What Does Leviticus 16:5 Mean in the King James?
And he shall take of the congregation of the children of Israel two kids of the goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
One Hebrew word names both the community’s missing and the offering brought for it.
THE MEANING
You stand within a shared human field of missing: this verse places the offering among the congregation rather than in isolation. Two goats belong to one offering for the missing, while a ram is set apart for a burnt offering; the chapter carries the shared burden toward naming and release.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The community’s missing is not only a private stain to conceal; this verse gives it a shared place to be named and addressed.
THE ROOT
חַטָּאת
ḥaṭṭāʾt
GROWS FROM
חטא
ḥṭʾ
To miss, err, or fail to reach the mark.
“sin offering” in this verse is ḥaṭṭāʾt. Beneath the familiar phrase, the Hebrew noun can name both the missing itself and the offering associated with it. The same word holds the rupture and the ritual response within one frame.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāṭāʾ: To miss, err, or sin.
חָטָא
The verb shows the people’s failure as a missing, not only as a religious category.
ḥēṭʾ: Missing, offense, or sin.
חֵטְא
This related noun names the condition that the offering addresses.
ḥaṭṭāʾt: Missing or sin; also an offering for the missing.
חַטָּאת
The word used for the offering keeps it linguistically joined to what the community has missed.
THE PATTERN
A community’s missing is brought into the open, given a shared form, and carried toward release.
When the sin, which they have sinned against it, is known, then the congregation shall offer a young bullock for the sin, and bring him before the tabernacle of the congregation.And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness:If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.THE THREAD
And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness:The word translated “sins” here comes from the same חטא root as the offering named in verse 5: the missing and the offering for it share a word-family. The verse then uses שָׁלַח (shalach), send, release, to show the missing being carried away.
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