What Does Leviticus 22:15 Mean in the King James?
And they shall not profane the holy things of the children of Israel, which they offer unto the LORD;
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
To profane is to make common what has been set apart.
THE MEANING
What you bring to the LORD does not become common simply because it passes through human hands. The verse speaks of something already set apart, then names the human act that can profane it. Sacredness is held in the tension between what is offered and how it is treated.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that offering something to God makes its later treatment inconsequential: what is set apart can still be profaned.
THE ROOT
יְחַלְּלוּ
yeḥallelū
GROWS FROM
חלל
ḥ-l-l
To make common or violate what is set apart.
English “profane” can sound like disrespect, but this Hebrew verb carries the act of making what is set apart common. The verse describes a change in how something already sacred is treated.
ALSO GROWS
ḥol: Common, ordinary, or profane.
חֹל
This branch names the ordinary state that profaning brings into contact with what is set apart.
ḥillul: Profanation or desecration.
חִלּוּל
This noun makes the act explicit: profanation is the violation of what has been set apart.
קָדְשֵׁי
qodšê
GROWS FROM
קדש
q-d-sh
To set apart as sacred.
The phrase names the holy things of Israel: things set apart. Beside the root for profaning, it reveals the hinge of the verse: profanation collapses the distinction between what is set apart and what is common.
ALSO GROWS
qādōš: Set apart, sacred.
קָדוֹשׁ
This adjective carries the same quality as the holy things named in the verse.
qiddēš: Set apart or consecrate.
קִדֵּשׁ
This verb shows the action of making something sacred by setting it apart.
יָרִימוּ
yārîmû
GROWS FROM
רום
r-w-m
To rise, raise, or lift up.
The Hebrew verb rendered “offer” is built from the root for lifting up. Its related noun for a contribution or offering preserves that image: what is given is lifted toward the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
rām: High or raised.
רָם
This branch makes the root’s sense of elevation visible in the act of offering.
terūmāh: A contribution or offering, something lifted up.
תְּרוּמָה
This offering word shares the lifting root and illuminates the movement in “which they offer.”
THE PATTERN
What is set apart is profaned when the boundary between sacred and common is erased.
Neither shall ye profane my holy name; but I will be hallowed among the children of Israel: I am the LORD which hallow you,Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they shewed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.THE THREAD
And ye shall bear no sin by reason of it, when ye have heaved from it the best of it: neither shall ye pollute the holy things of the children of Israel, lest ye die.Numbers 18:32 repeats the Hebrew root חלל (ḥ-l-l) for profaning and קדש (q-d-sh) for holy things. It also uses the lifting root רום (r-w-m), the root behind “offer” here, keeping the raised offering and the danger of profaning it in the same view.
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