Exodus 30:1-13 ▼

1 For burning incense you shall make an altar of acacia wood,

2 with a square surface, a cubit long, a cubit wide, and two cubits high, with horns that are of one piece with it.

3 Its grate on top, its walls on all four sides, and its horns you shall plate with pure gold. Put a gold molding around it.

4 Underneath the molding you shall put gold rings, two on one side and two on the opposite side, as holders for the poles used in carrying it.

5 Make the poles, too, of acacia wood and plate them with gold.

6 This altar you are to place in front of the veil that hangs before the ark of the covenant where I will meet you.

7 On it Aaron shall burn fragrant incense. Morning after morning, when he prepares the lamps,

8 and again in the evening twilight, when he lights the lamps, he shall burn incense. Throughout your generations this shall be the regular incense offering before the LORD.

9 On this altar you shall not offer up any profane incense, or any burnt offering or grain offering; nor shall you pour out a libation upon it.

10 Once a year Aaron shall purge its horns. Throughout your generations he is to purge it once a year with the blood of the atoning purification offering. This altar is most sacred to the LORD.

11 The LORD also told Moses:

12 When you take a census of the Israelites who are to be enrolled, each one, as he is enrolled, shall give the LORD a ransom for his life, so that no plague may come upon them for being enrolled.

13 This is what everyone who is enrolled must pay: a half-shekel, according to the standard of the sanctuary shekel—twenty gerahs to the shekel—a half-shekel contribution to the LORD.