Numbers
Chapter 18
1 God said to Aaron, “You, your sons, and your family must take responsibility for any wrongs done to the holy place, and you and your sons must also take responsibility for the mistakes in your priestly duties.”
2 Bring your relatives from the Levi tribe, your father’s tribe, with you so they can help and serve you. But you and your sons must serve in front of the tent of testimony.
3 They must take care of your duties and the duties of the whole tent, but they must not touch the holy objects or the altar, so that neither they nor you will die.
4 They will join you and take care of the meeting tent’s duties for all its service, and no outsider will come close to you.
5 You must take care of the sacred place and the altar, so that God’s anger will no longer fall on the people of Israel.
6 I have chosen your fellow Levites from the Israelites to be a gift to you, so they can serve at the meeting tent for God.
7 So you and your sons must do the duties of priests for all that concerns the altar and what is inside the curtain. You are to serve: I have given you the job of being priests as a gift. But anyone else who comes close will be killed.
8 God spoke to Aaron: Look, I have given you responsibility for my lifted offerings, all the holy gifts of the Israelites. I give them to you and your sons as your due, forever, because you are anointed.
9 These are the very holy gifts set aside for you: their grain offerings, sin offerings, and guilt offerings that they give to God will be very holy for you and your sons.
10 Eat it in the most holy place; every man can eat it; it is sacred for you.
11 This is yours: the lifted gift and all the Israelites’ waved offerings. I have given them to you, and to your sons and daughters, as a law forever. Anyone in your family who is clean may eat it.
12 I have given you all the finest olive oil, the best wine, and the best wheat, which are the first things they give to God.
13 Whatever first fruit is harvested from the land, which people bring to God, will belong to you; everyone who is clean in your family can eat it.
14 In Israel, anything dedicated will belong to you.
15 Every firstborn of any creature offered to God, human or animal, will be yours. However, you must buy back the firstborn of humans and unclean animals.
16 You must buy back anyone a month old or older as you have estimated their value, for the price of five shekels in the sanctuary currency, which equals twenty gerahs.
17 Do not buy back the first baby of a cow, sheep, or goat, because they are holy. You must put their blood on the altar and burn their fat. This is a fire offering that pleases God.
18 The meat of those animals will be yours, just like the breast that is waved and the right thigh are yours.
19 I have given you and your sons and daughters all the lifted gifts of the holy items that the people of Israel give to God as a permanent rule: it’s a lasting salt agreement before God for you and your descendants.
20 God spoke to Aaron, “You will not own land among them or have a share with them: I am your share and your inheritance among the Israelites.”
21 Look, I have given the Levites all the tithes in Israel as their inheritance for the work they do, the work at the meeting tent.
22 From now on, the Israelites must not come close to the meeting tent, or they will be guilty of sin and die.
23 The Levites must work in the meeting tent, and they will be responsible for their wrongs. This rule will last forever for all your descendants, and the Levites will not own any land among the people of Israel.
24 But I have given the Israelites’ tithes, which they give to God, to the Levites as their inheritance. So I told them they will have no property among the Israelites.
25 God spoke to Moses, saying,
26 Tell the Levites to say this: When you receive the tithes from the Israelites that I have given you as your inheritance, you must give a tenth of that tithe to God as a special offering.
27 Your special gift will be counted for you as if it were grain from the threshing floor or the full amount of wine from the winepress.
28 You must also give God a special gift from all the tithes you get from the Israelites; you will give part of that gift to Aaron the priest as God’s special offering.
29 From all the gifts you give, you must present all that is lifted up to God, the very best and holy part of it.
30 So you will tell them, when you have taken the best part from it, then it will be considered for the Levites as extra from the grain field and extra from the wine-making place.
31 You can eat it wherever you are, you and your families, because it is your pay for working at the meeting tent.
32 You will not be guilty if you set aside the best part of it; do not make the Israelites’ sacred things unclean, or you will die.