What Does Leviticus 17:9 Mean?
And does not bring it to the door of the tent of meeting, to bring it near to the LORD. Even that man shall be cut off from among his people.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And bringeth it not unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, to offer it unto the LORD; even that man shall be cut off from among his people.THE KEY
The root behind “cut off” also forms כָּרַת בְּרִית (karat berit, “cut a covenant”), so here the language of belonging carries the sharp edge of severance.
THE MEANING
The offering comes to the appointed opening of the tent of meeting before the LORD. The person who bypasses that meeting place is cut off from their people; the consequence is separation from the community.
THE ROOT
וְנִכְרַת
venikhrat
GROWS FROM
כרת
cut, sever, cut away
“cut off” in this verse is venikhrat. The root כרת (karat, “cut”) appears both in this penalty and in the phrase כָּרַת בְּרִית (karat berit, “cut a covenant”). The shared seed holds together being bound into a covenant and being severed from a people.
ALSO GROWS
karat berit: Make a covenant, expressed literally as cutting one.
כָּרַת בְּרִית
The same root that names exclusion also describes the forming of a bond.
keritut: A formal severing of a marriage bond.
כְּרִיתוּת
This branch gives “cut off” the weight of a relationship being severed, not simply a person being sent away.
מוֹעֵד
mo'ed
GROWS FROM
יעד
appoint, designate; arrange a meeting
The Hebrew designation is אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד (ohel mo’ed, “tent of meeting”), built on יָעַד (ya’ad, “appoint”). Its name makes this a meeting appointed for encounter, not a generic place to bring an offering.
ALSO GROWS
ya'ad: Appoint, designate, or set a meeting.
יָעַד
The place of offering is part of an encounter that has been appointed.
mo'ed: An arranged meeting or a designated time.
מוֹעֵד
The tent’s name marks the encounter as a shared, appointed meeting.
THE PATTERN
Approach to the LORD’s set-apart presence follows the place or means appointed for that encounter.
If his drawing near from the herd is a rising offering, he shall bring near a whole male to the opening of the tent of appointed meeting, and he shall bring it near of his own pleasure before the face of the LORD.But in the place which the LORD shall choose in one of your tribes, there you shall offer your rising offerings, and there you shall do all that I command you.Having therefore, brothers, open speech for entering the set-apart places by the blood of Jesus,THE THREAD
On that day the LORD cut a covenant with Abram, saying, To your seed I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates.In Hebrew, Genesis says the LORD כָּרַת (karat, “cut”) a בְּרִית (berit, “covenant”), from the same root rendered “cut off” here. The shared root makes this verse’s exclusion sound like severing from a bond of belonging.
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