How does Numbers 29:4 connect with other sacrificial laws in Leviticus? Focus verse “and with each of the seven lambs one-tenth.” (Numbers 29:4) Setting the scene • Numbers 29 lists the offerings for the seventh-month festivals. • Verse 4 sits in the instructions for the Feast of Trumpets (vv. 1-6). • It specifies the grain offering measure that accompanies the seven lambs of the burnt offering. Where we have seen this before in Leviticus • Leviticus 1 – Burnt offerings: unblemished animals “for a pleasing aroma to the LORD” (v. 9). Numbers 29:2-3 repeats that language and standard. • Leviticus 2 – Grain offerings: fine flour mixed with oil. Numbers 29:4 gives the exact portion—“one-tenth of an ephah”—which is the basic unit first laid down in Leviticus 2:1-3. • Leviticus 6:14-18 – Ongoing priestly grain-offering responsibilities. The fixed “one-tenth” portion in Numbers 29:4 echoes the perpetual rule that grain must always accompany burnt flesh on the altar (cf. Leviticus 6:15). • Leviticus 23:24-25 – The Feast of Trumpets is instituted here, but only in outline. Numbers 29 fills in the sacrificial details, using the same categories already defined in Leviticus 1-7. • Leviticus 4:27-35 – Sin offerings with a goat. Although the goat is named in Numbers 29:5, the flow from v. 4 to v. 5 shows the festival still needs the sin-offering component first explained in Leviticus 4. Why the matching measurements matter • Consistency – The “one-tenth” unit keeps every daily, weekly, monthly, and festival offering in step with the baseline given at Sinai. • Completeness – Burnt flesh plus grain plus drink (v. 6) mirrors the triad in Leviticus 2 and 23, portraying whole-person devotion: body (animal), sustenance (grain), and joy (wine). • Atonement – The burnt offering (Leviticus 1) deals with general sinfulness; the goat (Leviticus 4) addresses specific guilt. The grain in v. 4 is not cosmetic—it fulfills the law’s demand that blood and bread go together (Leviticus 2:13 “salt of the covenant”). The theological thread • The precise duplication of Levitical ratios in Numbers 29:4 shows that festival worship never drifts from the foundational sacrificial law. • Unblemished animals (Leviticus 1:3) plus exact grain (Leviticus 2) underscore God’s unchanging standard of holiness. • Every offering, whether daily or annual, looks ahead to the perfect offering of Christ, “an offering and a sacrifice to God for a fragrant aroma” (Ephesians 5:2)—language drawn straight from Leviticus and echoed in Numbers 29. Takeaway Numbers 29:4 is not an isolated line; it intentionally carries forward the fixed laws of Leviticus so that Israel’s festival worship stays anchored to the same unalterable pattern of sacrifice, holiness, and atonement laid down at Sinai. |
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