Leviticus 24: Showbread and an Eye for an Eye
From the tabernacle lamps to the law of exact retribution.
Leviticus 24 opens with instructions for the continual lamp and the twelve loaves of showbread kept before the LORD, following the feast calendar of Leviticus 23. Its command that the light burn without fail is echoed later in 2 Corinthians 4:6.
And Yahweh spake unto Moses, saying:
Command the sons of Israel, That they bring unto thee—pure oil olive, beaten, for giving light,—to cause the lamp to burn up continually.
Outside the veil of the testimony, in the tent of meeting, shall Aaron order it, from evening until morning, before Yahweh continually,—a statute age-abiding, to your generations.
Upon the pure lampstand, shall he order the lamps,—before Yahweh, continually.
And thou shalt take fine meal, and bake it, in twelve cakes,—of two-tenths, shall each cake be.
And thou shalt set them in two rows, six in a row,—upon the pure table, before Yahweh.
And thou shalt put upon each row pure frankincense,—so shall it belong unto the bread as a memorial, an altar-flame unto Yahweh.
Sabbath day by sabbath day, shall he order it before Yahweh continually,—from the sons of Israel as an age-abiding covenant:
so shall it be for Aaron and for his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place,—for most holy, shall it be unto him from among the altar-flames of Yahweh, a statute age-abiding.
And forth went the son of a woman of Israel—he being the son of a man of Egypt—in the midst of the sons of Israel;
and the son of the woman of Israel, and a man of Israel, reviled one another in the camp. And the son of the Israelitish woman uttered contemptuously the Name, and reviled. So they brought him in unto Moses,—now, the name of his mother, was Shelomith, daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan;
and they put him in ward,—that a clear answer might be given to them at the mouth of Yahweh.
Then spake Yahweh unto Moses, saying:
Bring forth him that reviled unto the outside of the camp, then shall all that heard [him] lean their hands upon his head,—and all the assembly shall stone him.
And, unto the sons of Israel, shalt thou speak saying,—What man soever curseth his God shall bear his sin.
And, he that contemptuously uttereth the name of Yahweh, shall be, surely put to death, all the assembly shall, surely stone, him,—as the sojourner so the home-born, when he contemptuously uttereth the Name, he shall be put to death.
And, when, any man, by smiting taketh the life of any human being, he shall be surely put to death,
And he that by smiting taketh away the life of a beast, shall make it good,—life for life.
And, when, any man, inflicteth a blemish upon his neighbour, as he hath done, so, shall it be done to him:
fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, as he inflicteth a blemish upon a human being, so, shall one be inflicted upon him.
And he that killeth a beast, shall make it good,-and he that killeth a human being, shall be put to death.
One rule, shall ye have, as the sojourner, so the home-born, shall be,—For, I—Yahweh, am your God.
So then Moses spake unto the sons of Israel, and they took forth the reviler, unto the outside of the camp, and stoned him with stones. Thus, the sons of Israel did, as Yahweh commanded Moses.