THESE ARE THE regulations for the fellowship offering a person may present to the LORD:
12“‘If he offers it as an expression of thankfulness, then along with this thank offering he is to offer cakes of bread made without yeast and mixed with oil, wafers made without yeast and spread with oil, and cakes of fine flour well-kneaded and mixed with oil. 13Along with his fellowship offering of thanksgiving he is to present an offering with cakes of bread made with yeast. 14He is to bring one of each kind as an offering, a contribution to the LORD; it belongs to the priest who sprinkles the blood of the fellowship offerings. 15The meat of his fellowship offering of thanksgiving must be eaten on the day it is offered; he must leave none of it till morning.
16“‘If, however, his offering is the result of a vow or is a freewill offering, the sacrifice shall be eaten on the day he offers it, but anything left over may be eaten on the next day. 17Any meat of the sacrifice left over till the third day must be burned up. 18If any meat of the fellowship offering is eaten on the third day, it will not be accepted. It will not be credited to the one who offered it, for it is impure; the person who eats any of it will be held responsible.
19“‘Meat that touches anything ceremonially unclean must not be eaten; it must be burned up. As for other meat, anyone ceremonially clean may eat it. 20But if anyone who is unclean eats any meat of the fellowship offering belonging to the LORD, that person must be cut off from his people. 21If anyone touches something unclean—whether human uncleanness or an unclean animal or any unclean, detestable thing—and then eats any of the meat of the fellowship offering belonging to the LORD, that person must be cut off from his people.’”
22The LORD said to Moses, 23“Say to the Israelites: ‘Do not eat any of the fat of cattle, sheep or goats. 24The fat of an animal found dead or torn by wild animals may be used for any other purpose, but you must not eat it. 25Anyone who eats the fat of an animal from which an offering by fire may be made to the LORD must be cut off from his people. 26And wherever you live, you must not eat the blood of any bird or animal. 27If anyone eats blood, that person must be cut off from his people.’”
28The LORD said to Moses, 29“Say to the Israelites: ‘Anyone who brings a fellowship offering to the LORD is to bring part of it as his sacrifice to the LORD. 30With his own hands he is to bring the offering made to the LORD by fire; he is to bring the fat, together with the breast, and wave the breast before the LORD as a wave offering. 31The priest shall burn the fat on the altar, but the breast belongs to Aaron and his sons. 32You are to give the right thigh of your fellowship offerings to the priest as a contribution. 33The son of Aaron who offers the blood and the fat of the fellowship offering shall have the right thigh as his share. 34From the fellowship offerings of the Israelites, I have taken the breast that is waved and the thigh that is presented and have given them to Aaron the priest and his sons as their regular share from the Israelites.’”
35This is the portion of the offerings made to the LORD by fire that were allotted to Aaron and his sons on the day they were presented to serve the LORD as priests. 36On the day they were anointed, the LORD commanded that the Israelites give this to them as their regular share for the generations to come.
37These, then, are the regulations for the burnt offering, the grain offering, the sin offering, the guilt offering, the ordination offering and the fellowship offering, 38which the LORD gave Moses on Mount Sinai on the day he commanded the Israelites to bring their offerings to the LORD, in the Desert of Sinai.
Original Meaning
FOLLOWING SUPPLEMENTARY INSTRUCTIONS regarding most holy sacrifices, which may only be eaten by priests, 7:11–36 regulates use of other meat by laypersons as well as priests. This section divides itself into several subsections:
Lay consumption of well-being offerings (vv. 11–21)
General prohibition against consuming fat or blood (vv. 22–27)
Priestly portions (vv. 28–36)
We will consider each of these subsections in order.
Lay consumption of well-being offerings. Although 7:11–21 falls within the major block of supplementary instructions addressed to the priests, we can assume that the priests were responsible for sharing such knowledge with the people. In later books, priests were to be custodians and teachers of torah, divine instruction (2 Chron. 15:3; cf. Ezek. 7:26; 22:26; Hos. 4:6; Hag. 2:11; Mal. 2:7).
The motivation of thanksgiving affects a well-being offering in a way that is not specified in chapter 3. Along with a “sacrifice of thanksgiving” (zebaḥ todah, NASB), a person must offer special grain items (7:12–13), aside from the usual grain and wine accompaniments specified in Numbers 15:1–12. After giving one of each kind of cake or wafer as a “contribution [terumah, that which is removed, i.e., set apart] to the LORD” (Lev. 7:14), to be utilized by the officiating priest rather than burned on the altar, the offerer can eat the rest. The text does not specify the total number of cakes or wafers belonging to each kind, which allows for the offerer to share his or her thanksgiving feast with any number of other people.
While thank offerings must be eaten on the day they are offered, the rule for votive and freewill offerings is more flexible in that they can be eaten the next day as well (7:15–16). However, anything left over to the third day must be incinerated (v. 17). The offerer is responsible for making sure that neither he nor she nor anyone else (e.g., a guest) desecrates the meat, which is still holy even though it has reached the limit of its ritual function (cf. 4:7, 11–12, 18, 20; 16:27), by transgressing the time limit through eating it on the third day. Such a violation retroactively invalidates the benefit of the entire sacrifice for the offerer and brings the person who eats under divine condemnation because it is “impure” meat (piggul; v. 18).1
Verses 19–21 state additional restrictions on consumption of well-being offering meat for the sake of preserving its sanctity: Meat defiled by contact with impurity is forbidden, and ritually impure persons are not permitted to eat sacrificial flesh. Violation of the latter prohibition is a serious one, judging from repetition of the penalty in verses 20–21 and its severity: “cut off from his people.” These are the first instances of the divine penalty of “cutting off” (root krt) in Leviticus. It is a fate that goes beyond death, which explains why a person who is stoned for Molech worship can be “cut off” by God as well (e.g., 20:2–3).2 Impurity must not defile holiness!
General prohibition against consuming fat or blood. With the earlier directions for well-being offerings came the general rule: “All fat is the LORD’s . . . you must not eat any fat or any blood” (3:16b–17; NRSV). Leviticus 7:22–27 reiterates and expands this. The prohibition of consuming suet/fat applies to sacrificeable species even if such an animal dies from something other than slaughter by a human being (7:23–25). Because all suet of such animals belongs to God,3 for a human being to consume it constitutes sacrilege, which is punishable by being cut off (7:25).
The prohibition of eating blood, that is, meat from which the blood is not drained out at the time of slaughter, is not restricted to sacrificeable species. This command has its roots much earlier than the Israelite sacrificial system in the instructions that God gave to Noah when he permitted him and his family to eat meat, but not blood, after the Flood (Gen. 9:3–4). The blood prohibition applies to any bird or land animal (Lev. 7:26–27), but not fish. Notice that neither Leviticus 3 nor 7 says that “all blood is the LORD’s.” While sacrificial suet is consumed by the Lord’s fire, he does not utilize the blood in this way.4
Priestly portions. The priestly portions of a well-being offering consists of (1) the breast, which must be dedicated by means of a ritual gesture—“raised [Hiphil of nwp; not ‘waved’] as an elevation offering [tenupah, from root nwp] before the LORD” (v. 30, NRSV; cf. v. 34)—and (2) the right thigh, which is dedicated without a ritual gesture simply by setting it apart as a “contribution” (terumah; vv. 32, 34; cf. v. 14).5
Verses 37–38 conclude the first major portion of the book of Leviticus: chapters 1–7, which provide prescriptive rules governing performance of sacrifices. This summary lists types of sacrifices in the order of their treatment in 6:8–7:36, but inserts “the ordination offering” (milluʾim) before the wellbeing offering (7:37). The ordination offering is part of the complex of rituals through which the priests are consecrated for their function as the Lord’s special agents (Ex. 29; Lev. 8).
Bridging Contexts
GENEROUS THANKSGIVING. A well-being offering for thanksgiving was special. Unlike votive or freewill offerings, it was to be eaten the same day, and it was accompanied by special grain offerings (7:12–17). Thus, it was similar to the ordination offering of the priests (Ex. 29:2–3, 23–25; Lev. 8:26–28) and the concluding well-being offering of the holy Nazirite (Num. 6:14–15, 17, 19–20).
For the Lord’s extravagant goodwill, thanksgiving calls for “generous” tokens of appreciation at times when his people can best afford them. Compare the fact that the Festival of Booths, observed in the autumn at the end of the harvest season (23:39), involved grateful rejoicing before the Lord (23:40) that resulted in far more sacrifices than any other festival (Num. 29:12–38). Similarly, the Pilgrims opulently celebrated the first American Thanksgiving at Plymouth, Massachusetts, when they brought in their harvest.
A thank offering was voluntary, but a person who chose to give it was required to do it up in the correct manner. While the Lord made sacrifices accessible to everyone (1:14–17; 5:7–13), his people were not to treat him shabbily.
Gratitude to God can be contagious because it begets generosity to others, which inspires their gratitude and consequent generosity, and so on (cf. 2 Cor. 9:10–11). An Israelite who offered a thank offering would have more food than he or she could eat in one day, and eating leftovers the next day was not permitted (Lev. 7:15). Since delicacies like this were too valuable to throw away, there was only one thing to do: have a party! In this way, the Lord set up opportunities for generously sharing his blessings and testifying to his goodness. Invitees would be affected by gratitude, at the very least for good food.
There is a sense in which the Christian Lord’s Supper/communion service is analogous to a thank offering as an occasion for fostering unity through communal gratitude to God for his incomparable generosity:
Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf. (1 Cor. 10:16–17)
Guarding the difference. Outside the context of purification offerings (see comments on 6:27–28), the Israelites were not permitted to bring the categories of holiness and impurity together (e.g., 7:20–21). One of the most important functions of the priests was to guard and teach the people distinctions between things that were holy versus common/profane and pure versus impure (Lev. 10:10–11; Ezek. 22:26), so that they would know and respect the difference between God and themselves. Even though he condescended to dwell among them in a quasi-human dwelling with a table, lampstand, and incense burner, he was not like them. He did not sit on a throne/chair in the Most Holy Place but hovered above and between the cherubim over the ark of the covenant (Ex. 25:22; Num. 7:89). He did not consume food in a human manner but received it in the form of smoke at the outer altar (Num. 28:2).
It was crucial for God’s people to keep in mind the transcendence of their resident deity because their only hope lay in trusting his superior character, power, and wisdom for guidance, sustenance, and protection. As we will find repeatedly illustrated in the book of Numbers, the moment God’s greatness was diminished or forgotten in the people’s estimation, they were in serious trouble. When they stopped looking up to him as their standard and support, they would look to themselves, from whence came no help.
Contemporary Significance
JOYFUL LONGING AND DEPENDENCE. Well-being offerings were occasions of joy, but as slain offerings, they pointed beyond themselves to a cost of ultimate joy in the future. Thus they enacted the concept expressed by C. S. Lewis: “All joy (as distinct from mere pleasure, still more amusement) emphasizes our pilgrim status; always reminds, beckons, awakens desire. Our best havings are wantings.”6 Our joy is faith in greater joy to come. Henri Nouwen poignantly sketches this reality:
Our life is a short time in expectation, a time in which sadness and joy kiss each other at every moment. There is a quality of sadness that pervades all the moments of our life. It seems that there is no such thing as a clear-cut pure joy, but that even in the most happy moments of our existence we sense a tinge of sadness. In every satisfaction, there is an awareness of limitations. In every success, there is the fear of jealousy. Behind every smile, there is a tear. In every embrace, there is loneliness. In every friendship, distance. And in all forms of light, there is the knowledge of surrounding darkness. . . . But this intimate experience in which every bit of life is touched by a bit of death can point us beyond the limits of our existence. It can do so by making us look forward in expectation to the day when our hearts will be filled with perfect joy, a joy that no one shall take away from us.7
Although well-being offerings did not expiate for sinful actions, their blood nevertheless served to ransom the lives of those who offered them (17:11), reminding us that even our ability to effectively express joy in worship is dependent on Christ and his sacrifice. It can be said that through Christ, the Well-Being Offering, “I asked God for all things, that I might enjoy life. God gave life, that I might enjoy all things.”8
We need Christ for joyful worship because all of our communication with heaven is dependent on him. As the divine “Word” who “became flesh” (John 1:1–5, 14), he serves as “Jacob’s ladder,” a highway of interaction between heaven and earth (1:51; cf. Gen. 28:12). Without him and the priestly mediation bought by his sacrifice, we would have no access to God. Even the prayers of the saints (i.e., “holy ones”) need the mediation of holy incense to accompany them as they come up before God in his heavenly temple (Rev. 8:3).
Material support for intangible ministry. At the Israelite sanctuary, priests who carried out spiritual transactions for their people received various kinds of “agents’ commissions” from God. This system was necessary because only the Aaronic priests were authorized to officiate at the altar and inside the sacred Tent, and they needed a source of livelihood.
In the New Testament, only Christ is qualified by the unique sacrifice of himself for a new kind of Melchizedek (“King of Righteousness”) priesthood in God’s heavenly temple (Heb. 7, citing Ps. 110). Now instead of praying horizontally toward the place of an altar at the sanctuary/temple in Jerusalem (e.g., 1 Kings 8:30, 35; Dan. 6:10), Christians are invited to pray vertically to the place where Christ, our high priest, is always available to make intercession for us (Heb. 7:25). Our prayers go ballistic to the throne of grace, the control center of the universe (4:14–16; cf. Rev. 4–5).
Christian ministers are not priests who receive portions of sacrifices for which their mediation is necessary to carry out spiritual transactions with God. So in the sense of access to God, the New Testament rules out an earthly Christian priesthood consisting of human priests. Nevertheless, Christian ministers do contribute some vital services that the Israelite priests provided, such as leadership in worship and discipline and teaching people how to live in holiness and purity. Christ affirmed the value of these services: When he instructed his disciples before sending them out to serve others, he told them that they should justly expect to be supported by those who benefited from their ministry (Matt. 10:10; Luke 10:7). Paul also taught that insofar as ministers of the gospel provide real benefit through their efforts, they deserve material support for their ministry even though it is spiritual and therefore intangible (1 Cor. 9:4–11; cf. 1 Tim. 5:18).