תשאו את עון כהונתכם, “you shall bear any guilt connected with your priesthood.” The meaning of the verse is: “if you do not carefully guard the priesthood any guilt arising from negligence will be borne by you. The reason the Torah adds: “you and your sons with you in front of the Tent of Testimony” (verse 2), is that both you and your sons are always perceived as being in My (G’d’s) presence all the time. Sifri Korach 116 explains that the priests are responsible for what occurs inside the Sanctuary whereas the Levites are responsible for what occurs around it outside in the sacred precincts. Each group was expected to mount guards at night, etc.

ולא ימותו גם הם גם אתם, “so that not both you and they will die.” This is the source for the halachah that the functions of the Levites are not interchangeable, that a priest may not perform functions designated for the Levite, nor the Levite functions reserved for the priest (Erchin 11, Maimonides Hilchot Kley Hamikdash 3,10). Not only this, but even priests who have been assigned certain tasks must not exchange their duties with priests who have been assigned different priestly assignments, nor must Levites exchange duties within the framework of what is their exclusive domain. If a Levite was assigned the duty to play an instrument or participate in the songs the Levites sing, he must not instead engage in washing the hands of the priests, for instance! This is why the Torah writes (Numbers 4,49) איש איש על עבודתו, “each man to his designated task.” This is the way these words have been defined in Sifri 116. The words: “but to the holy vessels and to the Altar they shall not approach,” are a warning, whereas the words following “so that they will not die,” are the Torah’s way of spelling out the penalty for non-observance of the warning. The words גם הם, “they also,” are the source for the inadmissibility of exchanging duties either by mutual consent or willful pre-empting the duties assigned to a colleague. It occurred once that Rabbi Joshua ben Chanayah wished to assist a colleague in closing the doors and he was stopped from doing so by Rabban Yochanan who told him that seeing he was one of the singers he had not business to concern himself with the duties of those who were in charge of the gates (Erchin 11).

ושמרו את משמרת אהל מועד, “and they are to safeguard the duties pertaining to the Tent of Meeting.” The purpose of this שמירה, supervision, is to enhance the reputation of the Tabernacle as it is a well known fact that any building surrounded by guards of honour is considered as of greater importance by people seeing the guards than even a palace not surrounded by guards.

עבודת מתנה אתן את כהונתכם, “I make your priesthood a service of dedication.” The performance of the sacrificial duties which I (G’d) impose on the priests are not to be viewed as menial tasks but as a major service and a gift from Me to you. Apart from the fact that you derive your livelihood from the performance of these duties you are to consider it as an honor and glory bestowed upon you. The reason that the Torah repeats here once more that “the stranger who approaches (unauthorized) shall die,” is because this time it is not addressed to members of other tribes but to priests who for one reason or another have become disqualified. Even Levites are subject to this warning. If we find that the prophet Samuel (a Levite, not a priest) offered a burnt-offering (Samuel I 7,9) this was an exception dictated by special circumstances. It was similar to Gideon (a member of the tribe of Menashe) who is also reported as offering a sacrifice (Judges 6,25-27). Moreover, seeing that this paragraph deals with the situation in the desert and the period when the Tabernacle had recently been erected and the firstborn had been replaced by the Levites, there is ample reason to repeat the warning once more. (Rabbi Chavell points out that the sacrifice offered by Samuel on a private altar after the destruction of he Tabernacle in Shiloh was perfectly permissible for any Israelite and that there is nothing strange about what Samuel did there although he was the first one to do so. Compare Avodah Zarah 24. According to the Talmud Temurah 28 the night on which Gideon offered a sacrifice was historically important as no fewer than eight prohibitions were waived on that night).

וידבר ה' אל אהרן ואני הנה נתתי לך את משמרת תרומותי, “The Lord said to Aaron: “here I have entrusted to you the minding of My gifts, etc.” At this juncture G’d reconfirms Aaron’s status as High Priest after his position had previously been challenged. You may understand why the Torah found it necessary to do this by means of a parable. A king had given a present of a field to a close friend of his without bothering to draw up a deed confirming the gift. After a while, people seeing the king’s friend treat the field as his challenged him. The king told the friend who was somewhat upset: “let whoever wants to challenge My gift challenge it.” However, I will provide you with a deed proving that you have title to the field and I will put my royal seal on it. Here we have written proof of the 24 different kinds of gifts the king (G’d) bestowed on the priests, most of which came from the pockets of the Israelites (compare Sifri 119). Chulin 133 confirms this stating: “there are 24 different kinds of gifts called מתנות כהונה, ‘gifts that the priests are entitled to.’” They are equivalent to what is called a ברית מלח, a “covenant based on salt.” Just as salt is of an enduring quality so anyone who observes this covenant is highly regarded, whereas anyone who breaches any part of this covenant (withholds any of these items from the priests) is considered as if he had violated all parts of this covenant. The reason for this is that the covenant is spelled out both in general terms, i.e. לכל קדשי בני ישראל לך נתתים, “of all the sacred donations of the Israelites I give them to you,” and is subsequently listed in detail once more. These twenty-four gifts are divided into three distinct categories. Ten of them apply to sacrificial offerings presented in the Temple and to be consumed only within the sacred precincts of the Temple Mount. Ten more apply to other parts of the Holy Land, i.e. they are to given to the priests anywhere within the Holy Land. The last four are gifts to be given to the priests within the (whole) confines of the city of Jerusalem. The ten gifts to be consumed within the confines of the sacred grounds of the Temple are: meat from sin-offerings of four-legged animals; meat from a sin-offering consisting of a bird; meat from the guilt-offering for a sin definitely performed, meat from a similar guilt offering when the sinner is not certain he has become guilty of that sin; parts of the meat of public peace-offerings, the log of oil to be offered by a person cured from the skin disease tzoraat; the two show-breads offered in the Temple each Sabbath; the breads offered on Shavuot each year (new wheat harvest); remainders of all “gift-offerings” consisting of flour and oil. The part of the Omer (annual new barley offering) not consigned to the Altar. The four gifts given to the priests for use within the confines of the city of Jerusalem are: the firstborn male animal fit for the altar; the respective first fruit (of the seven kinds of produce the land of Israel is famous for). The remains of the ram brought by the Nazarene at the end his term, and lastly, the hides of the various animals which are offered on the altar. The ten gifts which are applicable and usable by the priest throughout the Land of Israel are: a gift by the farmer before he separates the tithe from his grain harvest. Terumat-Maasser, a corres-ponding gift to the priest by the Levite of the tithe he has received from the Israelite. Challah, the first part of the dough (discussed in Numbers chapter 15,17-21); the wool of the first shearing of the sheep. The stomach, forearm and cheekbones of the average animal offered as a freely donated offering by the ordinary Israelite. The five shekel the father needs to give to the priest to redeem his son if he is the firstborn of his wife by natural birth. The lamb or money in lieu of the lamb traded in order to redeem the fistborn of a farmer’s donkey. Certain lands which belonged to proselytes who died intestate. Fields donated to the Temple Treasury and not subject to the Jubilee legislation. Property stolen from a proselyte who died without heirs before the stolen property could be returned by the thief.

בקדש הקדשים תאכלו, “you shall eat it in the most holy.” Seeing that the Inner Sanctuary, known generally as קדש הקדשים, is not an area in which one may consume any part of the offerings since even the High Priest may only enter there on Yom Kippur when eating is altogether forbidden, the meaning of this word must be something different. The term does not apply to a location but to a state of ritual purity, i.e. the highest state of ritual purity the priest can attain. He is not allowed to eat the parts of the sacrificial meat described in the previous verse unless he is in that state of purity. Alternatively, the term here is relative, i.e. compared to the outer courtyard of the Tabernacle, the area of the Sanctuary including the עזרה, is considered “the holy of holies” (compare Ibn Ezra).

כל חרם בישראל לך יהיה, “Every segregated property (proscribed) to the Israelites shall be yours.” When an Israelite vows a property of his as out of bounds to himself it becomes out of bounds both to himself as well as to the other Israelites and becomes the property of the priests of the roster who perform service in the Temple at that time. Elsewhere, in Leviticus 27,21, this legislation is couched in the words: כשדה החרם לכהן תהיה אחזתו, “as land proscribed; it becomes the priest’s holding.” In the event that the donor had intended his property to be used to make repairs to the Temple, for instance, then it is used for that purpose instead of being given to the priests to become their personal property. Our sages (Midrash Tehillim 1) derive this rule from a propaganda tale used by Korach to incite the people: A certain woman owned a female sheep and when the time came to shear its wool, the local priest asked her to give him the wool. When the same sheep birthed her first young male lamb the priest took it. When she saw all this she slaughtered the animal. When the priest found out he came to claim his portion of the meat. When frustrated at this state of affairs the woman decided to rather declare the whole animal as חרם, hoping thereby to deprive the priest, she found to her dismay that the priest now claimed the entire animal.

ופדויו מבן חודש ומעלה, “those that have to be redeemed must be at least one month old.” The subject of the word ופדויו is the male human firstborn.

ברית מלח עולם היא לפני ה’, “It is an eternal salt-like covenant before Hashem.” According to the plain meaning of the text the meaning is that the covenant is “cut off,” absolute, final, just like salt is cut off from the mine in which is it detached from the mother lode. The word means that something is final, irreversible. We find the word used in this sense in Jeremiah 17,6 ארץ מלחה ולא תשב, “a land so full of salt that it will never be habitable again.”

A kabbalistic approach: the words “it is an eternal covenant” mean that the covenant described as a “salt-like covenant” is an eternal covenant. Just as salt preserves the meat indefinitely, so this type of covenant endures indefinitely. The major ingredient of salt is water. Due to the power of the sun which shone upon it it turns into salt. In other words, salt represents a fusion of the elements fire and water. Similarly, the covenant is a combination of the attributes Mercy and Justice. This is the mystical dimension of Genesis 36,39 בת מי זהב, (compare author’s comment on page 544 our translation on the meaning of the word בת). The whole verse explains to us that this covenant is the “salt of the universe.” it ensures that the universe endures, or, G’d forbid, will be destroyed if the covenant is breached. We have proof of this from Deut. 29,22 where the earth around Sodom and Gomorah which had undergone a rain of sulfur and salt some 500 years earlier is described as still unfit to produce vegetation. At first glance, describing salt as a destructive agent and using it as an example of an enduring covenant, i.e. something positive, appears contradictory. However, this is not so. The two statements are merely two halves of the same coin.

You should realize that in these two paragraphs which have been written consecutively the gifts which have been allocated to both the priests and the Levites have been spelled out. In both paragraphs G’d addressed only Aaron using both the term וידבר and the term ויאמר (verses 8 and 20 respectively). The details of the 24 gifts that the priests are entitled to were told Aaron under the heading of וידבר, whereas the gifts the Israelites were to give to the Levites were introduced with the words ויאמר ה’ אל אהרן. You are already aware that the attribute which applies to the priests is primarily the attribute which characterizes the written Torah, whereas the attribute which applies to the Levites is predominantly that which is characterized by the oral Torah (our author elaborated on this in Exodus 13,1 in the kabbalistic part of his commentary). ...

In connection with the Levites you encounter the wording 'על פי ה’, an expression you do not encounter in connection with covenantal instructions issued to the Israelites (non-Levites). Our sages in Gittin 60 have said that “G’d only concluded a covenant with the Jewish people for the sake of the oral Torah.” When you open the “eyes” of your heart and look carefully you will observe that the heritage allocated to the priests is associated with G’d’s attribute אני, i.e. אני חלקך ונחלתך, “I am your share and your heritage among the Children of Israel” in verse 20 of our chapter. In this instance the word אני undoubtedly describes the attribute of Mercy. Other examples of where the wordאני clearly describes G’d in His capacity as the attribute of Mercy are found in Exodus 6,5: וגם אני שמעתי את נאקת בני ישראל, “and I have also heard the groaning of the Children of Israel, etc.” The share of the Levites is the tithe which in itself is an allusion to the עשירית, the tenth emanation. This is why the Torah phrases this as ולבני לוי הנה נתתי כל מעשר בישראל לנחלה, “and as to the members of the tribe of Levi: “here I have given every tithe in Israel as a heritage, etc.” You will find that Yaakov treated his son Levi as the tenth amongst his sons (compare what the author wrote on page 418 our translation in connection with Genesis 27,19). Yaakov took the vow to tithe everything G’d would give him so seriously that he even tithed his children. When a shepherd wants to tithe every tenth of his flock as prescribed by the Torah, he first leads all the sheep into the fold and then counts them individually, one by one. The last one in then becomes the first one out. Similarly, when Yaakov, a shepherd set out to tithe one of his children he first brought them into the fold commencing with his eldest Reuven and concluding with his youngest Binyamin. When he counted them subsequently, commencing this time with Binyamin, Levi was the tenth and therefore became sanctified.

We find this idea in Pirke d'Rabbi Eliezer chapter 37 where the author writes specifically that Yaakov tithed in reverse order, i.e. in the order we just described. According to that statement he commenced with Binyamin while he latter was still in the womb of his mother. The Midrash goes on to describe the archangel Michael presenting Levi before G’d and saying: Lord Almighty this one is Your lot, the share of Your tithes. G’d stretched out His hand and blessed Levi saying that all the sons of Levi should become holy forthwith and perform service to the Lord on earth similar to what the ministering angels do in the celestial regions. The archangel Michael continued saying: “do not the king’s servants receive their livelihood from the king as compensation for their services?” Therefore G’d allocated the tithes of the Children of Israel to the Levites. This is the meaning of Deut. 18,1: “the fire-offerings of Hashem and His inheritance shall they eat” (the latter part applies to the Levites). Thus far Pirke d'Rabbi Eliezer.

While it is true that every Levite has been sanctified, the priest has been accorded an even greater level of holiness. The Levite himself publicizes the additional sanctity of the priest seeing he has to tithe the tithe he has received from the Israelite and give it to the priest. This is the meaning of Numbers 8,19: “and from among the Israelites I formally assign the Levites to Aaron and his sons, to perform the service for the Israelite in the Tent of Meeting, etc.”

If you will look closely at our verse (18,19) you will note that the Torah applies the feminine pronoun היא to the tasks performed by the priests, i.e. the ברית מלח, whereas in connection with the Levites (verse 23) the Torah employs the pronoun הוא, i.e. the masculine pronoun. What this proves is that the attributes are not totally separate from one another and that each attribute contains elements from the other. When something is defined as “feminine,” this does not mean that it is exclusively feminine, but that the feminine ingredients in that attribute dominate; the same applies to instances when we encounter the masculine attribute, i.e. the masculine aspect is the dominant one. We already explained repeatedly that the same concept applies to attributes such as “Justice” and “Mercy” respectively. In the instance quoted the word היא means that although we said previously that the dominating attribute associated with the priests is the attribute of Mercy, the Torah wants us to realize that this attribute is not exclusive; neither is the attribute of Justice which we described as predominant in connection with the Levites exclusive; hence the masculine pronoun הוא is here (23) associated with the Levites. [A construction such as found in verses 23, i.e. ועבד הלוי הוא את עבודת אהל מועד, is most unusual as the word הוא appears totally superfluous in the sentence. Ed.] We find similar examples of apparently inverted associations with the “wrong” attribute in connection with both Yaakov and David. The most famous example is Micah 7,20 תתן אמת ליעקב, as we would never have expected the harsh attribute אמת to be applied to Yaakov. Similarly, when David (Psalms 23,1) describes the attribute “Elohim” i.e. the attribute of Justice as being the one which looks after him as a protective shepherd, this seems at first glance similarly innocuous. The lesson from that wording is that the attribute of Justice contains elements of the attribute of Mercy. David uses the subject of פרנסה, livelihood, to demonstrate that both of these attributes are involved on their respective levels in ensuring man’s livelihood.

בארצם לא תנחל, “in their land you shall have no heritage.” Our sages apply this verse (only) to the time when the land parcels will be distributed to the various tribes (Sifri Korach 119). וחלק לא יהיה לך בתוכם, “and you will not have a share among them.” This refers to booty captured in war. אני חלקך, “I am your share.” You will eat at My table (altar). The portions of the offerings assigned to you (the priests) are portions from G’d’s table.

ולבני לוי, “to the sons of Levi, etc.” Seeing that in connection with the priests the Torah had spoken of “Pinchas and his descendants after him,” (Numbers 25,13), i.e. that the priesthood would be hereditary in character, the Torah had to teach us that the same principle applied to the duties and privileges associated with the Levites. The Torah chose the word: “sons of” seeing that it had not previously used the word “after him” as it had in connection with the priesthood bestowed on Pinchas. The letter ו in ולבני, is an additive, adding something to the original i.e. the subject discussed previously, the priesthood. Just as the term “an eternal salt-like covenant” applies to the priests and the priesthood, so the same term applies to the Levites and their duties and privileges. These portions which we conclude here describe that after the various challenges to the already prevailing hierarchy had been disposed of, the staff of Aaron had to sprout not only as symbol of his personal status but as symbol once and for all that the functions of both the Levites and the Priests had been ordained from on high not just for this generation but on an ongoing hereditary basis. As mentioned previously, the sprouting of Aaron’s staff contained not only the message of Aaron’s “superiority,” but the whole phenomenon was to serve as warning to any future challengers of the system that G’d’s punishment would be swift, just as the almond tree develops swiftly. We find strong allusions to this concept in Psalms 92,8, in Isaiah 35,2, in Hoseah 14,6 and in Proverbs 11,28. In all of the verses mentioned the verb פרח does not only describe development, growth as such, but swift development.