Sin Offering: the Priest and the Congregation
1 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘If anyone sins unintentionally, in any of the things which Yahweh has commanded not to be done, and does any one of them, 3 if the anointed priest sins so as to bring guilt on the people, then let him offer for his sin which he has sinned a young bull without defect to Yahweh for a sin offering. 4 He shall bring the bull to the door of the Tent of Meeting before Yahweh; and he shall lay his hand on the head of the bull, and kill the bull before Yahweh. 5 The anointed priest shall take some of the blood of the bull, and bring it to the Tent of Meeting. 6 The priest shall dip his finger in the blood, and sprinkle some of the blood seven times before Yahweh, before the veil of the sanctuary. 7 The priest shall put some of the blood on the horns of the altar of sweet incense before Yahweh, which is in the Tent of Meeting; and he shall pour out the rest of the blood of the bull at the base of the altar of burnt offering, which is at the door of the Tent of Meeting. 8 He shall take all the fat of the bull of the sin offering from it: the fat that covers the innards, and all the fat that is on the innards, 9 and the two kidneys, and the fat that is on them, which is by the loins, and the cover on the liver, with the kidneys, he shall remove, 10 as it is removed from the bull of the sacrifice of peace offerings. The priest shall burn them on the altar of burnt offering. 11 He shall carry the bull’s skin, all its meat, with its head, and with its legs, its innards, and its dung 12 —all the rest of the bull—outside of the camp to a clean place where the ashes are poured out, and burn it on wood with fire. It shall be burned where the ashes are poured out. 13 “‘If the whole congregation of Israel sins, and the thing is hidden from the eyes of the assembly, and they have done any of the things which Yahweh has commanded not to be done, and are guilty; 14 when the sin in which they have sinned is known, then the assembly shall offer a young bull for a sin offering, and bring it before the Tent of Meeting. 15 The elders of the congregation shall lay their hands on the head of the bull before Yahweh; and the bull shall be killed before Yahweh. 16 The anointed priest shall bring some of the blood of the bull to the Tent of Meeting. 17 The priest shall dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle it seven times before Yahweh, before the veil. 18 He shall put some of the blood on the horns of the altar which is before Yahweh, that is in the Tent of Meeting; and the rest of the blood he shall pour out at the base of the altar of burnt offering, which is at the door of the Tent of Meeting. 19 All its fat he shall take from it, and burn it on the altar. 20 He shall do this with the bull; as he did with the bull of the sin offering, so he shall do with this; and the priest shall make atonement for them, and they shall be forgiven. 21 He shall carry the bull outside the camp, and burn it as he burned the first bull. It is the sin offering for the assembly.
The offering is for sin nobody meant to commit, and the two heaviest cases are a priest and the whole nation.
The category is defined in the second verse and the qualifier governs the chapter: if anyone sins unintentionally Leviticus 4:2.
That is a strange thing for a legal system to begin with. The offense being provided for is one nobody chose. A man broke a commandment without knowing it, and the law's first response is not to excuse him but to give him a way of dealing with it.
What lies behind that is a view of guilt as something real rather than something felt. A wrong done in ignorance is still done; the ignorance affects the culpability and not the fact. And the practical consequence runs the other way from what a reader expects — because the sinner does not know, the discovery is what triggers the remedy: when the sin in which they have sinned is known Leviticus 4:14.
The chapter then works down a ladder of four, and the ranking is by responsibility rather than by rank.
First the anointed priest, and the reason his offering is a bull is given: he sins so as to bring guilt on the people Leviticus 4:3. His fault is costed at the highest rate because it does not stay with him. A man who represents others contaminates what he represents.
Second, the whole congregation — and its offering is also a bull Leviticus 4:14. A nation can be guilty of something none of its members noticed, and the case assumes it: the thing is hidden from the eyes of the assembly.
For both of these, the blood goes further than in any ordinary offering. It is sprinkled seven times before the veil of the sanctuary Leviticus 4:6 and put on the horns of the incense altar inside the holy place. Sin at that level has reached inside the tent, and the remedy has to be taken in after it.
And the carcass is not eaten. It is carried outside the camp and burned Leviticus 4:21 — the one disposal in the system that removes the animal entirely from the place where people live. A New Testament argument turns on that detail, noting that the bodies whose blood is brought into the sanctuary are burned outside, and applying it to a death outside a city gate Hebrews 13:11–12.
The result is stated in the plainest words in the chapter: the priest shall make atonement for them, and they shall be forgiven Leviticus 4:20.
settled What this mark means