What Does Numbers 28:12 Mean?
And three tenths of flour for a gift, mingled with oil, for one young bull; and two tenths of flour for a gift, mingled with oil, for one ram;
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 three tenth deals of flour for a meat offering, mingled with oil, for one bullock; and two tenth deals of flour for a meat offering, mingled with oil, for one ram;THE KEY
The flour and oil are joined by a Hebrew root that Genesis also uses in its wordplay about Babel’s confusion.
THE MEANING
The offering has a distinct measure for each animal: three tenths of flour for the bull and two for the ram. The flour is mingled with oil, making the accompanying provision a prepared mixture. Proportion and blending are part of the offering itself.
THE ROOT
בְּלוּלָה
belulah
GROWS FROM
בלל
b-l-l
To mix, mingle, or blend; in some contexts, to confuse.
“mingled” in this verse is belulah. The English word gives the sense of a recipe, while the Hebrew root also carries the possibility of confusion. Here, the mixture is deliberate and measured; Genesis uses the same root in a wordplay about language becoming confused at Babel.
ALSO GROWS
balal: To mix, mingle, or confuse.
בָּלַל
This verb names the action behind “mingled” and is used in Genesis 11:7–9 for the confusing of language.
belil: Mixed fodder or a prepared mixture.
בְּלִיל
Isaiah 30:24 uses this related noun for animal feed, showing the root can name a concrete mixture prepared for use.
Bavel: Babel; the name is linked by biblical wordplay to confusion.
בָּבֶל
Genesis 11:9 plays the name against the verb “to confuse”; this is a scriptural sound-play, not a claim about the name’s historical etymology.
THE PATTERN
An offering is measured in proportion to what it accompanies or to what the giver has.
Or for a ram, you shall prepare a gift of two tenth measures of flour mixed with a third of a hin of oil.And the grain gift is an ephah for a ram, and the grain gift for the lambs as his hand gives, and a hin of oil to an ephah.For if the leaning heart is there first, it is well received according to what one has, and not according to what one does not have.THE THREAD
Or for a ram, you shall prepare a gift of two tenth measures of flour mixed with a third of a hin of oil.The word translated “mingled” comes from the same Hebrew root in both verses. Numbers 15:6 adds the oil measure, showing the ram’s portion as a fully specified mixture.
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