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LXX Leviticus

Septuagint

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Chapter 1

1 And the Lord called Moses again and spoke to him out of the tabernacle of witness, saying, 2 Speak to the children of Israel, and you shall say to them, If any man of you shall bring gifts to the Lord, you shall bring your gifts of the cattle and of the oxen and of the sheep. 3 If his gift be a whole burnt offering, he shall bring an unblemished male of the herd to the door of the tabernacle of witness, he shall bring it as acceptable before the Lord. 4 And he shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering as a thing acceptable for him, to make atonement for him. 5 And they shall kill the calf before the Lord;⁠ and the sons of Aaron the priests shall bring the blood, and they shall pour the blood all around on the altar, which is at the doors of the tabernacle of witness. 6 And having flayed the whole burnt offering, they shall divide it by its limbs. 7 And the sons of Aaron the priests shall put fire on the altar, and shall pile wood on the fire. 8 And the sons of Aaron the priests shall pile up the divided parts, and the head, and the fat on the wood on the fire, the wood which is on the altar. 9 And the entrails and the feet they shall wash in water, and the priests shall put all on the altar: it is a burnt offering, a sacrifice, a smell of sweet aroma to the Lord. 10 And if his gift be of the sheep to the Lord, or of the lambs, or of the kids for whole burnt offerings, he shall bring it a male without blemish, and he shall lay his hand on its head. 11 And they shall kill it by the side of the altar, toward the north before the Lord, and the sons of Aaron the priests shall pour its blood on the altar all around. 12 And they shall divide it by its limbs, and its head and its fat, and the priests shall pile them up on the wood which is on the fire, on the altar. 13 And they shall wash the entrails and the feet with water, and the priest shall bring all the parts and put them on the altar: it is a burnt offering, a sacrifice, a smell of sweet aroma to the Lord. 14 And if you bring a gift, a burnt offering to the Lord, of birds, then he will bring his gift of doves or pigeons. 15 And the priest shall bring it to the altar, and shall wring off its head; and the priest shall put it on the altar, and shall wring out the blood⁠ at the bottom of the altar. 16 And he shall take away the crop with the feathers, and shall cast it forth by the altar toward the east to the place of the ashes. 17 And he shall break it off from the wings and shall not separate it, and the priest shall put it on the altar on the wood which is on the fire: it is a burnt offering, a sacrifice, a sweet smelling aroma to the Lord.

Texts in conversation

Compare Leviticus 1:5 and LXX Leviticus 1:5

Hebrew Bible · Septuagint

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Summary

In Leviticus, the person offering the sacrifice is the one who kills the animal, but in the Greek Septuagint translation this task is given to the priests. This follows a pattern in the Greek that changes ritual duties and gives them to the priests.

Passages

Leviticus 1:5

Hebrew Bible
4 He must lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it will be accepted for him to make atonement on his behalf. 5 Then the one presenting the offering must slaughter the bull before the Lord, and the sons of Aaron, the priests, must present the blood and splash the blood against the sides of the altar, which is at the entrance of the Meeting Tent. 6 Next, the one presenting the offering must skin the burnt offering and cut it into parts,
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Leviticus

LXX Leviticus 1:5

Septuagint
4 And he shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering as a thing acceptable for him, to make atonement for him. 5 And they shall kill the calf before the Lord; and the sons of Aaron the priests shall bring the blood, and they shall pour the blood all around on the altar, which is at the doors of the tabernacle of witness. 6 And having flayed the whole burnt offering, they shall divide it by its limbs.
300–201 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in LXX Leviticus

References

"... The plural, harmonized with the other plurals in the context, likely reflects the following concern: in the Masoretic text, the slaughter of the victim is attributed to the offerer and not to the priest. However, this is a characteristic perspective of the priestly tradition (P), according to which the slaughter is not the central moment of the sacrifice. The Septuagint (and the Samaritan Pentateuch) contains the same reading in verses 6 and 9, where even the number of the noun is modified, as well as in verses 11 (not in the Samaritan Pentateuch), 12, and 13. The change, likely due to theological considerations, is attested in various textual traditions and was probably already present in the Vorlage of the Septuagint ..."
Giorgio Paximadi, “Entre variantes et interprétations. Corruption textuelle ou exégèse dans le texte de la Septante du Lévitique ?” in The Text of Leviticus: Proceedings of the Third International Colloquium of the Dominique Barthélemy Institute, ed. Innocent Himbaza (Leuven: Peeters, 2020), 133–148.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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