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The Festival of Harvest

15 “From the day after the Sabbath—the day you bring the bundle of grain to be lifted up as a special offering—count off seven full weeks. 16 Keep counting until the day after the seventh Sabbath, fifty days later. Then present an offering of new grain to the Lord. 17 From wherever you live, bring two loaves of bread to be lifted up before the Lord as a special offering. Make these loaves from four quarts of choice flour, and bake them with yeast. They will be an offering to the Lord from the first of your crops. 18 Along with the bread, present seven one-year-old male lambs with no defects, one young bull, and two rams as burnt offerings to the Lord. These burnt offerings, together with the grain offerings and liquid offerings, will be a special gift, a pleasing aroma to the Lord. 19 Then you must offer one male goat as a sin offering and two one-year-old male lambs as a peace offering.

20 “The priest will lift up the two lambs as a special offering to the Lord, together with the loaves representing the first of your crops. These offerings, which are holy to the Lord, belong to the priests. 21 That same day will be proclaimed an official day for holy assembly, a day on which you do no ordinary work. This is a permanent law for you, and it must be observed from generation to generation wherever you live.[a]

22 “When you harvest the crops of your land, do not harvest the grain along the edges of your fields, and do not pick up what the harvesters drop. Leave it for the poor and the foreigners living among you. I am the Lord your God.”

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Footnotes

  1. 23:21 This celebration, called the Festival of Harvest or the Festival of Weeks, was later called the Festival of Pentecost (see Acts 2:1). It is celebrated today as Shavuot (or Shabuoth).

New Meal Offerings

15 “Starting the day after the Sabbath, count for yourselves seven weeks from the day you brought the sheaf of the wave offering. They are to be complete. 16 Count fifty days to the day after the seventh Sabbath, then bring a new meal offering to the Lord. 17 Bring two loaves[a] of bread from home as wave offerings made from two tenths of fine flour baked with leaven as first fruits to the Lord. 18 Along with the loaves of bread, bring seven lambs (each of them[b] one year old and without defect), one young bull as an offering, and two rams as offerings to the Lord—along with your gift and drink offerings—and present them as an offering made by fire, a pleasing aroma to the Lord. 19 Prepare one male goat for a sin offering and two one year old rams for peace offerings. 20 Then the priest is to wave them—the two lambs with the bread of first fruits—as raised offerings in the Lord’s presence. They’ll be sacred to the Lord on account of the priest.

21 “On the same day, proclaim a sacred assembly for yourselves. You are not to do any servile work—and this is to be an eternal ordinance wherever you live throughout your generations. 22 Furthermore, when you harvest the produce of your land, you are not to harvest all the way to the corners of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and resident alien. I am the Lord your God.”

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Footnotes

  1. Leviticus 23:17 The Heb. lacks loaves
  2. Leviticus 23:18 The Heb. lacks each of them