Chapter Eight

The ordination of Aaron and his sons and the sacrifices brought by them

Leviticus 8:1. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Leviticus 8:2. Take Aaron and his sons with him, and the garments, and the anointing oil, and the bull of the sin offering, and the two rams, and the basket of unleavened bread; What was commanded to Moses in Exod 29:1-3 and following, in the given chapter (and Lev 9) of the Book of Leviticus is presented as the fulfillment of that statute.

Leviticus 8:3. And assemble all the congregation at the entrance of the tent of meeting. Leviticus 8:4. And Moses did as the Lord commanded him, and the congregation assembled at the entrance of the tent of meeting. At the ordination of the sacred ministers – these mediators between the community of the people of Israel and the Lord, naturally, the presence of the entire community was required at the tent, since from this point forward a class was being set apart from the people for special service to the Lord. But the term “community” (esp. edah, qahal) can mean not the gathering of all the people, but only its elders and most honored representatives (Num 16:2, see Lev 9:1), who, according to the Pentateuch, were called more than once to serve as witnesses of significant events in place of all the people (Exod 17:6). Nevertheless, the ordination ritual lasted seven days (Lev 8:33); therefore a large part of the people could witness the significant and profoundly important ritual of the ordination of the sacred ministers.

Leviticus 8:6. And Moses brought Aaron and his sons and washed them with water; Leviticus 8:7. And he put on him the tunic, and girded him with the belt, and clothed him with the robe, and put the ephod on him, and girded him with the skillfully woven band of the ephod, tying the ephod to him with it; Leviticus 8:8. And he placed on him the breastpiece, and in the breastpiece he put the Urim and the Thummim; Leviticus 8:9. And he set the turban on his head, and on the turban, in front, he set the golden plate, the holy crown, as the Lord had commanded Moses. Leviticus 8:10. And Moses took the anointing oil and anointed the tabernacle and all that was in it, and consecrated them; Leviticus 8:11. And he sprinkled some of it on the altar seven times, and anointed the altar and all its utensils and the basin and its stand, to consecrate them; Leviticus 8:12. And he poured some of the anointing oil on the head of Aaron and anointed him, to consecrate him. Leviticus 8:13. And Moses brought Aaron’s sons and clothed them with tunics and girded them with sashes and bound caps on them, as the Lord commanded Moses. Ordination encompasses four main acts. The first act – washing with water (Lev 6, book Exod 29:4), probably the whole body, as was required of the high priest on the Day of Atonement (Lev 16:4), not merely the washing of hands and feet, which was required before each sacred action (Exod 30:19-21). Signifying the removal of not merely physical but also moral uncleanness of those being ordained, this washing was the negative moment of ordination and at the same time a prefiguring of the highest, absolute holiness of the High Priest of the New Covenant (Heb 7:26). The second act – clothing Aaron in all sacred garments assigned to the rank of high priest (Exod 28) – a symbol of the ecclesiastical-communal ministry to which the high priest was now entering (Lev 8:7-8; see Exod 29:5); equally for the same reason and with the same significance the sons of Aaron were clothed in corresponding sacred garments – priests (Lev 8:18, see Exod 29:8). The third act – anointing with sacred oil (the preparation of which is spoken of in Exod 30:23-25) first of the tabernacle and all its furnishings (Lev 8:10-11, see Exod 30:28-29) – for the consecration of this work of human hands for service to God, and then the anointing of Aaron and his sons (Lev 8:12, see Exod 28:41). The anointing of the latter is not mentioned in the given passage (Lev 8:13). But from Exod 30:30 (see Lev 7:36) and especially Exod 40:13-15, it is evident that anointing was also performed over the priests, at least in the establishment of the priesthood by law: “Anoint them, as you anointed their father, that they may serve me as priests, and their anointing shall admit them to a perpetual priesthood throughout their generations” (Exod 40:15; cp. Lev 7:36). Both the biblical text and Jewish tradition distinguish, however, the anointing of Aaron from the anointing of the priests, his sons. The first consisted primarily in a pouring (Hebrew lazag) of oil on the head of Aaron in an abundant quantity (see Ps 7:2) and then in the anointing (maschach) – probably of the face and garments. The anointing (maschach) of the priests consisted only in the latter action and was understood by tradition in the sense of marking on the forehead of each a likeness of the Greek letter χ (Maimonides) or the Hebrew letter kaph (k, according to Abarbanel). But both the higher anointing of Aaron and the lower anointing of his sons served equally as a symbol of the bestowal of the grace of the Holy Spirit (see 1 Sam 10:1-6, Ps 61:1), necessary for them in view of the extraordinary importance and responsibility of their ministry. The fourth and final act of ordination – the sacrifice-making of those being ordained (Lev 8:14-30, see Exod 29:10-28). Sacrifices were brought for sin (Lev 14-17), for burnt offering (Lev 8:18-21) and a special ordination sacrifice (Lev 8:22-30). For the sin offering of the high priest (together with his son) a bull is taken, according to the prescription Lev 4:3, and the entire ritual in all agrees with the regulation Lev 4:3-12, concerning the sin offering of the high priest. There is, however, also a difference. If in Lev 4:3 and following a definite fact of the sin of the high priest already ordained is meant, then here, in the ordination of the holy place and its ministers, the general sinfulness of the latter is in view, and since the tabernacle is being consecrated at the same time, the blood of the sacrifice is smeared on the horns of only the burnt offering altar (this center of the Old Testament sacrificial cult), not on the horns of the incense altar, and no sprinkling of blood before certain objects occurs (in regard to the blood-sprinkling the sacrifice for the sins of Aaron and his sons approaches, in this way, the sacrifice for the sins of the laypeople, Lev 4:25). All the meat with the hide was burned outside the camp according to Lev 4:12: the ones being ordained could not eat the sacrifice for their sin, and Moses, the performer of the sacrifice in this case, was not a priest and therefore also did not have the right to taste it.

Leviticus 8:18. And Moses brought the ram of the burnt offering, and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the ram; Leviticus 8:19. And Moses killed it and dashed the blood on the altar all around; Leviticus 8:20. And he cut the ram into pieces, and Moses burned the head and the pieces and the fat; Leviticus 8:21. And he washed the entrails and the legs with water, and Moses burned all the ram on the altar as a burnt offering, a pleasing aroma, a food offering to the Lord, as the Lord commanded Moses. The burnt offering was a ram, in all respects in accordance with the prescription Lev 1:10-13 concerning the burnt offering of small livestock, and the specific command concerning this from the Lord to Moses Exod 29:15-18.

Leviticus 8:22. And Moses brought the second ram, the ram of ordination, and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the ram; Leviticus 8:23. And Moses killed it and took some of its blood and put it on the lobe of Aaron’s right ear and on the thumb of his right hand and on the big toe of his right foot. Leviticus 8:24. And Moses brought Aaron’s sons, and put some of the blood on the lobe of their right ears and on the thumbs of their right hands and on the big toes of their right feet, and Moses dashed the blood on the altar all around. Leviticus 8:25. Then he took the fat and the broad tail and all the fat that was on the entrails, and the appendage on the liver, and both kidneys and their fat and the right thigh; Leviticus 8:26. And from the basket of unleavened bread that was before the Lord, he took one unleavened bread and one bread with oil and one wafer, and placed them on the fat and on the right thigh; Leviticus 8:27. And he put all these in the hands of Aaron and in the hands of his sons, and waved them as a wave offering before the Lord; Leviticus 8:28. Then Moses took them from their hands and burned them on the altar with the burnt offering; this was an ordination offering, a pleasing aroma, a food offering to the Lord. Leviticus 8:29. And Moses took the breast and waved it as a wave offering before the Lord; it was Moses’ portion of the ram of ordination, as the Lord commanded Moses. Leviticus 8:30. Then Moses took some of the anointing oil and some of the blood that was on the altar and sprinkled it on Aaron and his garments, and also on his sons and his sons’ garments; thus he consecrated Aaron and his garments, and his sons and his sons’ garments with him. In the ordination sacrifice, also a ram was taken. The ritual of sacrifice, in essentials, is similar to the rituals of the peace offering (Lev 8:22, cp. Lev 3): the same parts were burned (Lev 7), and likewise the ceremony of waving before the Lord was performed over the same parts (the right thigh and the breast) and in union with the same bread products, as in the peace offering (cp. Lev 8:25). But the peculiarity, exclusively belonging to this ordination sacrifice, consisted in the anointing with the blood of the ordination sacrifice of the right ear, the thumb of the right hand, and the big toe of the right foot of the high priest and priests (Lev 7:29-34). According to Blessed Theodoret (question 8 on Leviticus), “the right ear is a sign of praiseworthy obedience, and the hand and foot are symbols of good deeds; therefore the right hand and right foot were anointed, because there are deeds of the left and harmful obedience.” In view of the identity of this latter ceremony with the ceremonies at the admission into the theocratic community of a healed and cleansed leper (Lev 8:23-24), its significance can be determined thus: entering as ministers into the sanctuary and approaching more closely than others to God (cp Lev 14:14) the high priest and priests were cleansed, like the healed lepers, from all impurity in the most perfect manner, which was indicated by their continuous stay in the courtyard of the tabernacle for seven days (Num 16:5 Lev 8:33-34). The blood and oil were also sprinkled on the garments of Aaron and his sons to express their total dedication (equally with the sprinkled and consecrated sanctuary) to God.

Leviticus 8:33. You shall not go outside the entrance of the tent of meeting for seven days, until the days of your ordination are completed, for it will take seven days to ordain you; Leviticus 8:34. As has been done today, the Lord has commanded to be done to make atonement for you; Leviticus 8:35. At the entrance of the tent of meeting you shall remain day and night for seven days and keep the charge of the Lord, so that you do not die, for so I am commanded. Leviticus 8:36. And Aaron and his sons did all the things that the Lord had commanded through Moses. (See Exod 29:29-35). The conclusion of the ordination ritual; Moses’s instructions to Aaron and his sons concerning the use of the flesh of the ordination sacrifice (Lev 8:31-32) and the directive about their seven-day stay “at the entrance of the tent of meeting” (Lev 8:35), that is, in the courtyard of the tabernacle, with the obligation to repeat in each of the seven days the sacrifices and rituals of the first day (Exod 29:35). According to Maimonides, the priests were ordained once and for all by this ordination; each new high priest, however, had to be ordained again (the anointing of high priests existed only until the Babylonian captivity).