“Hands-On Experience”

Sunday, October 21, 2012

I have been told that the early Jews made sacrifices (sometimes on a daily basis) by bringing their animals or birds to the door of the Temple, killing the animal or bird themselves, and then handing it over to the priest to make the offering to God.  Is that correct?  I am very confused if that is the way that it happened.  Please help me in my confusion.

Sincerely,
Too Much Blood

Dear Too Much Blood,

There were certain sacrifices where the priest killed the animal, and there were a few sacrifices where the person offering the animal killed it themselves.  Most of the time the priest killed the animal, but in certain circumstances, the individual would do it.  The most notable of these is the burnt offering for someone’s sin.  When someone sinned, they could bring an animal to the door of the temple, lay their hand on the animal’s head, and then kill the animal and present it as a burnt offering to God (Lev 1:1-9).  This is probably the type of sacrifice you are thinking of.

However, the regular sacrifices were made by the priests: the morning and evening sacrifices (Num 28:1-4), the various feasts, and the weekly showbread (Lev 24:5-9)… just to name a few.  There are very few cases when individuals other than priests were involved with any part of the sacrifices.

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