת עצמו

This specification is needed to exclude the priest’s own offering,

שאין עורה לו.

for he cannot keep its hide.

That is, when the priest offers his own sacrifice, keeping the creature’s hide would be an unethical form of self-dealing. A burnt offering is meant to be an unstinting gift to the Deity.

(According to Jacob Milgrom [1991:411], Ehrlich’s German-language commentary Randglossen explains further that for the priest’s own offering, the entire animal would be burned, including the hide, just as in the case of the priest’s cereal offering in 6:15.)

(If אִישׁ merely meant an “adult male”—as a simplistic reading of biblical dictionaries might imply—then the priest’s offering would not be excluded, for he is obviously an adult male. And such a reading would yield a rather uninformative verse.)

Other biblical usages of singular אִישׁ to introduce an additional party as constitutive of the depicted situation (often rendered with terms like “another…” or “someone else”) include: Gen 31:50; 41:38; 45:1; Exod 2:12; 12:44; 34:3; Lev 16:21; 19:20; 20:10 (2nd instance); Num 5:13; 19:9, 18; Deut 19:16; Josh 10:14; Judg 16:19; 1 Sam 2:25 (2nd instance); 10:22; 12:4; 2 Sam 17:18; 18:26 (2nd instance); 21:4; 2 Kgs 12:5 (2nd instance); Isa 3:5 (2nd instance); Ezek 18:8 (2nd instance); Ps 49:17; Prov 20:5; Est 1:8. Nearly all of these cases employ the bare noun.

Regarding gender implications, here אִישׁ is used to refer to a category of persons, rather than a specific individual. Such references, by their nature, do not exclude women from their scope (Stein 2008; Stein 2013). In terms of societal norms, both men and women are in view as bringers of sacrificial offerings (see my comment at 1:3). Thus we have no warrant to translate in gendered terms.

As for rendering into English, the NJPS “a man’s” nowadays restricts gender unduly. The revised rendering conveys the function of אִישׁ in a gender-inclusive manner.