Votive Offerings

27 The Lord said to Moses, ² “Say to the people of Israel, When a man makes a special vow of persons to the Lord at your valuation, ³ then your valuation of a male from twenty years old up to sixty years old shall be fifty shekels of silver, according to the shekel of the sanctuary. ⁴ If the person is a female, your valuation shall be thirty shekels. ⁵ If the person is from five years old up to twenty years old, your valuation shall be for a male twenty shekels, and for a female ten shekels. ⁶ If the person is from a month old up to five years old, your valuation shall be for a male five shekels of silver, and for a female your valuation shall be three shekels of silver. ⁷ And if the person is sixty years old and upward, then your valuation for a male shall be fifteen shekels, and for a female ten shekels. ⁸ And if a man is too poor to pay your valuation, then he shall bring the person before the priest, and the priest shall value him; according to the ability of him who vowed the priest shall value him.

⁹ “If it is an animal such as men offer as an offering to the Lord, all of such that any man gives to the Lord is holy. ¹⁰ He shall not substitute anything for it or exchange it, a good for a bad, or a bad for a good; and if he makes any exchange of beast for beast, then both it and that for which it is exchanged shall be holy. ¹¹ And if it is an unclean animal such as is not offered as an offering to the Lord, then the man shall bring the animal before the priest, ¹² and the priest shall value it as either good or bad; as you, the priest, value it, so it shall be. ¹³ But if he wishes to redeem it, he shall add a fifth to the valuation.

¹⁴ “When a man dedicates his house to be holy to the Lord, the priest shall value it as either good or bad; as the priest values it, so it shall stand. ¹⁵ And if he who dedicates it wishes to redeem his house, he shall add a fifth of the valuation in money to it, and it shall be his.

¹⁶ “If a man dedicates to the Lord part of the land which is his by inheritance, then your valuation shall be according to the seed for it; a sowing of a homer of barley shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver. ¹⁷ If he dedicates his field from the year of jubilee, it shall stand at your full valuation; ¹⁸ but if he dedicates his field after the jubilee, then the priest shall compute the money-value for it according to the years that remain until the year of jubilee, and a deduction shall be made from your valuation. ¹⁹ And if he who dedicates the field wishes to redeem it, then he shall add a fifth of the valuation in money to it, and it shall remain his. ²⁰ But if he does not wish to redeem the field, or if he has sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed any more; ²¹ but the field, when it is released in the jubilee, shall be holy to the Lord, as a field that has been devoted; the priest shall be in possesion of it. ²² If he dedicates to the Lord a field which he has bought, which is not a part of his possession by inheritance, ²³ then the priest shall compute the valuation for it up to the year of jubilee, and the man shall give the amount of the valuation on that day as a holy thing to the Lord. ²⁴ In the year of jubilee the field shall return to him from whom it was bought, to whom the land belongs as a possession by inheritance. ²⁵ Every valuation shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs shall make a shekel.

²⁶ “But a firstling of animals, which as a firstling belongs to the Lord, no man may dedicate; whether ox or sheep, it is the Lord’s. ²⁷ And if it is an unclean animal, then he shall buy it back at your valuation, and add a fifth to it; or, if it is not redeemed, it shall be sold at your valuation.

²⁸ “But no devoted thing that a man devotes to the Lord, of anything that he has, whether of a man or beast, or of his inherited field, shall be sold or redeemed; every devoted thing is most holy to the Lord. ²⁹ No one devoted, who is to be utterly destroyed from among men, shall be ransomed; he shall be put to death.

³⁰ “All the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the trees, is the Lord’s; it is holy to the Lord. ³¹ If a man wishes to redeem any of his tithe, he shall add a fifth to it. ³² And all the tithe of herds and flocks, every tenth animal of all that pass under the herdsman’s staff, shall be holy to the Lord. ³³ A man shall not inquire whether it is good or bad, neither shall he exchange it; and if he exchanges it, then both it and that for which it is exchanged shall be holy; it shall not be redeemed.”

³⁴ These are the commandments which the Lord commanded Moses for the people of Israel on Mount Sinai.