5. You are to make the poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold.
6. “You are to put it in front of the curtain that is before the ark of the testimony (before the atonement lid that is over the testimony), where I will meet you.
7. Aaron is to burn sweet incense on it morning by morning; when he attends to the lamps he is to burn incense.
8. When Aaron sets up the lamps around sundown he is to burn incense on it; it is to be a regular incense offering before the Lord throughout your generations.
9. You must not offer strange incense on it, nor burnt offering, nor meal offering, and you must not pour out a drink offering on it.
10. Aaron is to make atonement on its horns once in the year with some of the blood of the sin offering for atonement; once in the year he is to make atonement on it throughout your generations. It is most holy to the Lord.”
11. The Lord spoke to Moses:
12. “When you take a census of the Israelites according to their number, then each man is to pay a ransom for his life to the Lord when you number them, so that there will be no plague among them when you number them.
13. Everyone who crosses over to those who are numbered is to pay this: a half shekel according to the shekel of the sanctuary (a shekel weighs twenty gerahs). The half shekel is to be an offering to the Lord.
14. Everyone who crosses over to those numbered, from twenty years old and up, is to pay an offering to the Lord.
15. The rich are not to increase it, and the poor are not to pay less than the half shekel when giving the offering of the Lord, to make atonement for your lives.
16. You are to receive the atonement money from the Israelites and give it for the service of the tent of meeting. It will be a memorial for the Israelites before the Lord, to make atonement for your lives.”
17. The Lord spoke to Moses:
18. “You are also to make a large bronze basin with a bronze stand for washing. You are to put it between the tent of meeting and the altar and put water in it,
19. and Aaron and his sons must wash their hands and their feet from it.
20. When they enter the tent of meeting, they must wash with water so that they do not die. Also, when they approach the altar to minister by burning incense as an offering made by fire to the Lord,
21. they must wash their hands and their feet so that they do not die. And this will be a perpetual ordinance for them and for their descendants throughout their generations.”
22. The Lord spoke to Moses: