Catholic Public Domain Version

Numbers 18:7-22 Catholic Public Domain Version (CPDV)

7. But as for you and your sons: guard the priesthood. For all that pertains to the service of the altar and of what is beyond the veil shall be exercised by the priests. If any outsider will approach, he shall be killed."

8. And the Lord said to Aaron: "Behold, I have given you custody of my first-fruits. Everything that is sanctified by the sons of Israel I have delivered to you and your sons, for the office of the priesthood, by everlasting ordinances.

9. Therefore, you shall receive these, from the things that are sanctified and offered to the Lord. Every offering, and sacrifice, and whatever is repaid to me, on behalf of sin and also for offenses, and which becomes the Holy of holies, shall be for you and for your sons.

10. You shall eat it in the Sanctuary. Only the males shall eat from it, because it has been consecrated for you.

11. But the first-fruits, which the sons of Israel shall vow and offer, I have given to you, and to your sons, as well as to your daughters, by a perpetual right. Whoever is clean in your house shall eat them.

12. All the innermost of the oil, and of the wine, and of the grain, whatever first-fruits they offer to the Lord, I have given to you.

13. All the first of the crops, which the soil produces and which are carried to the Lord, shall fall to your use. Whoever is clean in your house shall eat them.

14. All that the sons of Israel shall repay by vow shall be yours.

15. Whatever goes out first from the womb, of all flesh, which they offer to the Lord, whether from men or from cattle, shall be your right; yet only in so far as, for the firstborn of man, you shall accept a price. And every animal that is unclean you shall cause to be redeemed.

16. And its redemption shall be, after one month, five shekels of silver, by the weight of the Sanctuary. A shekel has twenty obols.

17. But the firstborn of a cow, or of a sheep, or of a goat, you shall not cause to be redeemed, because they have been sanctified to the Lord. Thus, their blood you shall pour out upon the altar, and their fat you shall burn as a most sweet odor to the Lord.

18. Yet truly, the flesh shall fall to your use, just as the consecrated breast and the right shoulder shall be yours.

19. All the first-fruits of the Sanctuary, which the sons of Israel offer to the Lord, I have given to you and to your sons as well as to your daughters, as a perpetual right. It is an everlasting covenant of salt before the Lord, for you and for your sons."

20. And the Lord said to Aaron: "In their land, you shall possess nothing; neither shall you have a portion among them. I am your portion and your inheritance in the midst of the sons of Israel.

21. But I have given, to the sons of Levi, all the tithes of Israel as a possession, for the ministry by which they serve me in the tabernacle of the covenant,

22. so that the sons of Israel may no longer approach to the tabernacle, nor commit deadly sin.