Imamat 21:17

21:17 “Tell Aaron, ‘No man from your descendants throughout their generations ¹  who has a physical flaw ²  is to approach to present the food of his God.

Imamat 21:22

21:22 He may eat both the most holy and the holy food of his God,

Imamat 22:25

22:25 Even from a foreigner ³  you must not present the food of your God from such animals as these, for they are ruined and flawed; ⁴  they will not be acceptable for your benefit.’”

[21:17]  ¹ tn Heb “to their generations.”

[21:17]  ² tn Heb “who in him is a flaw”; cf. KJV, ASV “any blemish”; NASB, NIV “a defect.” The rendering “physical flaw” is used to refer to any birth defect or physical injury of the kind described in the following verses (cf. the same Hebrew word also in Lev 24:19-20). The same term is used for “flawed” animals, which must not be offered to the Lord in Lev 22:20-25.

[22:25]  ³ tn Heb “And from the hand of a son of a foreigner.”

[22:25]  ⁴ tn Heb “for their being ruined [is] in them, flaw is in them”; NRSV “are mutilated, with a blemish in them”; NIV “are deformed and have defects.” The MT term מָשְׁחָתָם (moshkhatam, “their being ruined”) is a Muqtal form (= Hophal participle) from שָׁחַת (shakhat, “to ruin”). Smr has plural בהם משׁחתים (“deformities in them”; cf. the LXX translation). The Qumran Leviticus scroll (11QpaleoLev) has תימ הם[…], in which case the restored participle would appear to be the same as Smr, but there is no בְּ (bet) preposition before the pronoun, yielding “they are deformed” (see D. N. Freedman and K. A. Mathews, The Paleo-Hebrew Leviticus Scroll, 41 and the remarks in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 358).