Commentaria in Leviticum
Chapter 7. Synopsis of the Chapter
The law and rite of the victim for trespass is described, and, verse 11, of peace-victims, namely by whom and when each is to be eaten. Then, verse 23, God forbids the eating of the fat of victims and of all blood. Lastly, verse 30, of the peace-victim He assigns the breast and right shoulder to the sacrificing priest.
1. This also is the law of the victim for trespass, it is the holy of holies: 2. Therefore where the holocaust is immolated, the victim for trespass shall also be slain: its blood shall be poured round about the altar. 3. They shall offer of it the rump and the fat that covereth the entrails, 4. The two little kidneys, and the fat which is near the flanks, and the caul of the liver with the little kidneys; 5. And the priest shall burn them upon the altar: it is the burning of the Lord for trespass. 6. Every male of the priestly race shall eat of this flesh in the holy place, because it is the holy of holies. 7. As the victim is offered for sin, so is it also for trespass: the law of both victims shall be one: it shall belong to the priest that offereth it. 8. The priest that offereth the victim of holocaust shall have the skin thereof. 9. And every sacrifice of fine flour that is baked in the oven, and whatsoever is dressed on the gridiron, or in the frying-pan, shall be the priest’s that offereth it: 10. Whether they be tempered with oil, or dry, to all the sons of Aaron shall be given alike. 11. This is the law of the sacrifice of peace-offerings, which is offered to the Lord. 12. If the oblation be for thanksgiving, they shall offer loaves without leaven tempered with oil, and unleavened wafers anointed with oil, and fine flour fried, and cakes tempered and mixed with oil: 13. Also loaves of leavened bread with the sacrifice of thanksgiving, which is offered for peace-offerings: 14. Of which one shall be offered to the Lord for firstfruits, and shall be the priest’s that shall pour out the blood of the victim, 15. And the flesh shall be eaten the same day, neither shall any of it remain until the morning. 16. If any man by vow, or of his own accord, offer a sacrifice, it shall be eaten in like manner the same day: but if any of it remain until the morrow, it is lawful to eat it: 17. But whatsoever shall be found on the third day, the fire shall burn it. 18. If any man eat of the flesh of the victim of peace-offerings on the third day, the oblation shall be of no effect, neither shall it profit the offerer: yea rather, whatsoever soul shall defile itself with such meat shall be guilty of transgression. 19. The flesh that hath touched any unclean thing shall not be eaten, but shall be burnt with fire: he that is clean shall eat of it. 20. The soul that is defiled and eateth of the flesh of the peace-offerings, which was offered to the Lord, shall perish out of his people. 21. And he that shall touch the uncleanness of man, or of beast, or of any thing that can defile, and shall eat of such flesh, shall perish from among his people. 22. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 23. Speak to the children of Israel: You shall not eat the fat of sheep, nor of oxen, nor of goats. 24. The fat of a carcass that died of itself, and of that which was taken by a beast, you shall have for divers uses. 25. If any man eat the fat, which should be offered in burning to the Lord, he shall perish from among his people. 26. Moreover you shall not take for your food the blood of any creature whatsoever, whether of birds or of beasts. 27. Every soul that shall eat blood shall perish from among his people. 28. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 29. Say to the children of Israel: He that offereth the victim of his peace-offerings to the Lord, let him offer therewith a sacrifice, that is, the libations thereof. 30. He shall hold in his hands the fat of the victim, and the breast: and when he hath consecrated both to the Lord, he shall deliver them to the priest, 31. Who shall burn the fat upon the altar: but the breast shall be Aaron’s and his sons’. 32. The right shoulder also of the peace-offerings shall fall to the priest for firstfruits. 33. He among the sons of Aaron that offereth the blood and the fat, shall have also the right shoulder for his portion. 34. For the breast of elevation and the shoulder of separation I have taken of the children of Israel from off the victims of their peace-offerings, and have given them to Aaron the priest, and to his sons, by a law for ever, from all the people of Israel. 35. This is the anointing of Aaron and his sons in the ceremonies of the Lord, in the day when Moses offered them, that they might do the office of the priesthood, 36. And what the Lord commanded to be given them by the children of Israel, by a perpetual observance in their generations. 37. This is the law of the holocaust, and of the sacrifice for sin, and for trespass, and for consecration, and of the victims of peace-offerings, 38. Which the Lord appointed to Moses on mount Sinai, when he commanded the children of Israel to offer their oblations to the Lord in the desert of Sinai.
Verse 1. This also is the law of the victim for trespass.—Here is a grave difficulty, how the sacrifice for sin and the sacrifice for trespass are distinguished. Sin in Hebrew is called chattath; the Septuagint, hamartia; trespass in Hebrew is called asham; the Septuagint render it pleimmeleia. The Hebrews interpret sin to be that which is against affirmative precepts, which they assert to be in Holy Scripture as many as there are bones in the human body, namely 248; but trespass to be that which is against negative precepts, which they number as many as there are days in the year, namely 365. Both are enumerated severally by Genebrard at the end of the last edition of the Chronology. Second, conversely, St. Augustine here, Question 20, understands by sin the fault of commission, by trespass the fault of omission. So also St. Gregory, homily 21 on Ezechiel: “This is the difference between sin and trespass: that sin is to do evil, but trespass is to leave undone the good things which are above all to be held.” St. Gregory adds: “Or certainly sin is in deed, trespass in thought.” So also most more recent writers, as Lyranus, Abulensis, Isidore Clarius, Peter Serranus. Others distinguish them otherwise. But I say that sin, when distinguished from trespass (for often these two are taken for the same, as is plain from chapters 4, 5, 6), is that which is committed prudently and knowingly; trespass is that which is done ignorantly, namely through imprudence, forgetfulness, or even ignorance, especially of the law; as when one is ignorant of a law, or has forgotten it. This is proved, first, because Procopius here and St. Jerome on Ezechiel 40:39 distinguish them so, nay the Septuagint also in that place; for all these render trespass agnoia, that is, ignorance. Second, because so our interpreter renders, chapter 5, last verse, saying: “Because by mistake he offended (Hebrew asham) against the Lord.” Third, because the Septuagint here render trespass pleimmeleia, which is the same as if you said para melos, beside care, or amelia, that is, negligence, as some render it here: as when one through negligence is ignorant or forgetful of what the law prescribes, and what he himself ought to do. Fourth, because St. Augustine also brings this opinion.
You will object: How then did Moses, chapter 6, last verse, call the victim for the fault of the pontiff or of the whole people a victim for sin, when yet in chapter 4, verses 2, 3 and 13, he said this fault was ignorance?
I answer: He did it to show the gravity of the sin of the pontiff and of the whole people, and that the ignorance of those who ought to know the law and easily can, and who are bound to teach it to others, is to be held not as ignorance but as knowledge. Add that here and elsewhere sin is often confounded with trespass, and taken for the same.