Leviticus 2:6

Thou shalt part it in pieces, and pour oil thereon: it is a meat offering.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(6) Thou shalt part it in pieces.—The cake thus baked was not to be offered as a whole, but broken up in pieces and mingled with oil. Bread, broken in pieces and steeped in oil, butter, milk, or sweet juices, still constitutes a favourite dish among the Bedouin Arabs.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

2:1-11 Meat-offerings may typify Christ, as presented to God for us, and as being the Bread of life to our souls; but they rather seem to denote our obligation to God for the blessings of providence, and those good works which are acceptable to God. The term meat was, and still is, properly given to any kind of provision, and the greater part of this offering was to be eaten for food, not burned. These meat-offerings are mentioned after the burnt-offerings: without an interest in the sacrifice of Christ, and devotedness of heart to God, such services cannot be accepted. Leaven is the emblem of pride, malice, and hypocrisy, and honey of sensual pleasure. The former are directly opposed to the graces of humility, love, and sincerity, which God approves; the latter takes men from the exercises of devotion, and the practice of good works. Christ, in his character and sacrifice, was wholly free from the things denoted by leaven; and his suffering life and agonizing death were the very opposites to worldly pleasure. His people are called to follow, and to be like him.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Part it in pieces - Break, not cut. The Bedouins are in the habit of breaking up their cakes when warm and mixing the fragments with butter when that luxury can be obtained.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6. part it in pieces, and pour oil thereon—Pouring oil on bread is a common practice among Eastern people, who are fond of broken bread dipped in oil, butter, and milk. Oil only was used in the meat offerings, and probably for a symbolic reason. It is evident that these meat offerings were previously prepared by the offerer, and when brought, the priest was to take it from his hands and burn a portion on the altar.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Thou shalt part it in pieces; because part of it was offered to God, and part given to the priest.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Thou shalt part it in pieces,.... This answered to the dividing of the pieces of the burnt offering, Leviticus 1:6 and signified the same thing; See Gill on Leviticus 1:6, Leviticus 1:12 All meat offerings, it is said (l), that were prepared in a vessel, were obliged to be cut to pieces; the meat offering of an Israelite, one (cake) was doubled into two, and two into four, and then divided, each piece was about the quantity of an olive:

and pour oil thereon; after parted into pieces; see Gill on Leviticus 2:4.

it is a meat offering; as well as that of fine flour, or that which was baked in an oven.

(l) Misn. Menachot, c. 6. sect. 4. Maimon. Maaseh Hakorbanot, c. 13. sect. 10.

Geneva Study Bible

Thou shalt part it in pieces, and pour oil thereon: it is a meat offering.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Leviticus 2:6

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Secondly, if the minchah was an offering upon the pan, it was also to be made of fine flour mixed with oil and unleavened. Machabath is a pan, made, according to Ezekiel 4:3, of iron-no doubt a large iron plate, such as the Arabs still use for baking unleavened bread in large round cakes made flat and thin (Robinson, Palestine i. 50, ii. 180). These girdles or flat pans are still in use among the Turcomans of Syria and the Armenians (see Burckhardt, Syr. p. 1003; Tavernier, Reise 1, p. 280), whilst the Berbians and Cabyles of Africa use shallow iron frying-pans for the purpose, and call them tajen, - the same name, no doubt, as τήγανον, with which the lxx have rendered machabath. These cakes were to be broken in pieces for the minchah, and oil to be poured upon them (the inf. abs. as in Exodus 13:3; Exodus 20:8, vid., Ges. 131, 4); just as the Bedouins break the cakes which they bake in the hot ashes into small pieces, and prepare them for eating by pouring butter or oil upon them.