Imamat 23:15-21

The Festival of Weeks

23:15 “‘You must count for yourselves seven weeks from the day after the Sabbath, from the day you bring the wave offering sheaf; they must be complete weeks. ¹  23:16 You must count fifty days – until the day after the seventh Sabbath – and then ²  you must present a new grain offering to the Lord. 23:17 From the places where you live you must bring two loaves of ³  bread for a wave offering; they must be made from two tenths of an ephah of fine wheat flour, baked with yeast, ⁴  as first fruits to the Lord. 23:18 Along with the loaves of bread, ⁵  you must also present seven flawless yearling lambs, ⁶  one young bull, ⁷  and two rams. ⁸  They are to be a burnt offering to the Lord along with their grain offering ⁹  and drink offerings, a gift of a soothing aroma to the Lord. ¹⁰  23:19 You must also offer ¹¹  one male goat ¹²  for a sin offering and two yearling lambs for a peace offering sacrifice, 23:20 and the priest is to wave them – the two lambs ¹³  – along with the bread of the first fruits, as a wave offering before the Lord; they will be holy to the Lord for the priest.

23:21 “‘On this very day you must proclaim an assembly; it is to be a holy assembly for you. ¹⁴  You must not do any regular work. This is a perpetual statute in all the places where you live throughout your generations. ¹⁵ 

Imamat 23:39-43

23:39 “‘On ¹⁶  the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you gather in the produce of the land, you must celebrate a pilgrim festival of the Lord for seven days. On the first day is a complete rest and on the eighth day is complete rest. 23:40 On the first day you must take for yourselves branches from majestic trees ¹⁷  – palm branches, branches of leafy trees, and willows of the brook – and you must rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days. 23:41 You must celebrate it as a pilgrim festival to the Lord for seven days in the year. This is a perpetual statute throughout your generations; ¹⁸  you must celebrate it in the seventh month. 23:42 You must live in temporary shelters ¹⁹  for seven days; every native citizen in Israel must live in temporary shelters, 23:43 so that your future generations may know that I made the Israelites live in temporary shelters when I brought them out from the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.’”

[23:15]  ¹ tn Heb “seven Sabbaths, they shall be complete.” The disjunctive accent under “Sabbaths” precludes the translation “seven complete Sabbaths” (as NASB, NIV; cf. NAB, NRSV, NLT). The text is somewhat awkward, which may explain why the LXX tradition is confused here, either adding “you shall count” again at the end of the verse, or leaving out “they shall be,” or keeping “they shall be” and adding “to you.”

[23:16]  ² tn Heb “and.” In the translation “then” is supplied to clarify the sequence.

[23:17]  ³ tc Smr, LXX, Syriac, Tg. Onq., and Tg. Ps.-J. insert the word חַלּוֹת (khallot, “loaves”; cf. Lev 2:4 and the note there). Even though “loaves” is not explicit in the MT, the number “two” suggests that these are discrete units, not just a measure of flour, so “loaves” should be assumed even in the MT.

[23:17]  ⁴ tn Heb “with leaven.” The noun “leaven” is traditional in English versions (cf. KJV, ASV, NASB, NRSV), but “yeast” is more commonly used today.

[23:18]  ⁵ tn Heb “And you shall present on the bread.”

[23:18]  ⁶ tn Heb “seven flawless lambs, sons of a year.”

[23:18]  ⁷ tn Heb “and one bull, a son of a herd.”

[23:18]  ⁸ tc Smr and LXX add “flawless.”

[23:18]  ⁹ tn Heb “and their grain offering.”

[23:18]  ¹⁰ sn See the note on Lev 1:9.

[23:19]  ¹¹ tn Heb “And you shall make.”

[23:19]  ¹² tn Heb “a he-goat of goats.”

[23:20]  ¹³ tn Smr and LXX have the Hebrew article on “lambs.” The syntax of this verse is difficult. The object of the verb (two lambs) is far removed from the verb itself (shall wave) in the MT, and the preposition עַל (’al, “upon”), rendered “along with” in this verse, is also added to the far removed subject (literally, “upon [the] two lambs”; see B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 159). It is clear, however, that the two lambs and the loaves (along with their associated grain and drink offerings) constituted the “wave offering,” which served as the prebend “for the priest.” Burnt and sin offerings (vv. 18-19a) were not included in this (see Lev 7:11-14, 28-36).

[23:21]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “And you shall proclaim [an assembly] in the bone of this day; a holy assembly it shall be to you” (see the remarks in B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 160, and the remarks on the LXX rendering in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 367).

[23:21]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “for your generations.”

[23:39]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Surely on the fifteenth day.” The Hebrew adverbial particle אַךְ (’akh) is left untranslated by most recent English versions; however, cf. NASB “On exactly the fifteenth day.”

[23:40]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “fruit of majestic trees,” but the following terms and verses define what is meant by this expression. For extensive remarks on the celebration of this festival in history and tradition see B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 163; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 389-90; and P. J. Budd, Leviticus (NCBC), 328-29.

[23:41]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “for your generations.”

[23:42]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “in the huts” (again at the end of this verse and in v. 43), perhaps referring to temporary shelters (i.e., huts) made of the foliage referred to in v. 40 (J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 389).