Leviticus 2

Il. Ver. 1—16. The various meat-offerings.—The changes in language which time produces affect even the sense of Scripture; for meat formerly signified food in general; and the meat-offering was usually, if not always, of meal, corn, or bread as we find in this chapter, and generally mixed up with oil and salt; but not with leaven, nor honey. ‘These offerings seem chiefly intended to acknowledge the goodness of divine providence, in favouring us with corn and oil, and other productions of the earth. In this view, even Cain brought his mincha, or meat-offering, to God, though he brought not, as Abel did, an animal sacrifice. (See on (Genesis 4:4).) The meat-offerings, (or oblations) under the law, however, pointed to Christ, as well 00 en <a EEE eee namely, as “ the bread of God which came down from heaven;” and the oil and frankincense joined with it, may well remind us

that “he offered himself through the Eternal Spirit,” whereof oil is the acknowledged emblem, as is frankincense of the “ prayers and supplications, which, with strong crying and tears,”’ he offered unto God in the days of his flesh and passion. ((Hebrews 5:7); ix. 14.) The “salt of the covenant,” added to these offerings, was a solemn pledge of friendship on the part of God, and fidelity on the part of man. Henry considers these oblations as a kind of quit-rent, by our dependance upon God, who giveth to all which we testi[fy] 2 life, and breath, and food convenient. They that would eat and f their meat and drink drink to his glory, must consecrate some 0

Notes on the verses

Ver. 10. Burnt-sacrifice.—(Olah, a burnt-offering, from alah, to ascend, because this offering ascended, as it were, to God in flame and smoke, being wholly consumed; for which reason it is called in the Septuagint a whole burnt-offering. This was the most important of all the sacrifices; and no part of it was eaten either by the priest or the offerer, but the whole offered to God. It has been sufficiently shown by learned men, that the earth, in every age, had their burnt-offerings; there was no other way to appease the incensed gods but human sacrifices, because they imagined, as Cesar expresses it, that life was necessary to redeem life, and that the gods would be satisfied with nothing less. |—Bagster.

Chap. IL. Ver. 1. A meat-offering….

of fine flour.—‘Meat” originally meant “food or victuals. Gothic, Mate; Saxon, Methe.” | Johnson quotes Shakspeare as using the word in this general sense; and an old English author, (Tusser) as using the adjective, meated, in the sense of fed, or foddered. Speaking of oxen and horses, he says, ‘‘well seated and used.”” The same appears from the terms sweatmeats, and whitemeats, the latter meanin[g] bread and milk, &c.—Minshew’s Guide, &c. and Johnson’s Dict. So, ri[gh]ting to Ainsworth, and the best Lexicographers, the Hebrew Mincha, “a meat-offering,” was properly of things without life, as flour, cakes, wafers, &c. and might better called (he thinks) a wheat-offering. See note on (Genesis 4)

4. The heathen copied these, and most of the Jewish forms of sacrifice. See Orient. Cust. No, 701, 702. ‘ Ver. 2. A handful of flour only was to be burnt with the frankincense; the remainder was to be the priest’s. \ Ver. 4,5. Baken in the oven….. in a pan.—Margin, “On a flat pala.” ‘All these were probably heated by the fire of the altar. In the East, they have various contrivances for this purpose. Sometimes the cakes are spread on the outside of a pan, and fire put within at the bottom; sometimes d[ue to] men, that almost every nation es, from the persuasion that is; and they even offered es it, that life was d with nothing the pan is placed on the fire, and the cake spread on the inside. The word used by the Arabs for this kind of oven is ¢enwr, the very word here used.

Flat stones, and plates of iron and copper, are likewise employed for the same purpose.—Oriental Customs, No. 49. Oriental Literature, No. 242. See also Dr. Clarke.

Ver. 13. The salt of the covenant.—Salt was as generally used in the sacrifices of the heathen as the Jews, and perhaps in the patriarchal times it was the established emblem of friendship and fidelity, as it still is in the East. Baron Du Tott, speaking of a native who was taking leave, and promised to return, he mentions, that when they were half way down stairs, i asked for a piece of bread and salt; which being immediately brought, putting the salt upon the bread, “he ate it with a devout gravity, (says the Baron) assuring me that I might now rely on him.”’—Orient.

Cust. No. 50.

Ver. 14. Green ears of corn dried.—{Offerings of different kinds of grain, flour, bread, fruits, &c. are the most ancient among the heathen nations; probably borrowed from the practice of the true worshippers of God. Ovid intimates, that these gratitude-offerings originated with agriculture:—‘‘In the most ancient times men lived by rapine and hunting; for the sword was considered more honourable than the plough; but when they sowed their fields, they dedicated the first-fruits of their harvest to Ceres, to whom the ancients attributed the art of agriculture, and to whom burnt-offerings of corn were made, according to immemorial usages.” Pliny observes, that ‘‘Numa taught the Romans to offer fruits to the gods, and to make supplications before them, bringing salt cakes and parched corn; as grain in this state was deemed most wholesome.”

And it is worthy of remark, that he farther observes, the ancient Romans considered “no grain as pure or proper for divine service that had not been previously parched.”’]—Bagster. Parched corn, is a species of food still in use among the poor in Palestine and Egypt. The God of Israel is here represented as partaking with the poor, in the humblest of their repasts.