What Does Leviticus 16:33 Mean in the King James?

And he shall make an atonement for the holy sanctuary, and he shall make an atonement for the tabernacle of the congregation, and for the altar, and he shall make an atonement for the priests, and for all the people of the congregation.

Leviticus 16:33 · KJV

The analysis reads the King James wording.

King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

The same act of covering reaches the sanctuary, altar, priests, and people: no part of the shared sacred life stands outside it.

THE MEANING

This verse meets you as part of a whole: the places where you gather, the work carried out there, and the people beside you all belong within the same covering. It holds the sanctuary, tent, altar, priests, and congregation together rather than isolating one person from the space and shared life around them.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The idea that only the individual needs covering; here, the sacred space, altar, priests, and congregation are all named.

THE ROOT

כִּפֶּר

kipper

GROWS FROM

כפר

K-P-R

cover, cover over

“atonement” in this verse is kipper. The same verb is repeated across the sanctuary, tent, altar, priests, and congregation: covering reaches across the whole sacred field, not only an individual. This root also describes coating Noah’s ark with pitch, where a covering seals and preserves; the shared word makes the image concrete without making the two acts identical.

ALSO GROWS

kippūr: covering; atonement

כִּפּוּר

This noun preserves the same covering sense carried by the repeated verb in the verse.

kōfer: pitch, a coating or covering; in other contexts, a covering payment

כֹּפֶר

The same root supplies the word for the pitch coating the ark, giving a physical image of covering.

THE PATTERN

The covering extends across the whole field of worship, from sacred objects to the gathered people.

And Aaron shall make an atonement upon the horns of it once in a year with the blood of the sin offering of atonements: once in the year shall he make atonement upon it throughout your generations: it is most holy unto the LORD.

Exodus 30:10 · KJVThe altar itself receives the yearly atonement, as the sanctuary and altar do in Leviticus.

A Psalm of David, Maschil. Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

Psalm 32:1 · KJVThe covering reaches the person’s transgression, showing the same image applied to what weighs on an individual.

And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.

Hebrews 9:22 · KJVThe verse speaks of purging both things and people’s release from wrongdoing, spanning the sacred and the personal.

THE THREAD

Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.

Genesis 6:14 · KJV

The Hebrew verb translated “pitch it” comes from the same ⁨כפר⁩ (K-P-R) root as “make an atonement” here. In Genesis, the root names a coating that seals the ark; in Leviticus, it names a covering extended across the sanctuary and its people.

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