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Responsibility of Priests and Levites

18 The Lord said to Aaron: You and your sons and your ancestral house with you shall bear responsibility for offences connected with the sanctuary, while you and your sons alone shall bear responsibility for offences connected with the priesthood. So bring with you also your brothers of the tribe of Levi, your ancestral tribe, in order that they may be joined to you, and serve you while you and your sons with you are in front of the tent of the covenant.[a] They shall perform duties for you and for the whole tent. But they must not approach either the utensils of the sanctuary or the altar, otherwise both they and you will die.

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Footnotes

  1. Numbers 18:2 Or treaty, or testimony; Heb eduth

18 Eternal One (to Aaron): It’s on you and your sons and your extended family that the responsibility for this sanctuary lies. Any offense against the sacred meeting place, whether the sanctuary or the priesthood, is to be born by the members of your ancestral house. So gather your extended family, your immediate family and those belonging to your staff, the tribe of Levi, so that they understand you’re all in this together. Your brothers from the greater Levi family will assist you while you and your sons come up to the tent holding the covenant. 3-5 Those Levites will answer to you and help out with the tent as a whole, but they absolutely may not touch the vessels of the sacred place or approach its altar. If they do, they and you will die. Also, an outsider may not approach you. This way, the whole congregation will be forever spared My destructive fury.

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