אמור

God spoke to Moses: “Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron.” Moses gathered them near the Tabernacle and explained that their work was special, so they had extra rules. A priest was not to make himself impure by contact with a dead body, except for close relatives, mother, father, son, daughter, brother, or an unmarried sister. They also could not shave their heads smooth, cut the edges of their beards, or make cuts in their skin.

Because they brought offerings, they had to guard what was holy. They were not to marry a woman known for prostitution or a divorced woman. The high priest had even stricter rules and could marry only a virgin.

God also said that a priest with a physical defect could not serve at the altar, though he could still eat the sacred food. Priests had to be careful with sacred donations: if they were impure, they waited until evening after washing. Most other people could not eat this food, though a priest’s daughter could if she returned home, widowed or divorced and without children.

Next God told Moses to announce the sacred times. “Six days you may work, but the seventh day is Shabbat,” a Hebrew word meaning a day of complete rest, “a sacred occasion.”

God then described the spring festivals. On the fourteenth day of the first month, at twilight, the people brought the Passover offering. On the fifteenth began the Feast of Unleavened Bread, lasting seven days. The first and seventh days were sacred occasions with no regular work.

God also spoke about what would happen once Israel entered the land and harvested grain. They were to bring the first sheaf to the priest, who lifted it before God. That same day they offered a year-old lamb, a grain offering of choice flour mixed with oil, and wine. Then they counted seven full weeks, fifty days, and brought two loaves as first fruits, along with offerings. Even during harvest, they were not to reap the edges of their fields or pick up every gleaning, leaving some for the poor and the stranger.

God gave more instructions for the seventh month. On the first day there was complete rest, a sacred occasion marked by loud blasts. On the tenth day came the Day of Atonement, a day of self-denial with no work. On the fifteenth began the Feast of Booths for seven days, with rest on the first day and again on the eighth. The people lived in booths and rejoiced, remembering that God had sheltered them when they came out of Egypt.

Inside the Tent of Meeting, the Israelites brought clear oil of beaten olives so lamps could burn from evening to morning. Each week the priests also set twelve loaves on the pure table in two rows, with frankincense, and later ate the bread in a sacred place.

Then a fight broke out in the camp. A man, the son of an Israelite woman and an Egyptian man, spoke God’s Name in blasphemy. He was held until God’s decision was given: he was taken outside the camp, witnesses laid hands on his head, and the community stoned him. God said the same rule applied to citizen and stranger. Moses also taught one standard of justice: restitution for killed livestock, and “fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth.”