Restrictions against the Unclean

Then the LORD said to Moses 2 “ Tell Aaron and his sons to treat with respect the sacred offerings that the Israelites have consecrated to Me so that they do not profane My holy name. I am the LORD.

3 

Tell them [that] for the generations to come, if any of [their] descendants in a state of uncleanness approaches the sacred offerings that the Israelites consecrate to the LORD, that person must be cut off from My presence. I am the LORD.

4 

If a descendant of Aaron has a skin disease[fn] or a discharge, he may not eat the sacred offerings until he is clean. Whoever touches anything defiled by a corpse or by a man who has an emission of semen, 5 or whoever touches a crawling creature or a person that makes him unclean whatever the uncleanness may be — 6 the man who touches any of these will remain unclean until evening. He must not eat from the sacred offerings unless he has bathed himself with water.

7 

When the sun has set, he will become clean, and then he may eat from the sacred offerings, for they are his food. 8 He must not eat anything found dead or torn by wild animals, which would make him unclean I am the LORD. 9 [The priests] must keep My charge, lest they bear the guilt and die because they profane it. I am the LORD who sanctifies them.

10 

No one outside [a priest’s family] may eat the sacred offering, nor may the guest of a priest or his hired hand eat [it]. 11 But if a priest buys a slave with his own money, or if [a slave] is born in his household, that [slave] may eat his food.

12 

If the priest’s daughter is married to a man other [than a priest], she is not to eat of the sacred contributions. 13 But if a priest’s daughter with no children becomes widowed or divorced and returns to her father’s house, she may share her father’s food as in her youth. But no outsider may share it.

14 

If anyone eats a sacred offering in error, he must add a fifth to its value and give the sacred offering to the priest 15 The priests must not profane the sacred offerings [that] the Israelites present to the LORD 16 by allowing the people to eat the sacred offerings and thus to bear the punishment for guilt. For I am the LORD who sanctifies them.”

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