17:1–2 The Lord’s words are addressed to priests and people alike, making them binding upon all Israelites. These commands go beyond ritual performance at the sanctuary to touch on practices of daily life for the community. This is emphasized throughout the chapter by underscoring how these laws are for “any one” (vv. 3, 8, 10, 13). The sojourner is included in four of the five commands, extending the requirements of holy living to all who are associated with the covenant community (vv. 8, 10, 12, 13, 15).

17:3–4 The first prohibition concerns the place of animal slaughter. A person who butchers a domestic animal, whether inside the camp (around the home) or outside the camp (herding livestock), without bringing it to the tent of meeting as an offering is regarded as guilty of bloodshed and thus worthy of being cut off (cf. 7:20). The punishment interprets the nature of animal slaughter: every act of animal slaughter is a sacrificial act.

The ox, lamb, and goat appear in lists together as domestic animals that may be offered as a peace offering, the only offering from which the offerer may eat (7:23; 22:27).203 An Israelite who slaughters an animal for its meat must bring it as a gift to the Lord (17:5) and honor him with the fat portions, but the worshiper may feast on the rest. Most importantly, the blood must be handled in a sacral manner and applied to the altar (v. 6). If not, then the person is considered to have “shed blood,” the biblical idiom for unjust killing. Killing an animal apart from the sanctuary is equated with murder, meaning that all non-sacrificial slaughter is banned. Slaughter is never secular, as the animal’s blood must be disposed of in a way that returns life to its Maker. The pronouncement strikes an ethical note, a concern that will continue to unfold in subsequent chapters that deal with the ethics of a holy people (chs. 18–25).

Yet, practically speaking, occasions could arise wherein it would not be appropriate for an animal to be offered as a sacrifice, and ordinary slaughter would be more fitting. Animals that were blemished or sick could not be offered on the altar (22:20–25). Additionally, the herd or flock would be culled to breed for desirable traits (Gen. 30:37–43), to increase milk productivity, or to keep the flock at optimal size for the pasturage.204 Must every slaughter be a sacrifice?

It is important to bear in mind that the setting of these laws is the wilderness, and their aim is to orient the life of every Israelite around the presence of a holy God. Once Israel settles in the land, the law accommodates to the new lived reality. Within the land of their inheritance Israelites must still bring their sacrifices and tithes to the sanctuary, but, if they crave meat and live at a distance, “Then you may kill any of your herd or your flock, which the Lord has given you, as I have commanded you, and you may eat within your towns whenever you desire” (Deut. 12:21). If an animal is blemished, “You shall eat it within your towns. The unclean and the clean alike may eat it, as though it were a gazelle or a deer” (Deut. 15:22). However, under no circumstance are the people to eat its blood (cf. comment on 17:10).

17:5–6 The reason for mandating that all slaughter take place at the tabernacle is because the people are sacrificing in the open country. They should bring their gifts to the sanctuary, where the Lord has established his presence and priesthood, slaughter them there as peace offerings that honor him with the fat portions, and be free to feast on the rest. Most importantly, the blood must be ritually dashed against the “altar of the Lord,” named and marked as his own. The name of the Lord rings out seven times in these laws to direct the worshipers’ attention continually to their covenant Sovereign, who commands their exclusive worship.205 Any slaughter apart from the Lord’s altar leads to idolatry (cf. 1 Kings 12:25–13:2).

The command articulated here will develop into one of the most enduring cornerstones of OT worship. A worshiper must approach the Lord only at the place where his covenant presence dwells: “You shall seek the place that the Lord your God will choose out of all your tribes to put his name and make his habitation there. There you shall go, and there you shall bring your burnt offerings and your sacrifices, your tithes and the contribution that you present, your vow offerings, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock” (Deut. 12:5–6; cf. Deut. 12:11–14). From the time Israel enters the land until the destruction of the temple in AD 70 all will stream to Jerusalem, the place of the Lord’s habitation, to honor him with their gifts. There is only one legitimate place to seek the Lord, one place consecrated by his presence, and one altar that has been ignited by his fire.

17:7 It now becomes clear that the reason for the severity of the cutting-off penalty (Lev. 17:4) is the gravity of the offense. What is brought across as “goat demons” literally translates as “hairy ones, shaggy creatures,” a common term for goats though in this context one that clearly refers to some form of supernatural being worshiped by some Israelites. Although this is distant from us in its specific details, we catch a glimpse of an idolatrous practice that will be repeated in Israel’s history (cf. 2 Chron. 11:15). Such practices are absolutely forbidden. Whether inside the camp, where the Holy One dwells, or outside the camp, where impurity is banished (Lev. 16:21–22), the Lord reigns over all. Dominion is his alone.

Without validating belief in demonic spirits the law denounces their worship in a decisive blow—anyone who sacrifices to idols “whores” after false gods (cf. Ex. 34:14–17; Deut. 31:16). The Lord’s covenant with Israel is a marriage, demanding exclusive faithfulness to him to whom they are bound in trust through blood (Jer. 2:2; Hos. 2:2). To worship other gods is tantamount to infidelity, rejecting the Lord’s claims and abandoning the marriage for other lovers (Jer. 3:1–2, 6–10; Ezekiel 16; 23; Hos. 2:5; 5:4). Bringing sacrifices to the house of the Lord will be a statute forever, even after the wilderness period, when Israel is settled in the land. Although the social setting may change in the years to come, the Lord’s requirements will remain the same (cf. Deut. 12:10–14).

17:8–9 The prohibition continues to unfold, focusing on sacrificial animals and extending to address resident aliens, who are likewise responsible for bringing offerings to the one designated place of worship. Offering worship to the Lord is not restricted to Israel but open to all who approach him by faith (Num. 15:14). Resident aliens can bring burnt offerings and peace offerings, provided they follow the proper sacrificial protocol outlined here: slaughtering the animal at the sanctuary, abstaining from the blood of sacrifice or game, and purifying themselves in the event of eating meat from animals that die naturally or from predation (Lev. 17:10, 12, 13, 15; cf. 22:18).206

17:10 The blood prohibition is the axis around which this chapter revolves, clarifying the laws on sacrificial animals that have come before and the laws on non-sacrificial animals to follow. The peculiar phrase “to eat blood” refers to eating an animal’s flesh with the blood still in it, meaning it has not been drained in slaughter (cf. Gen. 9:4; Deut. 12:16, 23). Discourse on the ritual handling of lifeblood expands from a negative decree to a positive one—blood may not be consumed because it is reserved for the specific and sacred purpose of expiation.

The Lord’s voice breaks into the speech mediated through Moses to confront every hearer: “I will set my face against . . . and will cut off.” The cutting-off penalty that earlier had been expressed passively (Lev. 17:4, 9) becomes active in the mouth of the Lord, who promises to carry it out himself against any who defies him. The ultimate break in relationship is when the Lord no longer shines his countenance in blessing upon the worshipers but sets his face against them in opposition.

17:11 The statement “The life of the flesh is in the blood” is key to understanding the theology and ritual logic behind the sacrificial system. This evocative image conveys that blood is that which makes a living being alive; blood and life are inextricably linked. In the case of a person blood has power and contains something of the life of the person that continues to have agency even after death. The blood of the innocent slain cries from the ground to be avenged, from the first murder to the martyrs before the altar at the end of time (Gen. 4:10–12; Deut. 21:7–9; Isa. 26:21; Rev. 6:9–10).

That the life is in the blood may be easily observed: as blood pours out of a mortal wound, so does the life of a living being. What cannot be observed but must be revealed by the Lord is that he will accept the blood as atonement for the life of the worshiper. The verse unfolds in associative logic: (1) Life is in the blood of all living beings. (2) Blood makes atonement for human life. And (3) the blood of sacrificial animals makes efficacious atonement because of the life in it. The Lord will graciously accept its life as a substitute for the life of the offerer.

Up until now the people have observed priests’ placing (Hb. natan) the blood on the altar (Lev. 4:25; 8:15; 9:9; 16:18). This verse, however, contends that all along it has been the Lord who has placed it on the altar—“I have given [natan] it for you on the altar to make atonement for your souls.” The wording reframes how Israel is to understand the sacrificial procedure, as though the Lord is saying, “It is not you who are placing the blood on the altar for me, for my benefit, but rather the opposite: it is I who have placed it there for you—for your benefit.”207 The blood serves as a ransom, as payment for the life of the worshiper because the Lord has ordained the principle of a life for a life (Ex. 21:23; Lev. 24:18; Deut. 19:21).

17:12 The Lord quotes himself, reaching back to what he has already commanded (3:17; 7:26–27) in order to repeat, restate, and emphasize the absolute certainty of this issue.

According to traditional herding practices Israel made use of the slaughtered animal in its entirety: the meat and its byproducts of milk and cheese for food, wool and hides for clothing, bones for tools such as spindles and knife handles, and its horns for calling the congregation to assemble.208 The cultural context thus marks the blood prohibition as striking, especially in light of cooking methods in the ancient world that made use of blood, as does modern global cuisine.209 The Lord emphatically sets apart the animal’s blood for his use, and in obedience the covenant people enact with every slaughter the reality that life belongs to the Lord.

17:13 Clean animals that are hunted, though not offered on the altar, must be treated according to the law that regulates blood disposal. Game could be hunted for meat, as requested by Isaac to bestow blessing on Esau: “Take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt game for me” (Gen. 27:3). Meat dishes of “deer, gazelles, roebucks, and fattened fowl” are said to have graced Solomon’s kingly table (1 Kings 4:23). Game native to Israel (Deut. 14:5) and still abundant today includes the wild goat known as the ibex (Capra ibex) and the mountain gazelle (Gazella gazella). Once Israel settles in the land and relies on its cultivation, archaeological evidence shows that these become a very minor part of their diet.210

The blood of a hunted animal must be drained and covered with earth. The parallel passage in Deuteronomy directs that the blood be poured out “on the earth like water” but does not mention covering it (Deut. 12:24). The legislation of Leviticus focuses on a different factor: since improper slaughter is equated with bloodguilt (Lev. 17:4), the blood must be covered over as though it were a living entity that is receiving burial.

17:14 The repetition of the command to refrain from consuming blood takes the reader back to the origins of human history. After the flood waters recede and Noah and his family emerge onto a renewed earth with renewed blessing they are permitted to eat meat. Having stewarded the lives of living creatures within the confines of the ark, humanity is to steward them in the world and use some for food, always acknowledging the Lord, who gives them into their hand: “But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood” (Gen. 9:4). The blood prohibition applies to all humanity, but it is for Israel to understand this divine revelation as it relates to its standing before God.

17:15–16 The chapter concludes with an allowance for a person who has eaten the meat of an animal that has died naturally or by predation (this allowance does not apply to priests; 22:8–9).211 This is the only legal case that does not conclude with one’s being cut off; rather it offers a solution to address the impurity. An animal that has died by the hand of nature or by predation (1 Sam. 17:34–35) will bring impurity on the eater (perhaps because its blood has not been properly drained, and its carcass is unclean; Lev. 11:39–40). The remedy is for the person to wash his body and clothes. Should he not bathe to cleanse himself from impurity, then he is culpable and will be held responsible by the Lord for his disobedience.