Torah Portion BeChukotei
Torah Portion BeChukotei
Leviticus 26:3-27:34
Lev 26:3 “‘If you walk in my statutes, and keep my mitzvot, and do them;
Lev 26:4 then I will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.
Lev 26:5 Your threshing shall reach to the vintage, and the vintage shall reach to the sowing time; and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely.
These are physical and economic blessings promised in this lifetime to believers who are Torah observant. These promises have not disappeared at all – they are eternal and operative right this minute.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:6 “‘I will give shalom in the land, and you shall lie down, and no one will make you afraid; and I will remove evil animals out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land.
Again, blessings for this lifetime.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:7 You shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword.
Lev 26:8 Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand; and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword.
It doesn’t say you won’t have any enemies, or that warfare will not come to where you are, but it does promise that if your nation is Torah observant, it will prevail those who threaten you. This promise holds for us until the Tribulation, where we are told plainly not once but twice that the False Messiah, the Beast, will prevail against believers.
Dan 7:21 I saw, and the same horn made war with the holy ones, and prevailed against them; Dan 7:22 until the ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the holy ones of the Elyon, and the time came that the holy ones possessed the kingdom… Dan 7:25 He shall speak words against the Elyon, and shall wear out the holy ones of the Elyon; and he shall think to change the times and the law; and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and half a time.
Revelation agrees:
Rev 13:5 And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. Rev 13:6 And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. Rev 13:7 And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:9 “‘I will have respect for you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, and will establish my covenant with you.
The fact that Elohim uses the future tense here indicates He is referring to the “new covenant” spoken in of Jeremiah and other places:
Jer 31:31 Behold, the days come, says YHWH, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Yisra’el, and with the house of Yehudah: Jer 31:32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they broke, although I was a husband to them, says YHWH. Jer 31:33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Yisra’el after those days, says YHWH: I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their Elohim, and they shall be my people.
Instead of having it passed down from father to son, as it was from Adam when he ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (obviously, Torah tells us what is good and what is evil), or having it written down on paper or carned into stone – allowing Rabbis to add to it and take things away from it – instead of these we should have the Torah written in our hearts and minds, written by the Spirit of Elohim who doesn’t make mistakes, written where they cannot tamper with it. What’s “new” about the covenant isn’t it’s content – it’s still the same Law. No, what’s new about it is it’s location, in our hearts and minds.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:10 You shall eat old store long kept, and you shall move out the old because of the new.
Lev 26:11 I will set my tent among you: and my soul won’t abhor you.
Lev 26:12 I will walk among you, and will be your Elohim, and you will be my people.
Meaning we must be ritually clean in body and righteous in thougth and action.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:13 I am YHWH your Elohim, who brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves; and I have broken the bars of your yoke, and made you go upright.
Freedom does not mean anarchy. Freedom is not freedom from Torah, it’s freedom from the bondage of slavery to sin!
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:14 “‘But if you will not listen to me, and will not do all these mitzvot;
Lev 26:15 and if you shall reject my statutes, and if your soul abhors my ordinances, so that you will not do all my mitzvot, but break my covenant;
Lev 26:16 I also will do this to you: I will appoint terror over you, even consumption and fever, that shall consume the eyes, and make the soul to pine away; and you will sow your seed in vain, for your enemies will eat it.
Lev 26:17 I will set my face against you, and you will be struck before your enemies. Those who hate you will rule over you; and you will flee when no one pursues you.
This is Yeshua as YHWH Incarnate speaking. He will set His face against those in the House of Israel, either native born or grafted-in, who refuse to obey His Torah. Their enemies will prevail over them – which is exactly why the False Messiah, the Beast, prevails against those who will be left behind at the Parousia, because they would not obey Torah for all the time that they professed to be part of the House of Israel. The Tribulation is to the church what exile was to Judah – the same punishments for the same sins.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:18 “‘If you in spite of these things will not listen to me, then I will chastise you seven times more for your sins.
Lev 26:19 I will break the pride of your power, and I will make your sky like iron, and your soil like brass;
Lev 26:20 and your strength will be spent in vain; for your land won’t yield its increase, neither will the trees of the land yield their fruit.
Humiliation and famine.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:21 “‘If you walk contrary to me, and won’t listen to me, then I will bring seven times more plagues on you according to your sins.
Lev 26:22 I will send the wild animals among you, which will rob you of your children, destroy your livestock, and make you few in number; and your roads will become desolate.
Wild animals don’t have to be big – viruses and bacteria are living creatures, too. Depopulation due to plague, sickness, or pandemic could very well be in America’s future.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:23 “‘If by these things you won’t be reformed to me, but will walk contrary to me;
Lev 26:24 then I will also walk contrary to you; and I will strike you, even I, seven times for your sins.
This is not passively allowing cause and effect to happen naturally, or even letting hasatan run roughshod over those who would not obey – this is Elohim taking an active part in goading those in the House of Israel who refused to obey.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:25 I will bring a sword upon you, that will execute the vengeance of the covenant; and you will be gathered together within your cities: and I will send the pestilence among you; and you will be delivered into the hand of the enemy.
That is, the vengeance described in the covenant for breaking it – such as this chapter.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:26 When I break your staff of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall deliver your bread again by weight: and you shall eat, and not be satisfied.
It would ordinarily be incredibly difficult to bake ten loaves of bread in one ordinary household oven, even in modern days. But during the Tribulation, flour will be so scarce that loaves will be quite small – one slice for the children, maybe one for the adults, if any at all. Recall that all the grasses will be burnt up, according to Revelation. Grains are grasses. Flour will be rationed severely, if it is made available to the public at all.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:27 “‘If you in spite of this won’t listen to me, but walk contrary to me;
Lev 26:28 then I will walk contrary to you in wrath; and I also will chastise you seven times for your sins.
Beyond goading, at this point Elohim has lost His proverbial temper. Active punishment follows.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:29 You will eat the flesh of your sons, and you will eat the flesh of your daughters.
Widespread starvation – this is not just what happened in the past – it is what will happen in the Tribulation.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:30 I will destroy your high places, and cut down your incense altars, and cast your dead bodies upon the bodies of your idols; and my soul will abhor you.
Lev 26:31 I will lay your cities waste, and will bring your sanctuaries to desolation, and I will not take delight in the sweet fragrence of your offerings.
Elohim will not accept or listen to the prayers for mercy of those rebellious persons of the House of Israel.
Isa 1:15 When you spread forth your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. Yes, when you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Isa 1:16 Wash yourselves, make yourself clean. Put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes. Cease to do evil. Isa 1:17 Learn to do well. Seek justice. Relieve the oppressed. Judge the fatherless. Plead for the widow.” Isa 1:18 “Come now, and let us reason together,” says YHWH: “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. Isa 1:19 If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; Isa 1:20 but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured with the sword; for the mouth of YHWH has spoken it.”
Isa 59:1 Behold, YHWH’s hand is not shortened, that it can’t save; neither his ear heavy, that it can’t hear: Isa 59:2 but your iniquities have separated between you and your Elohim, and your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.
Jer 14:11 YHWH said to me, Don’t pray for this people for [their] good. Jer 14:12 When they fast, I will not hear their cry; and when they offer burnt offering and meal offering, I will not accept them; but I will consume them by the sword, and by the famine, and by the pestilence. Jer 14:13 Then said I, Ah, Adonai YHWH! behold, the prophets tell them, You shall not see the sword, neither shall you have famine; but I will give you assured shalom in this place. Jer 14:14 Then YHWH said to me, The prophets prophesy lies in my name; I didn’t send them, neither have I commanded them, neither spoke I to them: they prophesy to you a lying vision, and divination, and a thing of nothing, and the deceit of their own heart. Jer 14:15 Therefore thus says YHWH concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name, and I didn’t send them, yet they say, Sword and famine shall not be in this land: By sword and famine shall those prophets be consumed.
We’re not talking about the nations here – we’re talking about the House of Israel. This chapter is addressed to Judah and Ephraim, both native Israelites and the mixed multitude that are grafted-in. There is no other audience in view here – this is going to happen to both those of all 12 tribes of Israel who refuse to believe in Elohim at all, and those who profess belief but refuse to obey, both native-born and grafted in. This is important to understand. This is a housecleaning, and has nothing to do with other nations.
Those teachers and preachers who have been telling people that Elohim will keep believers safe during the Tribulation have clearly not studied the scripture. The False Messiah prevails against them – the Beast devours them. Most of the world’s population will die by starvation, pestilence, and warfare. Man will be made more scarce than pure gold, as we have seen before.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:32 I will bring the land into desolation; and your enemies that dwell therein will be astonished at it.
Lev 26:33 I will scatter you among the nations, and I will draw out the sword after you: and your land will be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste.
Lev 26:34 Then the land will enjoy its sabbaths as long as it lies desolate and you are in your enemies’ land. Even then the land will rest and enjoy its sabbaths.
It seems to me that, as we saw in last week’s parashat, Elohim is the owner of all the earth. All of the land is really His, not ours. Notice before that scripture does not make it clear that the sabbath years will be imposed on other nations during the Messianic Kingdom, but now we might be inclined to say that they will be – there is one law for everyone, and that law includes the sabbath rests for the land, which needs to lie fallow and regenerate every 7th year. That being the case, every farmer of every nation who is a native Israelite or grafted-in believer should have been observing the Sabbath years – and haven’t been.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:35 As long as it lies desolate it shall have rest, even the rest which it didn’t have in your sabbaths, when you lived on it.
Lev 26:36 “‘As for those of you who are left, I will send a faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies: and the sound of a driven leaf will put them to flight; and they shall flee, as one flees from the sword; and they will fall when no one pursues.
Lev 26:37 They will stumble over one another, as it were before the sword, when no one pursues: and you will have no power to stand before your enemies.
Lev 26:38 You will perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies will eat you up.
Lev 26:39 Those of you who are left will pine away in their iniquity in your enemies’ lands; and also in the iniquities of their fathers shall they pine away with them.
As we see above, the Beast prevails.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:40 “‘If they confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, in their trespass which they trespassed against me, and also that, because they walked contrary to me,
Lev 26:41 I also walked contrary to them, and brought them into the land of their enemies: if then their uncircumcised heart is humbled, and they then accept the punishment of their iniquity;
Lev 26:42 then I will remember my covenant with Ya`akov; and also my covenant with Yitzchak, and also my covenant with Avraham; and I will remember the land.
Lev 26:43 The land also will be left by them, and will enjoy its sabbaths while it lies desolate without them: and they will accept the punishment of their iniquity; because, even because they rejected my ordinances, and their soul abhorred my statutes.
Lev 26:44 Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them; for I am YHWH their Elohim;
Lev 26:45 but I will for their sake remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their Elohim. I am YHWH.’”
This will be fulfilled in the establishment of the Millennial Kingdom. Those who repent and humble themselves, even to the point of death, will be rewarded in the Kingdom. This in no way causes their punishment to be taken away – indeed, it says specifically that they must accept it. It does not mean they will receive protection against the False Messiah. They will not receive any reprieve from the Tribulation.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 26:46 These are the statutes, ordinances and laws, which YHWH made between him and the children of Yisra’el in Mount Sinai by Moshe.
By this we are reminded that every Word of the Torah is the Word of YHWH Incarnate, Yeshua HaMashiach, and is binding on the entire House of Israel. Either you are part of the obedient believers of the House of Israel or you are not. The choice is yours.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:1 YHWH spoke to Moshe, saying,
Lev 27:2 “Speak to the children of Yisra’el, and say to them, ‘When a man makes a vow, the persons shall be for YHWH by your valuation.
Lev 27:3 Your valuation shall be of a male from twenty years old even to sixty years old, even your valuation shall be fifty shekels of silver, after the shekel of the sanctuary.
Lev 27:4 If it is a female, then your valuation shall be thirty shekels.
Lev 27:5 If the person is from five years old even to twenty years old, then your valuation shall be for a male twenty shekels, and for a female ten shekels.
Lev 27:6 If the person is from a month old even to five years old, then your valuation shall be for a male five shekels of silver, and for a female your valuation shall be three shekels of silver.
Here YHWH was miles ahead of other cultures. They allowed people to expose or kill or sacrifice infants and young children they thought they could not afford to raise. An Israelite could take the child to the Temple and dedicate it – and then return and redeem it when their fortunes improved. If they did not return, the child would be a permanent worker for a Levite family, either at the Temple or out in the Levite cities of refuge.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:7 If the person is from sixty years old and upward; if it is a male, then your valuation shall be fifteen shekels, and for a female ten shekels.
Lev 27:8 But if he is poorer than your valuation, then he shall be set before the Kohen, and the Kohen shall value him; according to the ability of him who vowed shall the Kohen value him.
If a person is dedicated to YHWH, depending on their various ages, the price to redeem them is on a graduated scale. If a person wished to redeem the family member who was vowed, but could not afford the price of redemption, then the Priests had the authority to lower the valuation – just as they could accept offerings of lesser value from the poor for sin and guilt offerings and offerings for cleanliness. Elohim never meant for money to be a wall around which the poor and needy could not navigate. That greedy attitude comes from men.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:9 “‘If it is an animal, of which men offer an offering to YHWH, all that any man gives of such to YHWH becomes holy.
Lev 27:10 He shall not alter it, nor change it, a good for a bad, or a bad for a good: and if he shall at all change animal for animal, then both it and that for which it is changed shall be holy.
If an animal is dedicated to YHWH, even if that animal becomes sick or injured or blemished it cannot be exchanged for another animal. It was dedicated and remains dedicated. It simply cannot be used for offerings – but it could be used for other purposes, like giving milk, for example, or being shorn.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:11 If it is any unclean animal, of which they do not offer as an offering to YHWH, then he shall set the animal before the Kohen;
Lev 27:12 and the Kohen shall value it, whether it is good or bad. As you the Kohen values it, so shall it be.
Lev 27:13 But if he will indeed redeem it, then he shall add the fifth part of it to its valuation.
Unclean animals could be used as beasts of burden, of course – or to power wheels and grinding mechanisms.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:14 “‘When a man dedicates his house to be holy to YHWH, then the Kohen shall evaluate it, whether it is good or bad: as the Kohen shall evaluate it, so shall it stand.
Lev 27:15 If he who dedicates it will redeem his house, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of your valuation to it, and it shall be his.
Apparently, this provision of Torah was being abused by the Pharisees:
Mat 15:3 He [Yeshua] answered them, “Why do you also disobey the mitzvah of Elohim because of your tradition? Mat 15:4 For Elohim commanded, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him be put to death.’ Mat 15:5 But you say, ‘Whoever may tell his father or his mother, “Whatever help you might otherwise have gotten from me is a gift devoted to Elohim,” Mat 15:6 he shall not honor his father or mother.’ You have made the mitzvah of Elohim void because of your tradition. Mat 15:7 You hypocrites! Well did Yeshaiyahu prophesy of you, saying, Mat 15:8 ‘These people draw near to me with their mouth, and honor me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. Mat 15:9 And in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrine rules made by men.’”
The Pharisees allowed their members to appear to be quite pious by dedicating all or most of their property. It was more holy to them to dedicate something for the use of the Kohanim or the Temple than to keep it for personal use. Sounds good, doesn’t it? But by this reasoning, they were able to avoid having to support their elderly parents or other extended family by dedicating their properties to YHWH. In the race to be holier-than-thou they had completely discounted their obligations to their family and community. Yeshua was not amused.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:16 “‘If a man dedicates to YHWH part of the field of his possession, then your valuation shall be according to the seed for it: the sowing of a homer of barley shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver.
Lev 27:17 If he dedicates his field from the Year of Jubilee, according to your valuation it shall stand.
Lev 27:18 But if he dedicates his field after the Jubilee, then the Kohen shall reckon to him the money according to the years that remain to the Year of Jubilee; and an abatement shall be made from your valuation.
Lev 27:19 If he who dedicated the field will indeed redeem it, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of your valuation to it, and it shall remain his.
Lev 27:20 If he will not redeem the field, or if he has sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed any more;
Lev 27:21 but the field, when it goes out in the Jubilee, shall be holy to YHWH, as a field devoted; it shall be owned by the Kohanim.
Same thing here. Tribal properties were being transferred permanently to the priests, leaving families without sufficient agricultural support.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:22 “‘If he dedicates to YHWH a field which he has bought, which is not of the field of his possession,
Lev 27:23 then the Kohen shall reckon to him the worth of your valuation up to the Year of Jubilee; and he shall give your valuation on that day, as a holy thing to YHWH.
Lev 27:24 In the Year of Jubilee the field shall return to him from whom it was bought, even to him to whom the possession of the land belongs.
In other words, he was basically pledging the crops of the field, not the field itself, since it was not part of his tribal inheritance and would have to be returned to the rightful owners in the year of Jubilee.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:25 All your valuations shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs to the shekel.
Other standards of weighing shekels were not acceptable. This kept people from pledging to give such-and-such worth of money or goods, only to short the pledge by using a lower valuation of the shekel. Sort of like pledging funds and then delaying and paying in depreciated currency.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:26 “‘Only the firstborn among animals, which is made a firstborn to YHWH, no man may dedicate it; whether an ox or sheep, it is YHWH’s.
Lev 27:27 If it is an unclean animal, then he shall buy it back according to your valuation, and shall add to it the fifth part of it: or if it isn’t redeemed, then it shall be sold according to your valuation.
The firstborn of every mother is already YHWH’s, both animal and human.
Exo 13:1 YHWH spoke to Moshe, saying, Exo 13:2 “Sanctify to me all of the firstborn, whatever opens the womb among the children of Yisra’el, both of man and of animal. It is mine.”
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:28 “‘Notwithstanding, no devoted thing, that a man shall devote to YHWH of all that he has, whether of man or animal, or of the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed: every devoted thing is most holy to YHWH.
That is, the priests can’t dump it (or him or her) back on the market – it’s holy and must be kept and used by them.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:29 “‘No one devoted, who shall be devoted from among men, shall be ransomed; he shall surely be put to death.
Since a considerable amount of space was just used above to explain how much to redeem human being dedicated to YHWH, this can’t be understood as applying to vows and dedications.
Lev 27:29 כל3605 חרם2764 אשׁר834 יחרם2763 מן4480 האדם120 לא3808 יפדה6299 מות4191 יומת׃4191
H2764 חרם חרם
chêrem cherem khay’-rem, kheh’-rem
From H2763; physically (as shutting in) a net (either literally or figuratively); usually a doomed object; abstractly extermination: – (ac-)curse (-d, -d thing), dedicated thing, things which should have been utterly destroyed, (appointed to) utter destruction, devoted (thing), net.
The proper way to understand this verse is that anyone who has been “put under the ban” cannot be redeemed. If you recall from the book of Joshua, there were several instances when persons of Nephilim lineage or certain villages of Cana’an were put under the ban, but the foolish Israelites kept slaves or booty from those places instead of killing them and destroying all the property. What resulted was anger from Elohim. Many critics have used passages about the ban to say that Judaism is a religion that promotes genocide, but this is not true. The whole land of Cana’an knew that the Israelites were coming.
Jos 2:9 and she [Rahav the prostitute, living in Jericho] said to the men [who were there spying for Joshua], I know that YHWH has given you the land, and that the fear of you is fallen on us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. Jos 2:10 For we have heard how YHWH dried up the water of the Sea of Suf before you, when you came out of Egypt; and what you did to the two kings of the Amori, who were beyond the Yarden, to Sichon and to `Og, whom you utterly destroyed. Jos 2:11 As soon as we had heard it, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more spirit in any man, because of you: for YHWH your Elohim, he is Elohim in heaven above, and on earth beneath.
Unlike us today, who are trapped in the land of our birth by red tape, passports, immigration restrictions, and other legalistic barriers – in those days all they had to do was pack up and leave. Not a single person had to die so that Israel could have the promised land – all they had to do was acknoweldge that YHWH is the owner of the land and has the right to give it to anyone He chooses, and then get up and leave. They had the whole planet before them, to migrate and be safe. I’m sure many thousands did exactly that. But the ones who remained did so in defiance of the rights and authority of YHWH Elohim – and therefore were put under the ban. Like the Arabs living in Israel today, their purpose was to undermine and invalidate Israel’s claim to the land – and YHWH did not want that to happen. Unfortunately, then as now, they allowed the non-Israelites to remain, and they became a thorn in their side.
Jos 23:11 Take good heed therefore to yourselves, that you love YHWH your Elohim. Jos 23:12 Else if you do at all go back, and cleave to the remnant of these nations, even these who remain among you, and make marriages with them, and go in to them, and they to you; Jos 23:13 know for a certainty that YHWH your Elohim will no more drive these nations from out of your sight; but they shall be a snare and a trap to you, and a scourge in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good land which YHWH your Elohim has given you. Jos 23:14 Behold, this day I am going the way of all the earth: and you know in all your hearts and in all your souls, that not one thing has failed of all the good things which YHWH your Elohim spoke concerning you; all are happen to you, not one thing has failed of it. Jos 23:15 It shall happen, that as all the good things are come on you of which YHWH your Elohim spoke to you, so will YHWH bring on you all the evil things, until he have destroyed you from off this good land which YHWH your Elohim has given you. Jos 23:16 When you disobey the covenant of YHWH your Elohim, which he commanded you, and go and serve other gods, and bow down yourselves to them; then will the anger of YHWH be kindled against you, and you shall perish quickly from off the good land which he has given to you.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:30 “‘All the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the trees, is YHWH’s. It is holy to YHWH.
Lev 27:31 If a man redeems anything of his tithe, he shall add a fifth part to it.
A man could decide that he had plenty of money, but needed his crops. He could redeem his tithe by adding 20% to the value of it.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:32 All the tithe of the herds or the flocks, whatever passes under the rod, the tenth shall be holy to YHWH.
Lev 27:33 He shall not search whether it is good or bad, neither shall he change it: and if he changes it at all, then both it and that for which it is changed shall be holy. It shall not be redeemed.’”
As for vowed creatures above, the tithe was considered dedicated no matter what shape it was in. As the herd passed under the rod, whatever was counted as tenth was marked with a splotch of dye on the top of their head, to show that they were the tithe and dedicated as such.
Leviticus, continued:
Lev 27:34 These are the mitzvot which YHWH commanded Moshe for the children of Yisra’el on Mount Sinai.
All the children of Israel, both the native born and the mixed multitude that was grafted-in.
Next: Haftarah BeChukotei.
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