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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Leviticus 8:1 - 8:1
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Consecration of the Priests and the Sanctuary (cf. Ex 29:1-37). - The consecration of Aaron and his sons as priests was carried out by Moses according to the instructions in Ex 29:1-36; Exo 40:12-15; and the anointing of the tabernacle, with the altar and its furniture, as prescribed in Exo 29:37; Exo 30:26-29, and Exo 40:9-11, was connected with it (Lev 8:10, Lev 8:11).
Lev 8:1-4
Lev 8:1-5 contain an account of the preparations for this holy act, the performance of which was enjoined upon Moses by Jehovah after the publication of the laws of sacrifice (Lev 8:1). Moses brought the persons to be consecrated, the official costume that had been made for them (Ex 28), the anointing oil (Exo 30:23.), and the requisite sacrificial offerings (Exo 29:1-3), to the door of the tabernacle (i.e., into the court, near the altar of burnt-offering), and then gathered “the whole congregation” - that is to say, the nation in the persons of its elders-there also (see my Archäeologie ii. p. 221). The definite article before the objects enumerated in Lev 8:2 may be explained on the ground that they had all been previously and more minutely described. The “basket of the unleavened” contained, according to Exo 29:2-3, (1) unleavened bread, which is called חַלָּה in Lev 8:26, i.e., round flat bread-cakes, and לֶחֶם כִּכַּר (loaf of bread) in Exo 29:23, and was baked for the purpose of the consecration (see at Lev 8:31, Lev 8:32); (2) unleavened oil-cakes; and (3) unleavened flat cakes covered with oil (see at Lev 2:4 and Lev 7:12).
Lev 8:5
When the congregation was assembled, Moses said, “This is the word which Jehovah commanded you to do.” His meaning was, the substance or essential part of the instructions in Exo 28:1 and 29:1-37, which he had published to the assembled congregation before the commencement of the act of consecration, and which are not repeated here as being already known from those chapters. The congregation had been summoned to perform this act, because Aaron and his sons were to be consecrated as priests for them, as standing mediators between them and the Lord.