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  • From: "Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Leviticus 27:29 and human sacrifice ???
  • Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2005 21:57:07 -0500

Dear Karl,

I have read and heard it repeatedly that the biggest moral
difference between Judaism and paganism is that
Judaism forbade human sacrifice. With the unfortunate
exception of YPTX's daughter, that characterization seems
accurate.

HH: This is not something Yahweh commanded, and there is debate about the interpretation of the passage.

In Leviticus 27:29 (look also at the verses around it) there
seems to be a command that human sacrifice is to be
practiced.

The question that may clear up this understanding is the
definition of XRM.

I checked Reinier de Blois' online dictionary, but does it
really fit this use?

I suspect that the lexeme XRM may have the idea of
marking out, as in designating animals to be sacrificed
such that they can no longer be considered owned by the
designator, but also marked as in blemished physically,
such that a hereditary priest may not serve in the temple
(Leviticus 21:18) or blemished morally such that his death
is an execution of the guilty, not a sacrifice.

HH: Milgrom summarizes the issue as having two alternatives, either verses 28-29 are speaking of the identical situation, or they are speaking of different situations. He concludes that they speak of different situations for two reasons: 1) a person would not be treated the same way as fields and unclean animals (v. 28), and 2) if verse 29 expanded on verse 28, there would be connective particle like )K joining verse 29 to verse 28. Milgrom notes the difference between the active verb in v. 28 ("dedicates") and the passive one in v. 29 ("is dedicated"). He sees verse 28 as something the owner of a slave, animal, or property decides. He views the banned person in verse 29 as assigned that status by an outside judicial body like a court.

HH: Delitzsch takes the view that a person was not free to dedicate a person this way unless there was some aggravated crime that deserved death. Otherwise it could become a roundabout way of murdering people. For him verse 29 seems to be a clarification of verse 28.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard




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