What Does Leviticus 4:20 Mean?
And he does to this young bull as he did to the young bull for falling short, and the priest makes a covering for them, and it is released to them.
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 he shall do with the bullock as he did with the bullock for a sin offering, so shall he do with this: and the priest shall make an atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them.THE KEY
The verse joins two distinct movements: atonement covers, and forgiveness releases.
THE MEANING
When wrongdoing is named, this verse holds two things together: atonement is made, and the people are forgiven. Its language gives forgiveness a concrete companion, the covering of what has gone wrong, rather than treating release as a denial that anything happened.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Forgiveness is not presented as pretending the wrong never happened; the verse names atonement before it names release.
THE ROOT
כִּפֶּר
kipper
GROWS FROM
כפר
kaphar
To cover; to make a covering.
“makes a covering” in this verse is kipper. “Atonement” can sound abstract, but its Hebrew root also carries the sense of covering. The verse then names forgiveness through a different root, joining covering and release without making them synonyms.
ALSO GROWS
kippurim: Atonements; covering rites.
כִּפֻּרִים
This related form keeps the verse’s act within a family of covering language.
kapporet: The covering over the ark, often rendered “mercy seat.”
כַּפֹּרֶת
Its name gives covering a physical image, echoing the concrete language beneath “atonement.”
וְנִסְלַח
venislach
GROWS FROM
סלח
salach
To forgive; to release.
“released” in this verse is venislach. The Hebrew carries forgiveness as release. In this verse that release follows atonement, so the two words touch the same outcome from distinct sides: covering and letting go.
ALSO GROWS
selichah: Forgiveness.
סְלִיחָה
This noun gives a name to the release expressed by “it shall be forgiven.”
sallaḥ: Forgiving; ready to forgive.
סַלָּח
This related form describes the one who forgives, keeping the release personal rather than abstract.
THE PATTERN
Scripture joins the addressing of wrongdoing with covering, cleansing, or release.
For on that day the priest makes a covering for you, to cleanse you, so that you may be clean from all your shortcomings before the LORD.A Psalm of David, Maschil. Flourishing is the one whose rebellion is released, whose shortcomings are covered.If we speak our shortcomings into the open, he is steady and aligned, to release our shortcomings, and to cleanse us from all crookedness.THE THREAD
For on that day the priest makes a covering for you, to cleanse you, so that you may be clean from all your shortcomings before the LORD.The same Hebrew verb, כִּפֶּר (kipper, “make atonement”), appears there alongside cleansing. The repeated root opens the covering in this verse toward a wider image of becoming clean.
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