וינזרו מקדשי בני ישראל, they should not think that the senior among them may treat the sacrifices donated by the people as if they were secular in nature as far as they were concerned. We are familiar with the principle alluded to here by the Torah from Moed Katan 16 מנודה לתלמיד אינו מנודה לרב, “if something is legally out of bounds to the student this does not automatically mean that it is equally out of bounds to the student’s teacher.” (although if the situation is reversed what is out of bounds to the teacher is most certainly also forbidden to the student. ולא יחללו את שם קדשי אשר הם מקדישים לי. They shall not desecrate the things the ordinary Jews have sanctified for Me, which now bear My holy name.

כי לחמו הוא, and he need not await his atonement before he may eat what is his regular diet, לחמו. Our sages in Pessachim 35 stated that as soon as the sun has set the priest (who had ritually immersed himself after having contracted ritual impurity) may eat t‘rumah. [he may not yet eat sacrificial meats which are of a higher level of holiness until the following morning as those are not considered his לחמו, regular diet. Ed.]

אני ה' מקדשם, I have sanctified them (the items sanctified as donations by the ordinary Israelites) It is therefore appropriate that priests who treat these sanctified objects with disdain (as if they were profane), be punished for desecrating them.

והשיאו אותם עון אשמה, they themselves, when they declared the items in question (for instance t’rumah) as sacred cause themselves to become guilty in the event they would trespass and make profane use of them. The Torah does not allow you to apply the principle הפה שאסר הוא הפה שהתיר, that just as one may declare something forbidden, the same person can also declare it as allowed. (D’mai,6,11) The reason why we cannot apply this principle in this case is אני ה' מקדשו, seeing that G’d Himself elevated this item to a status of holiness, a mere mortal, even the donor, cannot remove such sanctity at his own discretion.

אשר יקריב קרבנו, after the Torah had addressed the priests, who offer the sacrifices on the altar as well as their status of sanctity, it now discusses rules applying to the offerings themselves., saying that the following applies to לכל נדריהם ולכל נדבותם, even these offerings were voluntary offerings as opposed to mandatory offerings, and I might have thought that any such offering, even of a blemished animal, would be gratefully accepted by G’d, seeing the individual in question was under no obligation to offer any sacrifice at this time, the Torah states flatly that this is not so. The author, quoting Maleachi 1,5 as proof that one would not dare offer a gift to a human ruler that was less than perfect, how much less would one dare to do this “for” G’d, concludes that there must have been people in his time guilty of mistaking what is expected of them and offering inferior animals as sacrifices.

לרצונכם , as a sacrifice that will confer G’d’s goodwill upon you, and not for the Temple treasury.

תמים זכר, it must be male and unblemished seeing the Creator is described as having produced work which is perfect, unblemished, when He created the universe. (Compare Deuteronomy 32,4)

כל אשר בו מום לא תקריבו כי לא לרצון יהיה לכם, as elaborated on by Maleachi 1,8.

After the Torah has warned that the burnt offering, עולה, is of such a high rank of such sacred items, קדשי קדשיםthat only unblemished male animals may be used for such offerings, and that this requirement pertains only to cattle and sheep or goats, i.e. conditions which are not applicable to bird offerings, (compare Kidushin 16) it continues with ואיש כי יקריב 'זבח שלמים לה, to inform us that although this kind of meat offering is of a lower ranking sanctity, קדשים קלים and the Torah does not insist that such an animal must be male, in order to confer G’d’s goodwill on the donor, it must still be a perfect, unblemished animal of its species. We know from Leviticus 3,1 that such offerings are acceptable also if a female animal is offered. Verse 22 explains that it is simply not acceptable to offer a blemished animal to G’d as a sacrifice. An additional rule why blemished animals are not acceptable are the words ואשה לא תתנו מהם על המזבח לה'. The Torah informs us with these words that even if the blemish in the animal designated as the sacrifice originated only after it had been sanctified, the parts which are normally burnt on the altar, i.e. certain fat parts and membranes over the kidneys, because it simply is not acceptable that even if the parts designated for the altar are unblemished, anything which before getting to this stage had had a disqualifying blemish disqualifies the whole as it is looked upon with dismay by G’d.

נדבה תעשה אותו, even though numerous blemishes may be apparent you may donate them for the Temple treasury although the donor thought that on account of these blemishes they would be rejected by the Temple treasurer. The Torah differentiates between gifts for the Temple treasury and animals destined for the altar. Whereas even minor blemishes disqualify an animal from being offered on the altar, no such restrictions apply to gifts known as נדבה. This is possible because the bodies of such animals do not possess any sanctity, such sanctity only applies to their value, i.e. to the money realised from the sale of such animals. This enables the body which was donated to be treated as if it had never been sanctified in any way.

ומעוך וכתות, after the Torah spoke about the kind of physical blemishes which are of ritual consequence only in connection with sacrificial animals, and which must under no circumstances be caused to such an animal once it has been sanctified, the Torah turns to the kind of internal blemishes which one must not cause even to animals which have never been sanctified, are totally secular in their use.

Even though gifts for the Temple treasury are accepted from pagans, no blemished animals are to be accepted from them as such. Even if the animal became blemished through a deliberate surgical procedure, such as castrating it, something which generally improves the value of the animal so castrated, it disqualifies it from use by the Temple treasury, not to mention as a sacrifice on the altar. Seeing that the gentiles consider such animals as superior, we could not apply to such gifts the criticism voiced by Maleach 1,8 which we referred to twice already. We might therefore have thought that seeing that in the donor’s eyes he presents a superior gift to G’d this would be acceptable; the Torah takes a dim view of castrating animals which were created to proliferate. The Torah describes such castrated animals as

כי משחתם בהם מום, for their corruption is within them, (not only external). When disqualifying blemished animals for the altar the Torah did not only have in mind visible blemishes, which are after all, only external, but invisible blemishes also, the latter often being more serious.

שור או כשב, after the Torah had mentioned the various defective animals that are disqualified from being offered on the altar, it now mentions a number of situations in which even a perfectly healthy specimen of the ritually qualified animals may also not yet (or no longer) be fit as a sacrifice on the altar. Just as we learned that the monetary value of the animal is not the only criterion regarding its acceptability for the altar, so we shall hear now that there are still other considerations which can disqualify an animal frrom its being welcome to G’d as an offering. If an animal has not yet reached the eighth day of its life, it cannot be used as a sacrifice. If the owner of said animal, or the priest offering it on his behalf, intends to consume it or part of it outside the holy precincts allocated for such eating by the Torah, or said owner plans to eat it past the deadline set by the Torah for consumption of such sacrificial meat, the sacrifice not only becomes disqualified but the penalty is extremely harsh. The technical terms for such disqualify cations are מחוסר זמן, too young, or אותו ואת בנו, if the mother animal had been sacrifice already on the same day, or פיגול, if the donor or priest had planned to deviate from the halachah governing where and for how many days such an animal could be eaten after it had been slaughtered. The intention known as חוץ לזמנו, eating part of it beyond the deadline set by the Torah even carries the karet penalty. The time limits are spelled out in our verses here.

לרצונכם תזבחו ביום ההוא יאכל, your intentions at the time of performing the sacrificial procedure must be to eat it on the same day, (compare Rashi), the reason for these rules bein אני ה', seeing that I am perfect and My work is perfect, I will not tolerate deviations by you either by shortening the period or lengthening it. [seeing that this legislation has been dealt with in the Torah already in Leviticus 7,15-17 may have prompted the author to refer to Rashi’s explanation on our verse that the beginning of the time frame is meant, i.e. the same day, one must not wait until the second day to start eating from it.. Ed.]

ולא תחללו את שם קדשי, seeing that you the priests of all people are more aware than anyone of the perfection of My works, if you do not take care not to deviate from My commandments, this would be the greatest desecration of My holy name. The verse is reminiscent of Ezekiel 36,20 where the prophet laments that the exiles who come to host countries behave in such a way that the leaders of the host countries exclaim in dismay that surely these cannot the people of whom they have heard that they emulate the ways of their G’d!

ונקדשתי בתוך בני ישראל, to continue to perform miracles for them as I had vowed to do when I said in Exodus 34,10 “I shall display miracles in the presence of your whole nation as proof that אני ה' מקדשכם, I, the Lord sanctify you.”

המוציא אתכם מארץ מצרים להיות לכם לאלוקים. I wanted to become your immediate leader, not employing any intermediaries, just as I am an immediate leader for disembodied beings. Of course, this was based on the premise that you would walk in the path of My Holiness, as mentioned by Jeremiah 10,2 “do not learn the ways of the nations and do not be in awe of the portents you believe to see in the sky.”

'אני ה; I have not changed and I will continue to perform miracles as I have done in former times, unless you erect barriers between yourselves and Me by not walking in the paths I have assigned for you. We have this promise spelled out in Micha 7,15 “as in the days when you came out of Egypt I will display miracles.”