Numbers 18:18-32 ▼

18 and their flesh is yours, as the breast of the wave-offering and as the right leg are yours.

19 All the raised-offerings of the holy things, which the sons of Israel lift up to YHWH, I have given to you, and to your sons, and to your daughters with you, by a continuous statute—a covenant of salt; it [is] continuous before YHWH to you and to your seed with you.”

20 And YHWH says to Aaron, “You do not inherit in their land, and you do not have a portion in their midst: I [am] your portion and your inheritance in the midst of the sons of Israel;

21 and to the sons of Levi, behold, have given all the tenth in Israel for inheritance in exchange for their service which they are serving—the service of the Tent of Meeting.

22 And the sons of Israel no longer come near to the Tent of Meeting, to bear sin, to die,

23 and the Levites have done the service of the Tent of Meeting, and they bear their iniquity; [it is] a continuous statute throughout your generations that they have no inheritance in the midst of the sons of Israel;

24 but the tithe of the sons of Israel which they lift up to YHWH, a raised-offering, I have given to the Levites for inheritance; therefore I have said of them, They have no inheritance in the midst of the sons of Israel.”

25 And YHWH speaks to Moses, saying,

26 “And you speak to the Levites, and you have said to them: When you take the tithe from the sons of Israel which I have given to you from them for your inheritance, then you have lifted up the raised-offering of YHWH from it, a tithe of the tithe;

27 and your raised-offering has been reckoned to you as grain from the threshing-floor and as the fullness from the wine-vat;

28 so you lift up—you also—the raised-offering of YHWH from all your tithes which you receive from the sons of Israel; and you have given the raised-offering of YHWH from it to Aaron the priest;

29 out of all your gifts you lift up every raised-offering of YHWH, out of all its fat—its hallowed part—out of it.

30 And you have said to them: In your lifting up its fat out of it, then it has been reckoned to the Levites as increase of a threshing-floor and as increase of a wine-vat;

31 and you have eaten it in every place, you and your households, for it [is] your hire in exchange for your service in the Tent of Meeting;

32 and you bear no sin for it in your lifting up its fat out of it, but you do not defile the holy things of the sons of Israel, and you do not die.”