What Does Leviticus 6:25 Mean?
Speak to Aaron and to his sons, saying, This is the instruction of the offering for falling short. In the place where the rising is slaughtered shall the offering for falling short be slaughtered before the LORD. It is most set apart.
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
Speak unto Aaron and to his sons, saying, This is the law of the sin offering: In the place where the burnt offering is killed shall the sin offering be killed before the LORD: it is most holy.THE KEY
The Hebrew word for “sin offering” also names the missing itself, and its offering is killed where the ascending offering is killed, before the LORD.
THE MEANING
The verse gives the missed mark a named place before the LORD: its offering is killed where the burnt offering is killed. The killing remains explicit, and the text calls this offering most set apart.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that the missed mark must be hidden from God is undone: its offering is killed openly before the LORD.
THE ROOT
חַטָּאת
ḥaṭṭāʾt
GROWS FROM
חטא
ḥ-ṭ-ʾ
To miss, go wrong, or fail to reach the mark.
“offering for falling short” in this verse is ḥaṭṭāʾt. חַטָּאת can name both the missing and the offering associated with it, keeping the wound and its rite in one word. The verse does not hide the cost of that meeting: the offering is killed before the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāṭāʾ: To miss or do wrong.
חָטָא
The verb names the act of missing that the offering addresses.
ḥēṭʾ: A missing, fault, or offense.
חֵטְא
This noun names the missed mark from the same root as the offering.
עֹלָה
ʿōlāh
GROWS FROM
עלה
ʿ-l-h
To go up or ascend.
The Hebrew name carries the motion of rising, while “burnt offering” names what happens to it in the fire. The verse places the offering for the missing at the same killing place as the offering named for ascent.
ALSO GROWS
ʿālāh: To go up or ascend.
עָלָה
The verb makes the upward movement audible inside the offering’s name.
maʿălāh: An ascent or upward step.
מַעֲלָה
This related noun preserves the root’s sense of rising.
קֹדֶשׁ קָדָשִׁים
qōdeš qodāšîm
GROWS FROM
קדש
q-d-sh
To set apart, mark as distinct.
“most set apart” in this verse is qōdeš qodāšîm. The phrase is “set-apart of set-apart”: the offering is marked as belonging to a distinct, highest category. The verse holds the offering for the missing within that set-apart space before the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
qādōsh: Set apart.
קָדוֹשׁ
This adjective carries the root’s central sense into the verse’s declaration.
miqdāsh: A sanctuary, a set-apart place.
מִקְדָּשׁ
The sanctuary is another branch of the same root of setting apart.
THE PATTERN
The missed mark is brought into God’s presence through an offering whose cost is made explicit.
And he leans his hand upon the head of the young goat, and slaughters it in the place where the rising offering is slaughtered before the LORD. It is the offering for falling short.Yet the LORD delighted to crush him, and to sicken him. When you make his living soul a guilt offering, he shall see his seed, and lengthen his days, and the delight of the LORD shall break through in his hand.And nearly all things are cleansed in blood according to the instruction, and without the pouring out of blood, no release comes.THE THREAD
For he made him who knew no falling short to be a shortcoming for us, so that in him we might become the alignment of God.The Greek word rendered “sin” is hamartia, also used in the Greek Leviticus for the sin offering. That shared word holds the missing and the offering for it together, opening Paul’s stark phrase beside Leviticus’s explicit killing.
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