The Wilderness Years

Only the L'vi'im are to perform the service in the tent of meeting, and they will be responsible for whatever they do wrong. This is to be a permanent regulation through all your generations. They are to have no inheritance among the people of Isra'el,

because I have given to the L'vi'im as their inheritance the tenths of the produce which the people of Isra'el set aside as a gift for ADONAI. This is why I have said to them that they are to have no inheritance among the people of Isra'el."

ADONAI said to Moshe,

"Tell the L'vi'im, 'When you take from the people of Isra'el the tenth of the produce which I have given you from them as your inheritance, you are to set aside from it a gift for ADONAI, one tenth of the tenth.

The gift you set aside will be accounted to you as if it were grain from the thresh-ing-floor and grape juice from the wine vat.

In this way you will set aside a gift for ADONAI from all your tenths that you receive from the people of Isra'el, and from these tenths you are to give to Aharon the cohen the gift set aside for ADONAI.

From everything given to you, you are to set aside all that is due ADONAI, the best part of it, its holy portion.'

"Therefore you are to tell them, 'When you set aside from it its best part, it will be accounted to the L'vi'im as if it were grain from the threshing-floor and grape juice from the wine vat.

You may eat it anywhere, you and your households; because it is your payment in return for your service in the tent of meeting.

Moreover, because you will have set aside from it its best parts, you will not be committing any sin because of it; for you are not to profane the holy things of the people of Isra'el, or you will die.'" 21; Y'hudah (Jude) 1-25

ADONAI said to Moshe and Aharon,

"This is the regulation from the Torah which ADONAI has commanded. Tell the people of Isra'el to bring you a young red female cow without fault or defect and which has never borne a yoke.

You are to give it to El'azar the cohen; it is to be brought outside the camp and slaughtered in front of him.

El'azar the cohen is to take some of its blood with his finger and sprinkle this blood toward the front of the tent of meeting seven times.

The heifer is to be burned to ashes before his eyes -its skin, meat, blood and dung is to be burned to ashes.

The cohen is to take cedar-wood, hyssop and scarlet yarn and throw them onto the heifer as it is burning up.

Then the cohen is to wash his clothes and himself in water, after which he may re-enter the camp; but the cohen will remain unclean until evening.

The person who burned up the heifer is to wash his clothes and himself in water, but he will remain unclean until evening.

A man who is clean is to collect the ashes of the heifer and store them outside the camp in a clean place. They are to be kept for the community of the people of Isra'el to prepare water for purification from sin.

The one who collected the ashes of the heifer is to wash his clothes and be unclean until evening. For the people of Isra'el and for the foreigner staying with them this will be a permanent regulation.

"Anyone who touches a corpse, no matter whose dead body it is, will be unclean for seven days.

He must purify himself with [these ashes] on the third and seventh days; then he will be clean. But if he does not purify himself the third and seventh days, he will not be clean.

Anyone who touches a corpse, no matter whose dead body it is, and does not purify himself has defiled the tabernacle of ADONAI. That person will be cut off from Isra'el, because the water for purification was not sprinkled on him. He will be unclean; his uncleanness is still on him.

"This is the law: when a person dies in a tent, everyone who enters the tent and everything in the tent will be unclean for seven days.

Every open container without a cover closely attached is unclean.