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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).

15 (A)You shall also count for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath, from the day when you brought in the sheaf of the wave offering; there shall be seven complete Sabbaths. 16 You shall count fifty days to the day after the seventh Sabbath; then you shall present a (B)new grain offering to the Lord. 17 You shall bring in from your dwelling places two loaves of bread as a wave offering, made of [a]two-tenths of an ephah; they shall be of a fine flour, baked (C)with leaven as first fruits to the Lord. 18 Along with the bread you shall present seven one-year-old male lambs without defect, and a bull of the herd and two rams; they are to be a burnt offering to the Lord, with their grain offering and their drink offerings, an offering by fire of a soothing aroma to the Lord. 19 You shall also offer (D)one male goat as a [b]sin offering, and two male lambs one year old as a sacrifice of peace offerings. 20 The priest shall then wave them with the bread of the first fruits as a wave offering with two lambs before the Lord; they are to be holy to the Lord for the priest. 21 On this very day you shall (E)make a proclamation as well; you are to have a holy convocation. You shall do no laborious (F)work. It is to be a permanent statute in all your dwelling places throughout your generations.

22 (G)When you reap the harvest of your land, moreover, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field nor gather the gleaning of your harvest; you are to leave them for the needy and the stranger. I am the Lord your God.’”

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Footnotes

  1. Leviticus 23:17 About 0.13 cubic feet or 0.004 cubic meters
  2. Leviticus 23:19 Or purification offering