Leviticus 6 explained: Making Amends and Tending the Altar

Paying back what you took (vv. 1-7)

Cheating someone, keeping something you were asked to look after, or lying about lost property you found is treated as a wrong against the LORD, not just against the neighbor. The guilty person had to return everything plus an extra fifth for the owner's loss, and only then bring a ram so the priest could make atonement, meaning restore them to God.

The fire that never goes out (vv. 8-13)

The instructions now turn to the priests: the burnt offering burned slowly all night, and each morning a priest in plain linen cleared the ashes, changed clothes, and carried them to a clean spot outside the camp. The repeated order that the fire must never go out may link to a later scene in Leviticus where the altar's first fire comes from God, so keeping it alive kept that fire going.

The priests' share of grain (vv. 14-18)

From a grain offering of flour, oil and incense, a handful was burned as a token of the whole, and the priests ate the rest as their food, without yeast and only in the courtyard of the sacred tent. The line that whatever touches it becomes holy, meaning set apart for God, is debated: it may mean holiness passed on by contact, or that only people already set apart should touch it.

The high priest's own offering (vv. 19-23)

The chief priest, installed by having oil poured on him, offered a small amount of flour cooked in oil, half in the morning and half in the evening; scholars differ on whether this was a one-time offering on his installation day or a daily one from then on. Unlike other grain offerings it was burned completely, so a priest never ate from an offering made for himself.

Handling the sin offering (vv. 24-30)

The priest ate the meat of an ordinary sin offering inside the sanctuary area, blood on clothing was washed there, and a clay pot used for cooking it was broken (probably because porous clay soaked up the meat) while a bronze pot was scrubbed. If the animal's blood had been carried into the tent itself, as for the priest's or the whole people's sin, the meat was burned instead of eaten.

Key verse: Leviticus 6:13

Something to think about

When someone has wronged you, how much does their apology mean if they don't also repair the damage?