Parashat HaShavua: Pinchas

(39) You shall offer the one lamb in the morning, and you shall offer the other lamb at twilight.(40) There shall be a tenth of a measure of choice flour with a quarter of a hin of beaten oil mixed in, and a libation of a quarter hin of wine for one lamb;(41) and you shall offer the other lamb at twilight, repeating with it the meal offering of the morning with its libation—an offering by fire for a pleasing odor to the LORD,(42) a regular burnt offering throughout the generations, at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting before the LORD. For there I will meet with you, and there I will speak with you,(43) and there I will meet with the Israelites, and it shall be sanctified by My Presence.(44) I will sanctify the Tent of Meeting and the altar, and I will consecrate Aaron and his sons to serve Me as priests.

(1) עולת תמיד לדורותיכם, a daily recurring communal burnt offering throughout your generations.” This offering would be instituted daily after the Israelites had crossed the Jordan. Even though this has not been spelled out clearly, reason dictates that it was not an offering presented only in the desert or even only at the bottom of Mount Sinai. If it had been a one time offering, how would we understand the line: עולת תמיד העשויה בהר סיני, “the continual burnt offering offered at Mount Sinai?”We also have the statement by the prophet Amos in Amos 5,25: הזבחים ומנחה הגשתם לי במדבר ארבעים שנה בית ישראל, “the meat offerings and gift offering that you offered for Me for the forty years in the desert, house of Israel?” Where would the Israelites in the desert have taken the wine, oil, finely ground wheat flour, and all the four legged animals from while they had been in the desert, until the fortieth year completely apart from the people surrounding them? There were so many communal offerings on the Sabbaths, New Moons, festivals, in addition to the daily offerings! If you were to point to Moses telling Pharaoh that the Israelites were going to take all their livestock with them on their going to the desert for three days to offer sacrifices to their G-d (Exodus10,9) or when they complained about their livestock being thirsty, this was in the fortieth year after they had conquered the lands of Sichon and Og, and had captured a huge amount of livestock, which prompted Gad and Reuven to request to settle in that region permanently. Where would they have taken all these beasts from during the preceding 38 years? There certainly was no grass in the desert to have fed them!

(1) The LORD spoke to Moses, saying:(2) Command the Israelite people and say to them: Be punctilious in presenting to Me at stated times the offerings of food due Me, as offerings by fire of pleasing odor to Me.(3) Say to them: These are the offerings by fire that you are to present to the LORD: As a regular burnt offering every day, two yearling lambs without blemish.(4) You shall offer one lamb in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer at twilight.(5) And as a meal offering, there shall be a tenth of an ephah of choice flour with a quarter of a hin of beaten oil mixed in—(6) the regular burnt offering instituted at Mount Sinai—an offering by fire of pleasing odor to the LORD.

(2) Scripture tells us, according to the Version of Onkelos, that the Egyptians worshipped Aries, and therefore abstained from killing sheep, and held shepherds in contempt. Comp. "Behold we shall sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians," etc. (Exod. 8:26); "For every shepherd is an abomination to the Egyptians" (Gen. 46:34). Some sects among the Sabeans worshipped demons, and imagined that these assumed the form of goats, and called them therefore "goats" [se‘irim]. This worship was widespread. Comp. "And they shall no more offer their sacrifices unto demons, after whom they have gone a whoring" (Lev. 17:7). For this reason those sects abstained from eating goats' flesh. Most idolaters objected to killing cattle, holding this species of animals in great estimation. Therefore the people of Hodu [Indians] up to this day do not slaughter cattle even in those countries where other animals are slaughtered. In order to eradicate these false principles, the Law commands us to offer sacrifices only of these three kinds: "Ye shall bring your offering of the cattle [viz.], of the herd and of the flock" (Lev. 1:2). Thus the very act which is considered by the heathen as the greatest crime, is the means of approaching God, and obtaining His pardon for our sins. In this manner, evil principles, the diseases of the human soul, are cured by other principles which are diametrically opposite.

(11) On your new moons you shall present a burnt offering to the LORD: two bulls of the herd, one ram, and seven yearling lambs, without blemish.(12) As meal offering for each bull: three-tenths of a measure of choice flour with oil mixed in. As meal offering for each ram: two-tenths of a measure of choice flour with oil mixed in.(13) As meal offering for each lamb: a tenth of a measure of fine flour with oil mixed in. Such shall be the burnt offering of pleasing odor, an offering by fire to the LORD.(14) Their libations shall be: half a hin of wine for a bull, a third of a hin for a ram, and a quarter of a hin for a lamb. That shall be the monthly burnt offering for each new moon of the year.(15) And there shall be one goat as a sin offering to the LORD, to be offered in addition to the regular burnt offering and its libation.

(10) I will here call your attention to a very remarkable thing, although it does not seem at first thought to belong to our subject. It is only the goat brought on New-moon as a sin-offering that the law calls "a sin-offering unto the Lord" (Num. 28:15). The sin-offerings brought on the three festivals (ibid. vers. 22, 30; 29:5, 11, etc.) are not called so, nor are any other sin-offerings. The reason thereof is, according to my opinion, undoubtedly this: The additional offerings brought by the congregation at certain periods were all burnt-offerings; only "one kid of goats to make an atonement" was offered on every one of these exceptional days. The latter was eaten [by the priests], whilst the burnt-offerings were entirely consumed by fire, and are called "an offering made by fire unto the Lord." The phrases "a sin-offering unto the Lord" and "a peace-offering unto the Lord" do not occur in the law, because these were eaten by man; but even those sin-offerings that were entirely burnt (Lev. 4:12, 21) cannot be called "an offering made by fire unto the Lord," as will be explained in the course of this chapter. It is therefore impossible that the goats which are eaten [by the priests], and are not entirely burnt, should be called "sin-offerings unto the Lord." But as it was found that the kid offered on New-moon might be mistaken as an offering brought to the moon, in the manner of the Egyptians, who sacrificed to the moon on the days of New-moon, it was distinctly stated that this goat is offered in obedience to God's command, and not in honour of the moon. This fear did not apply to the sin-offerings on the Festivals, nor to any other sin-offering, because they were not offered on the days of New-moon, or on any other day marked out by Nature, but on such days as were selected by the Divine Will. Not so the days of New-moon: they are not fixed by the Law [but by Nature]. On the New-moon the idolaters sacrificed to the moon, in the same manner as they sacrificed to the sun when it rose and set in certain particular degrees. This is described in the works [mentioned above]. On this account the extraordinary phrase "A sin-offering unto the Lord" is exceptionally introduced in reference to the goat brought on New-moon, in order to remove the idolatrous ideas that were still lingering in the sorely diseased hearts. Note this exception likewise. A sin-offering which is brought in the hope to atone for one or more great sins, as, e.g., the sin-offering [of the Synhedrion or the high-priest] for a sin committed in ignorance, and the like, are not burnt upon the altar, but without the camp; upon the altar only the burnt-offering, and the like, are burnt, wherefore it was called the altar of the burnt-offering. The burning of the burnt offering, and of every "memorial," is called "a sweet savour unto the Lord"; and so it undoubtedly is, since it serves to remove idolatrous doctrines from our hearts, as we have shown. But the burning of these sin-offerings is a symbol that the sin [for which the offering is brought] is utterly removed and destroyed, like the body that is being burnt; of the sinful seed no trace shall remain, as no trace is left of the sin-offering, which is entirely destroyed by fire: the smoke thereof is not "a sweet savour unto the Lord," but, on the contrary, a smoke despised and abhorred. For this reason the burning took place without the camp. Similarly we notice that the oblations of a sotah is called "an offering of memorial, bringing iniquity to remembrance" (Num. 5:15); it is not a pleasing thing [to the Lord]. The goat [of the Day of Atonement] that was sent [into the wilderness] (Lev. 16:20, seq.) served as an atonement for all serious transgressions more than any other sin-offering of the congregation. As it thus seemed to carry off all sins, it was not accepted as an ordinary sacrifice to be slaughtered, burnt, or even brought near the Sanctuary; it was removed as far as possible, and sent forth into a waste, uncultivated, uninhabited land. There is no doubt that sins cannot be carried like a burden, and taken off the shoulder of one being to be laid on that of another being. But these ceremonies are of a symbolic character, and serve to impress men with a certain idea, and to induce them to repent; as if to say, we have freed ourselves of our previous deeds, have cast them behind our backs, and removed them from us as far as possible.

(6) The burnt offering shall be flayed and cut up into sections.(7) The sons of Aaron the priest shall put fire on the altar and lay out wood upon the fire;(8) and Aaron’s sons, the priests, shall lay out the sections, with the head and the suet, on the wood that is on the fire upon the altar.(9) Its entrails and legs shall be washed with water, and the priest shall turn the whole into smoke on the altar as a burnt offering, an offering by fire of pleasing odor to the LORD.

(3) ניחוח (of the root נוח, “to repose”, “to draw satisfaction from …”) — an odour of ניחוח: one that causes satisfaction to Me by the knowledge that I gave commands and that My will was executed (Sifra, Vayikra Dibbura d'Nedavah, Chapter 6 10; Zevachim 46b).

(1) And behold, in this verse the reason for the sacrifices is that they are "a fire offering with a pleasing odor to the Lord." But the Rambam said in the Guide for the Perplexed (3:46) that the reason for the sacrifices was for the sake of the Egyptians and Chaldeans, in whose lands Israel used to live and dwell, who would worship the bull and the sheep. Because the Egyptians worshipped a lamb, and the Chaldeans worshipped demons that appeared to them as goats. And the people of India to this day never slaughter a cow. For this reason (God) commanded to slaughter these three species in God's name to make known that the matter which (the pagans) thought of as the ultimate sin is what (the Israelites) will sacrifice to their Creator and their sins will be atoned for. For thus are bad beliefs healed, which are ailments of the soul, since every ailment and illness is healed through its opposite. These are his words and he continues at length. This is rubbish! They have healed a great fracture and a great difficulty lightly! The table of the Eternal is made polluted. (Malachi 1:12) For they are not only to remove [false beliefs] from the hearts of the wicked and fools of the world. Doesn't Scripture say that they are "food of the gift offering, for a pleasing odor?" (Leviticus 3:16) And also due to the idiocy of the Egyptians their illness won't be healed this way. Rather it would increase suffering, because the intention of the aforementioned wicked ones was to worship the constellations of the sheep and the ox, which have power, according to their thinking. And therefore they don't eat them in deference to their power and strength. But if they are slaughtered for the Revered Name, this would be an honor for them... Since the deeds of people are determined by thought, speech and action, God, may He be blessed, commanded that when he sins, he brings a sacrifice and place his hands upon him corresponding to the deed, and confess with his mouth corresponding to the speech, and burn the innards and the kidneys, as they are the instruments of thought and desire. And the limbs [of the sacrifice] correspond to the hands and feet of a person that does all of his work. And he sprinkles the blood on the altar corresponding to the blood of his soul, so that a person think in doing all of this that he sinned to God with his body and his soul, and it is fit for him that his blood be spilled and his body burnt; were it not for the kindness of the Creator, who took an exchange and ransom from him [in] the sacrifice - that its blood be instead of his blood and its soul be instead of his soul. And the central limbs correspond to his central limbs. And the portions with which to sustain the teachers of Torah [are so] that they will pray for him. And the daily sacrifice is because there is no saving the community from always sinning. And these words are tenable [and] grab the heart, like the words of classic homiletic teachings (Shabbat 87a). And in the way of truth (mysticism), the sacrifices contain a hidden secret...