Beginning
Duties of Priests and Levites
18 And the Lord said to Aaron: You and your sons and your father’s house with you will bear the iniquity of the sanctuary, and you and your sons with you will bear the iniquity of your priesthood. 2 Your brothers also of the tribe of Levi, the tribe of your father, bring with you, and let them be joined with you, and minister to you. But you and your sons with you will minister before the tent of witness. 3 They will perform duties for you and for the whole tent; but they will not come near the vessels of the sanctuary or the altar, so that neither they nor you die. 4 They will be joined to you and perform the duties of the tent of meeting, for all the service of the tent; no foreigner will come near you.
5 You yourselves will perform the duties of the sanctuary and the duties of the altar, so that wrath may never come upon the children of Israel again. 6 I Myself have taken your brothers, the Levites, from among the children of Israel; they are given to you as a gift from the Lord to perform the service of the tent of meeting. 7 And you and your sons with you will attend to your priesthood for everything at the altar, and within the veil, and you will serve. I have given your priesthood to you as a gift service, and the foreigner that comes near will be put to death.
Offerings for Priests and Levites
8 The Lord spoke to Aaron: I have certainly given you the charge of the offerings made to Me, all the hallowed gifts of the children of Israel. To you and to your sons have I given them as a portion, as an ordinance forever. 9 This will be yours of the most holy things, reserved from the fire: All of their offerings, all of their grain offerings and all of their sin offerings, and all of their guilt offerings, which they render to Me, will be most holy for you and for your sons. 10 In a most holy place shall you eat it; every male shall eat it. It shall be holy to you.
11 This is yours: the offering of their gift, with all the wave offerings of the children of Israel. I have given them to you and to your sons and to your daughters with you, as an eternal statute. Everyone who is clean in your house will eat of it.
12 All the best of the oil, and all the best of the wine, and of the wheat, the first fruits of what they will offer to the Lord, those have I given to you. 13 The first ripe fruit of all which is in their land, which they will bring to the Lord, will be yours. Everyone who is clean in your house will eat of it.
14 Everything devoted in Israel will be yours. 15 Everything that opens the womb of all flesh, which they bring to the Lord, whether it is of men or animals, will be yours. However, you will surely redeem the firstborn of man, and the firstborn of unclean beasts you will redeem. 16 Their redemption price, reckoned from one month of age, is five shekels,[a] after the shekel of the sanctuary, which is twenty gerahs.
17 But the firstborn of a herd animal, or the firstborn of a sheep, or the firstborn of a goat, you will not redeem. They are holy. You will splash their blood on the altar and will burn their fat as a fire offering, as a pleasing aroma to the Lord. 18 Their flesh will be yours, as the wave breast and as the right shoulder are yours. 19 All the offerings of the holy things which the children of Israel offer to the Lord I have given to you, and to your sons and your daughters with you, as an eternal statute. It is a covenant of salt forever before the Lord, to you and to your seed with you.
20 The Lord said to Aaron: You will not have an inheritance in their land, nor will you have any territory among them. I am your territory and your inheritance among the children of Israel.
Tithes for Supporting the Levites
21 I have given the children of Levi all the tithes in Israel for an inheritance, for their service, which they serve, even the service of the tent of meeting. 22 Hereafter, the children of Israel shall not come near the tent of meeting, lest they bear sin and die. 23 But the Levites will do the service of the tent of meeting, and they will bear their iniquity. It will be an eternal statute throughout your generations, that among the children of Israel they have no inheritance. 24 But the tithes of the children of Israel, which they offer as an offering to the Lord, I have given to the Levites to inherit. Therefore I have said to them, among the children of Israel they will have no inheritance.
The Tithe of the Levites
25 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 26 You will speak to the Levites, and say to them: When you take from the children of Israel the tithes that I have given you from them for your inheritance, then you will offer up an offering of it to the Lord, even one-tenth of the tithe. 27 And this offering will be counted to you, as though it was the grain of the threshing floor, and as the fullness of the winepress. 28 Thus you also will set apart an offering to the Lord from all the tithes which you receive from the children of Israel. Out of them you will give the offering of the Lord to Aaron the priest. 29 Out of all your gifts you shall present every offering due to the Lord, from all the best of them, the consecrated part of them.
30 You will say to them: When you have offered the best from it, then it will be counted to the Levites as the increase of the threshing floor, and as the increase of the winepress. 31 You will eat it in every place, you and your households, because it is your reward for your service in the tent of meeting. 32 You will bear no sin because of it, when you have offered the best of it. The holy things of the children of Israel you will not pollute, and you will not die.
Laws of Purification
19 And the Lord spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying: 2 This is the statute of the law which the Lord has commanded, saying: Tell the children of Israel that they will bring you a healthy red heifer, which has no blemish, and on which a yoke has never gone, 3 and you will give it to Eleazar the priest, and he will bring it outside the camp, and it will be slaughtered before him. 4 And Eleazar the priest will take from its blood with his finger and sprinkle some of its blood directly before the tent of meeting seven times. 5 Then it will be burned in his sight. Its hide and its flesh and its blood, with her dung, will be burned. 6 And the priest will take cedar wood, and hyssop, and scarlet and throw it into the midst of the burning of the heifer. 7 Then the priest will wash his clothes, and he will bathe his body in water, and afterward he will come into the camp, and the priest will be unclean until evening. 8 He who burns it will wash his clothes in water, and bathe his body in water, and will be unclean until evening.
9 A man who is clean will gather the ashes of the heifer and deposit them outside the camp in a clean place, and it will be guarded for the assembly of the children of Israel for water of purification. It is for purifying from sin. 10 He that gathers the ashes of the heifer will wash his clothes and be unclean until evening, and it will be for the children of Israel and for the foreigner that lives among them, for an eternal statute.
11 He that touches the dead body of any man will be unclean seven days. 12 He will make himself clean on the third day, and on the seventh day he will be clean. But if he does not make himself clean on the third day, then the seventh day he will not be clean. 13 Whoever touches the body of any man that is dead and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle of the Lord, and that person will be cut off from Israel. Because the water of purification was not sprinkled on him, he will be unclean. His uncleanness is still on him.
14 This is the law, when a man dies in a tent. Each person who comes into the tent and all that is in the tent will be unclean seven days. 15 Every open vessel which has no covering fastened on it is unclean.
16 Whoever in the field touches one that is slain with a sword, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave will be unclean seven days.
17 For an unclean person they will take from the ashes of the burnt sin offering, and running water will be on it in a vessel. 18 A clean person will take hyssop, and dip it in the water, and splash it on the tent, and on all the vessels, and on the people who were there, and on him that touched a bone, or one slain, or one dead, or a grave. 19 The clean person will splash on the unclean person on the third day and on the seventh day. And on the seventh day he shall purify himself, wash his clothes, and bathe in water; and he will be clean at evening. 20 But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself, that person will be cut off from among the assembly because he has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. The water of purification has not been sprinkled on him. He is unclean. 21 It will be an eternal statute to them.
He that sprinkles the water of purification will wash his clothes, and he that touches the water of purification will be unclean until evening. 22 Whatever the unclean person touches will be unclean, and the person that touches it will be unclean until evening.
Moses Strikes the Rock
20 Then the children of Israel, the whole assembly, came to the Wilderness of Zin in the first month, and the people dwelt in Kadesh, and Miriam died there and was buried there.
2 And there was no water for the assembly, and they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron. 3 The people argued with Moses, and spoke, saying, “O that we had died when our brothers died before the Lord! 4 And why have you brought up the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness, that we and our livestock should die here? 5 And why have you brought us up from Egypt, to bring us into this evil place? It is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates. Nor is there any water to drink.”
6 Moses and Aaron went from the presence of the assembly to the door of the tent of meeting, and they fell on their faces, and the glory of the Lord appeared to them. 7 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 8 Take the rod, and gather the assembly together, you and Aaron your brother, and speak to the rock before their eyes, and it will give its water, and you will bring out to them water from the rock; so you will give the assembly and their livestock drink.
9 So Moses took the rod from before the Lord, as He commanded him. 10 Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly before the rock, and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels. Will we bring out water from this rock for you?” 11 And Moses lifted up his hand, and he struck the rock twice with his rod, and plenty of water came out, and the assembly drank, and their livestock.
12 The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not believe in Me, to sanctify Me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore you will not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.”
13 This is the water of Meribah because the children of Israel argued with the Lord, and He was sanctified among them.
Edom Denies Israel Passage
14 Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom,
“Thus says your brother Israel: You know all the hardship that has found us, 15 how our fathers went down into Egypt, and we lived in Egypt a long time, and the Egyptians distressed us and our fathers. 16 And when we cried out to the Lord, He heard our voice and sent an angel and brought us out of Egypt.
“And here we are in Kadesh, a city on the edge of your territory. 17 Please let us pass through your land. We will not pass through the fields or the vineyards, or drink of the water of the wells. We will travel the king’s highway. We will not turn to the right hand nor the left, until we have passed through your territory.”
18 Edom said to him,
“You will not pass through me, lest with the sword I come out against you.”
19 The children of Israel said to him,
“We will travel the highway, and if we and our livestock drink of your water, then we will pay for it. I will only go through on my feet without doing anything else.”
20 He said,
“You will not go through.”
And Edom came out against them with many people and with a strong hand. 21 Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory, so Israel turned away from him.
The Death of Aaron
22 They journeyed from Kadesh, and the children of Israel, even the whole assembly, came to Mount Hor. 23 The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron in Mount Hor, by the border of the land of Edom, saying, 24 “Aaron will be gathered to his people because he will not enter into the land which I have given to the children of Israel because you rebelled against Me at the water of Meribah. 25 Take Aaron and Eleazar his son, and bring them up to Mount Hor, 26 and strip Aaron of his garments, and put them on Eleazar his son, and Aaron will be gathered to his people, and he will die there.”
27 Moses did as the Lord commanded, and they went up onto Mount Hor in the sight of all the assembly. 28 Moses stripped Aaron of his garments and put them on Eleazar his son. And Aaron died there on the top of the mountain, and Moses and Eleazar came down from the mountain. 29 When all the assembly saw that Aaron was dead, they wept for Aaron thirty days, all the house of Israel.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.