Laws concerning Offerings

151 Then the Lord told Moses, 2 "Give the following instructions to the people of Israel. "When you finally settle in the land I am giving you, 3 you will offer special gifts as a pleasing aroma to the Lord . These gifts may take the form of a burnt offering, a sacrifice to fulfill a vow, a voluntary offering, or an offering at any of your annual festivals, and they may be taken from your herds of cattle or your flocks of sheep and goats. 4 When you present these offerings, you must also give the Lord a grain offering of two quarts of choice flour mixed with one quart of olive oil. 5 For each lamb offered as a burnt offering or a special sacrifice, you must also present one quart of wine as a liquid offering. 6 "If the sacrifice is a ram, give a grain offering of four quarts of choice flour mixed with a third of a gallon of olive oil, 7 and give a third of a gallon of wine as a liquid offering. This will be a pleasing aroma to the Lord . 8 "When you present a young bull as a burnt offering or as a sacrifice to fulfill a vow or as a peace offering to the Lord, 9 you must also give a grain offering of six quarts of choice flour mixed with two quarts of olive oil, 10 and give two quarts of wine as a liquid offering. This will be a special gift, a pleasing aroma to the Lord . 11 "Each sacrifice of a bull, ram, lamb, or young goat should be prepared in this way. 12 Follow these instructions with each offering you present. 13 All of you native-born Israelites must follow these instructions when you offer a special gift as a pleasing aroma to the Lord . 14 And if any foreigners visit you or live among you and want to present a special gift as a pleasing aroma to the Lord, they must follow these same procedures. 15 Native-born Israelites and foreigners are equal before the Lord and are subject to the same decrees. This is a permanent law for you, to be observed from generation to generation. 16 The same instructions and regulations will apply both to you and to the foreigners living among you." 17 Then the Lord said to Moses, 18 "Give the following instructions to the people of Israel. "When you arrive in the land where I am taking you, 19 and you eat the crops that grow there, you must set some aside as a sacred offering to the Lord . 20 Present a cake from the first of the flour you grind, and set it aside as a sacred offering, as you do with the first grain from the threshing floor. 21 Throughout the generations to come, you are to present a sacred offering to the Lord each year from the first of your ground flour.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on Numbers 15:1-21

Commentary on Numbers 15:1-21

(Read Numbers 15:1-21)

Full instructions are given about the meat-offerings and drink-offerings. The beginning of this law is very encouraging, When ye come into the land of your habitation which I give unto you. This was a plain intimation that God would secure the promised land to their seed. It was requisite, since the sacrifices of acknowledgment were intended as the food of God's table, that there should be a constant supply of bread, oil, and wine, whatever the flesh-meat was. And the intent of this law is to direct the proportions of the meat-offering and drink-offering. Natives and strangers are placed on a level in this as in other like matters. It was a happy forewarning of the calling of the Gentiles, and of their admission into the church. If the law made so little difference between Jew and Gentile, much less would the gospel, which broke down the partition-wall, and reconciled both to God.