. . . and the whole thing gets muddled. The words we traditionally use to translate Hebrew terms in the “sacrificial” system are confusing and often convey the wrong ideas. If we are going to understand Leviticus and the old world system of sacrifices and offerings, the first thing we have to do is get the words right.

This was brought home to me again this past week at the AAPC lectures. Peter Leithart spoke on the “purification offering.” But, in fact, it’s really not an “offering” at all. And I don’t believe”purification” really best translates the meaning of the Hebrew term. I highly recommend Peter’s lecture. But even he could not avoid talking about all of the rituals in Leviticus 1 as “offerings.” It’s ingrained in us. It’s very hard to overcome. Let’s talk about it.

We use English words to translate some of the Hebrew terms in Leviticus that are not helpful, but are in fact loaded with all sorts of unfortunate connotations. The book of Leviticus is a book of rituals (mostly) and the Hebrew terms used are extremely precise. I believe our Bible translations make these rituals obscure because of traditional, but inappropriate designations.

I hope I’m not sounding arrogant. Once you get the words right, the sacrificial rituals are much easier to understand and can be better appreciated for their practical instruction. If you have not listened to Jim Jordan’s short lecture series on the “sacrificial system,” you need to. It don’t see it offered in the current on-line store catalog. Write to Biblical Horizons and ask for it. I think it’s about 7 or so tapes.

I’ve already mentioned the noun “offering” and the verb “to offer,” so let’s examine those terms. I look at my English translation (it doesn’t matter which one) of Leviticus chapter one and see the word “offering” used over and over again (16 times). The verb “offer” also occurs over and over again throughout the book of Leviticus. Offering and offer. What’s the problem?

What does the word “offering” mean to you? Well, an “offering” is something “offered” to someone else, right? It’s something we hope to give to someone either as a gift or maybe to patch things up? A husband “offers” his wife flowers to help mend things after a fight. A boss “offers” an employee an opportunity. If I offer you something, you have to reach out and take it or at least accept it. Two people make some sort of exchange when something is “offered.” The essential idea of an “offering” is that something is given, a present or gift given to another. Something passes from one person to the next: “I offer you this . . .”

Now, you might think that the idea and action of “offering,” as we have explained it above, occurs all over the book of Leviticus. After all, aren’t all the “sacrifices” named “offerings”? No, they are not. The Hebrew word that comes closest to meaning what our English word “offering” denotes is minchah. This word is often translated “grain offering” because it usually involves the fruit of the ground (but not always). You can find the word all through Levitus chapter 2, for example. Even so, the word minchah is never used in the Hebrew Bible to refer to any animal “sacrificial” rite. For instance, the word is not found in chapter one, even though the English word “offering” is used there repeatedly.

Here’s a standard translation of Levitus 1:1-3a (ESV):

The LORD called Moses and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying, “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When any one of you brings an offering to the LORD, you shall bring your offering of livestock from the herd or from the flock. If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, he shall offer a male without blemish. . .

Notice how the words “offering” and “offer” dominate the last sentence. This translation, I believe, creates the wrong impression about what is being prescribed here.

The Hebrew word translated “an offering” is qorban. It is related to the verb qrb, which means “to draw near, to approach.” It’s not too hard to figure out, even if it is difficult to express what this means in one English word. A qorban is something that is brought near, something that or someone who approaches something or someone else. The word does not have anything to do with “offering” someone something or exchanging gifts. It’s about someone or something approaching or drawing near.

What Yahweh says to the people is: “When a man draws near to Yahweh with something that is brought near from the livestock or from the flock. . .”

That’s rather literalistic and wooden, but it brings out the meaning of the Hebrew nicely. The worshipper is not coming to the tabernacle primarily to “offering” something to Yahweh. At least that’s not the idea here. The worshipper is “drawing near” (qrb) with a “thing that is brought near” (qorban). The entire emphasis here is spacial. It’s about coming near to God. It’s about being invited to draw near to God, joining him in his house. Yahweh speaks from “the tent of meeting” (Lev. 1:1) and gives instructions to the sons of Israel through Moses about how to visit his house. This is one of the most important points to learn about the “sacrificial system”: it’s about drawing near to God. It’s really not first a “sacrificial system” but a “drawing near system.” It prescribes the manner in which one is to enter Yahweh’s personal space, his house. A qorban is not an “offering” to God, rather it’s “a nearbringing,” if we can invent a neologism. I believe it’s Jordan’s invention, or maybe it’s from Fox’s translation The Five Books of Moses.

Every time that something is described in our English Bible as an “offering,” it is almost always really a “nearbringing” (qorban). They are not “burnt offerings” or “sins offerings,” rather, they are “things that are brought near” to Yahweh. Indeed, these “nearbrinings” represent the worshipper, who himself is drawing near through these ritual acts. But that’s for another post.

If I had the opportunity to go back and edit my book The Lord’s Service, this is one of the corrections I would make to the terminology I use throughout the book.

Jeff Meyers is pastor of Providence Reformed Presbyterian Church in St. Louis. This piece was originally posted at the Biblical Horizons blog.