Leviticus has already given the burnt offering twice, the grain offering twice and the sin offering twice, so what is left for chapter 7 to say? This Leviticus 7 summary and study guide follows what the last chapter of the set adds: the trespass offering, the peace offering meal, and who got to eat which part.
Table of Contents
- Setting the Stage
- Comprehensive Leviticus 7 Summary
- Leviticus 7 Outline
- The Priests’ Portions in Leviticus 7
- Observations from Leviticus 7
- Difficult Verses Explained
- Common Misunderstandings
- Christ Connection
- When, Where, and Why
- Key Verses
- Key Lessons from Leviticus 7
- Bible Study Questions
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Leviticus 7, The Full Text (KJV)
Setting the Stage
Exodus ends with a tent finished and nobody able to go inside it. Israel had built God a house at Mount Sinai, and when the work was done His glory filled it so completely that even Moses had to stay outside (Exodus 40:34-35).
Leviticus answers that shut door. God calls Moses from inside the tent and gives Israel the offerings that open it. Chapters 1 to 5 tell the people what to bring.
Chapters 6 and 7 go back over the same offerings for the priests who will handle them every day, and chapter 7 finishes the set. For the whole book at a glance, see our Book of Leviticus Summary by Chapter.
Comprehensive Leviticus 7 Summary
God gives Moses the priests’ side of two offerings the people had already been taught to bring. The trespass offering comes first. It is killed where burnt offerings are killed, its blood is sprinkled all round the altar, and its fat, its tail, its kidneys and the covering above its liver are burned. What is left feeds the priests, and they eat it in the holy place because it is most holy.
That leads God to settle the priests’ income generally. The priest who handles a sin or trespass offering keeps its flesh. The priest who handles a burnt offering keeps the animal’s skin, since nothing else survives the fire. Grain offerings that arrive baked go to the priest who presents them, and grain offerings that arrive as flour are split evenly among all of Aaron’s sons.
Then comes the peace offering, and here the worshipper eats as well. It can be brought to say thank you, to pay a vow, or freely with no occasion behind it, and the thank offering arrives with four kinds of bread, one of them leavened.
Each occasion carries its own deadline. Thanksgiving meat has to be finished the day it is offered, vow and freewill meat may run to the next day, and anything left on the third day is burned. The meat has to be clean and so does everyone who eats it.
God then speaks past the priests to the whole nation and forbids the fat of ox, sheep and goat, and the blood of any bird or beast, in every home. He turns back to the peace offering to say the worshipper carries his own offering forward, waves the breast before the LORD, and hands the right shoulder to the priest who did the work. The chapter closes by naming all six laws and the place where Moses received them.
One Word Summary
- Portions: the chapter’s real subject is who receives what
- Freshness: every deadline pushes the meal back toward the day it was given
- Boundaries: fat, blood and the third day each mark a limit
In One Sentence
God tells Moses how the trespass offering and the peace offering must be handled, fixes the share Aaron and his sons receive from every sacrifice, and forbids Israel to eat fat or blood.
Theme of Leviticus 7
Leviticus 7 is about the dividing of a sacrifice. One animal goes three ways: God keeps the fat and the blood, the priests receive a named portion they can live on, and the worshipper sits down to the rest.
Two things run alongside it. The worshipper’s share comes with conditions, because the meal is only his while it is fresh and while he is clean. And the fat and the blood stay off his table because they were never his to begin with.
Leviticus 7 Outline
- Leviticus 7:1-6: The trespass offering is killed where the burnt offering is killed, its fat is burned on the altar, and its flesh is eaten by the priests in the holy place.
- Leviticus 7:7-10: God fixes what the priests receive from the sin, trespass, burnt and grain offerings, including the skin of the burnt offering.
- Leviticus 7:11-14: The peace offering brought for thanksgiving comes with unleavened cakes, oiled wafers, fried cakes and leavened bread, and one of each is heaved to the priest who sprinkles the blood.
- Leviticus 7:15-18: Thanksgiving meat is eaten the same day, vow and freewill meat may also be eaten the next day, and meat eaten on the third day is refused.
- Leviticus 7:19-21: Flesh that touches anything unclean is burned, and anyone who eats while unclean is cut off from his people.
- Leviticus 7:22-27: God tells the whole nation to eat no fat of ox, sheep or goat, and no blood of any bird or animal, anywhere they live.
- Leviticus 7:28-31: The worshipper carries the fat and the breast forward with his own hands, and the breast is waved before the LORD for Aaron and his sons.
- Leviticus 7:32-34: The right shoulder is heaved to the priest who offered the blood and the fat, by God’s own grant to Aaron’s family.
- Leviticus 7:35-38: The appointed share of Aaron and his sons is confirmed as a lasting statute, and the chapter closes by naming all six sacrificial laws given at Sinai.
The Priests’ Portions in Leviticus 7
The chapter answers who eats what, but it answers in two places, at verses 7 to 10 and again at verses 28 to 34.
| Offering | Burned on the altar | Priest’s portion | Which priest | Worshipper’s portion |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Burnt offering | All the flesh and the fat | The skin (7:8) | The one who offered it | None |
| Grain offering, baked or fried | The memorial handful (Leviticus 2:9) | The rest (7:9) | The one who offered it | None |
| Grain offering, flour with oil or dry | The memorial handful (Leviticus 2:2) | The rest (7:10) | All Aaron’s sons, share and share alike | None |
| Sin offering | The fat (Leviticus 4:8-10) | The flesh (7:7) | The one who made atonement | None |
| Trespass offering | The fat, tail, kidneys and caul (7:3-5) | The flesh, eaten in the holy place (7:6) | Every male among the priests | None |
| Peace offering | The fat (7:31) | The waved breast (7:31) | Aaron and his sons together | The rest of the meat, and the remaining cakes |
| Peace offering | The heaved right shoulder (7:32-33) | The one who offered the blood and the fat |
Waving and heaving were two ceremonies for presenting a portion to God before it passed on to the priest, and the right shoulder that was heaved is most likely the hind leg, the haunch, rather than the foreleg. Two rows also look like they disagree with Leviticus 2:10, which gives the grain offering to all of Aaron’s sons where Leviticus 7:9 gives the cooked kind to the priest who presented it. Both stand as written, and one common explanation is that a priest was free to share out what fell to him.
The peace offering is the only sacrifice on the table where the worshipper takes anything home. The priests receive from every one of the others, which was the whole of their living, because their tribe was given no farmland: “I am thy part and thine inheritance among the children of Israel” (Numbers 18:20). God told Aaron that He Himself, and the offerings brought to Him, would be the priests’ inheritance instead of land.
Observations from Leviticus 7
One Law Did Not Mean One Rite (Leviticus 7:2, 7)
Verse 7 says of the sin offering and the trespass offering that “there is one law for them”, meaning the priest’s portion is settled the same way for both. Their blood was still handled differently.
The priest put the blood of a sin offering “upon the horns of the altar of burnt offering” (Leviticus 4:25), while the blood of a trespass offering was sprinkled “round about upon the altar” (Leviticus 7:2), the way the burnt offering’s blood was sprinkled (Leviticus 1:11). Even where God gives two offerings one rule for the priest’s share, He keeps the handling of each exactly where He set it.
Every Warning in This Chapter Is About Eating (Leviticus 7:20, 21, 25, 27)
The words “cut off from his people” fall four times here, and each time they land on a mouth. Eating while unclean, eating fat, eating blood.
Nothing in the list is about failing to bring an offering. The danger this chapter names is helping yourself at the altar rather than neglecting it. The sacrifice is God’s before it is anyone’s.
Leavened Bread Was Commanded Here and Banned on the Altar (Leviticus 7:13)
Leviticus 2:11 says no grain offering brought to the LORD may be made with leaven. Leviticus 7:13 tells the thankful worshipper to bring leavened bread. Both stand, because the ban covers what goes into the fire and this loaf never does.
One loaf of each kind goes to the priest as a heave offering, and the rest is eaten at the meal (Leviticus 7:14). Leviticus 23:17 does the same thing at Pentecost with two leavened loaves.
The Fat Went Up Before Anyone Was Fed (Leviticus 7:31)
The order in verse 31 is fixed. “And the priest shall burn the fat upon the altar: but the breast shall be Aaron’s and his sons’.” The altar is served first, and only then does the priest take his portion. Israel later saw what happens when that order is reversed.
Eli’s sons sent a servant to demand raw meat from worshippers “before they burnt the fat”, and Scripture’s verdict is that “men abhorred the offering of the LORD” (1 Samuel 2:15-17). The portions in this chapter were a grant God made, and the men who received them had no claim on what He kept for Himself.
God Kept Handing the Priests’ Instructions to Everybody (Leviticus 7:23, 29)
Twice inside a block of priestly procedure, God stops and says “Speak unto the children of Israel”. The rules about fat and blood go to the nation, and so do the rules about carrying a peace offering forward. Nothing in this law was reserved knowledge for the men who worked the altar. A worshipper heard what was supposed to happen to his own animal, and that is the shape of the whole chapter: the sacrifice belongs to God, and everyone is told how it is divided.
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Difficult Verses Explained
What Does “Cut Off From His People” Mean?
Scripture does not settle it to a single meaning, and the honest answer is that the sentence is God’s to carry out rather than a court’s. Elsewhere the phrase covers being shut out of the covenant people, and in some passages an early death or the ending of a family line (Leviticus 20:2-3; Malachi 2:12).
What every use shares is that the offender is removed from the people God had gathered to Himself. It also seems aimed at the person who knew he was unclean and ate anyway, since Leviticus 5:2 already provided a sacrifice for someone who became unclean without realising it.
Why Does God Command Leavened Bread Here When Leviticus 2:11 Forbids It?
Because the two verses govern different destinations. Leviticus 2:11 forbids leaven in anything burned on the altar. The leavened loaf of Leviticus 7:13 is heaved before the LORD, handed to the priest and eaten at the meal, and it never touches the fire. This is why Leviticus 23:17 can also call for leavened loaves at Pentecost without contradicting the earlier rule.
Why Was Eating the Meat on the Third Day an Abomination?
The chapter gives the ruling and withholds the reason: “it shall not be accepted, neither shall it be imputed unto him that offereth it” (Leviticus 7:18). The offering God had received was forfeited by how the worshipper handled the remains.
Bible teachers have suggested several reasons the text itself does not state, including spoilage in a hot country, pressure on the offerer to invite others rather than hoard the meat, and a guard against treating leftover sacrificial flesh as a charm. Leviticus 19:6-8 repeats the same rule and adds only that the man has profaned what was holy.
Common Misunderstandings
- Leviticus 7 says nothing about pork. Readers arrive here searching “Leviticus 7:11” or “Leviticus 7 pork” when what they want is Leviticus 11:7-8, which lists the swine among the unclean animals. Leviticus 7:11 opens the law of the peace offerings.
- A peace offering was not a gift to calm God down. In everyday English a peace offering is something you hand someone to settle a quarrel. The offering in this chapter celebrates peace the worshipper already has with God, which is why it ends in a meal.
- The third-day rule is not stated to be about spoiling meat. That reading is a suggestion made by Bible teachers, not a reason the chapter gives.
Christ Connection
The peace offering is where this chapter reaches furthest forward. It assumes peace already made, then feeds the worshipper on the sacrifice that made it, and the New Testament picks up both halves. “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1), and Christ made that peace the same way the older offering did, by blood. Paul says God was “having made peace through the blood of his cross” (Colossians 1:20).
Paul then sets the meal itself beside the Lord’s table. Asking about the bread and the cup, he says, “Behold Israel after the flesh: are not they which eat of the sacrifices partakers of the altar?” (1 Corinthians 10:18). Israel ate from the altar that had already received the blood; believers eat at a table set by a sacrifice already offered. Even the cleanness rule of Leviticus 7:20 carries across, since Paul warns the Corinthians against coming to that table unworthily (1 Corinthians 11:27-29).
The trespass offering reaches forward too. Isaiah says of the Servant, “when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin” (Isaiah 53:10), and the Hebrew word behind “offering for sin” there is the word Leviticus 7:1 uses for the trespass offering. The difference is that Leviticus never stops. Chapter 7 hands out portions from sacrifices that will be brought again tomorrow, which is why Hebrews says of Christ that “this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God” (Hebrews 10:12).
Sitting down is the part no priest in Leviticus ever got to do. What continues from this chapter is the thanksgiving. The offering of Leviticus 7:12 becomes, in Christ, “the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name” (Hebrews 13:15), brought now by a people Peter calls “an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5).
The portions of Leviticus 7 belonged to one family. The offering of praise belongs to everyone Christ has brought near.
When, Where, and Why
- When: In the second year after Israel left Egypt, shortly after the tabernacle was raised on the first day of the first month (Exodus 40:17), while the nation was still camped in the wilderness of Sinai (Leviticus 7:38).
- Where: At the tent of meeting in the middle of the camp, and more exactly at the altar in its courtyard, since that is where the trespass offering was killed and where the fat was burned. Verse 38 places the whole instruction “in the wilderness of Sinai”.
- Why: Moses writes this for the men at the altar. Fixing exactly what each priest receives let daily sacrifice run without arguments over the portions, and spelling out the deadlines and the cleanness rules kept the holy things from being handled carelessly by anyone who ate them.
Key Verses
“As the sin offering is, so is the trespass offering: there is one law for them: the priest that maketh atonement therewith shall have it.”
Leviticus 7:7
Both offerings are handled by the same rule, and the priest who performs the atonement receives what remains. This verse holds the first half of the chapter together, because everything in verses 1 to 10 follows from treating those two sacrifices as one category with one settled arrangement.
“If he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, and unleavened wafers anointed with oil, and cakes mingled with oil, of fine flour, fried.”
Leviticus 7:12
A worshipper who wants to thank God brings an animal and three kinds of bread with it, all of them made with oil. Thanksgiving in this chapter is something a person carries to the altar and pays for, which is why the New Testament can go on calling praise a sacrifice.
“This is the law of the burnt offering, of the meat offering, and of the sin offering, and of the trespass offering, and of the consecrations, and of the sacrifice of the peace offerings; Which the LORD commanded Moses in mount Sinai.”
Leviticus 7:37-38
This is the law of all six offerings, and God gave it to Moses at Sinai. The “meat offering” named in the list is the grain offering of Leviticus 2, since meat meant food of any kind in 1611 English. The two verses sign off everything from Leviticus 1 onward, which is why the next chapter turns to ordaining the men who will carry those laws out.
Key Lessons from Leviticus 7
- God feeds the people who serve Him from His own altar, which is the arrangement Paul appeals to when he says those who preach the gospel should live of the gospel (Leviticus 7:35-36; 1 Corinthians 9:13-14).
- Thanksgiving is something brought, not only something felt, since the thank offering came with an animal and four kinds of bread (Leviticus 7:12-13).
- A right offering can be forfeited by careless handling afterwards, as the third-day rule shows (Leviticus 7:18).
- Worship in this chapter is carried in a person’s own hands and cannot be sent by someone else (Leviticus 7:29-30).
- What God has claimed for Himself is not ours to consume, which is why the fat and the blood were off the table in every Israelite home (Leviticus 7:23-27).
To go deeper into the lessons from this chapter, read our full study: 14 Life-Changing Lessons from Leviticus 7.
Bible Study Questions
- According to Leviticus 7:8-10, which portions went to the priest who performed the offering, and which were shared among all of Aaron’s sons?
- Verse 7 says there is “one law” for the sin offering and the trespass offering. Compare Leviticus 7:2 with Leviticus 4:25 and describe what still differed between them.
- Leviticus 7:12, 7:16 name three occasions for a peace offering. What is the difference between a vow offering and a freewill offering, and why might the deadlines in verses 15 to 17 be the same for both?
- Why do you think God required the worshipper’s own hands to carry the offering forward in Leviticus 7:30, and what would be lost if a servant had brought it?
- Trace the word “clean” through Leviticus 7:19-21. Who and what had to be clean before anyone could eat?
- Leviticus 7:23 and 7:29 both begin “Speak unto the children of Israel” in the middle of instructions for priests. What does that tell you about who this law was for?
- Hebrews 13:15 calls praise a sacrifice. Reading it beside Leviticus 7:12, what does the older offering add to how you understand the newer one?
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between a wave offering and a heave offering?
The difference is the motion. A wave offering was moved to and fro toward the altar, and a heave offering was lifted up and set down, which is where the two English words come from. In Leviticus 7:30-32 the breast is waved and the right shoulder is heaved. Bible teachers describe the waving as a two-handed act, with the priest’s hands under the worshipper’s, so that the man who brought the animal did the giving himself.
Does the Bible still forbid eating blood?
The blood rule is the one command from this chapter that the New Testament church restated. Leviticus 17:11 gives the reason, that the life is in the blood and God gave it for atonement, and the prohibition goes back before Moses to Genesis 9:4. When the Jerusalem council wrote to Gentile believers, it asked them to “abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication” (Acts 15:29). Believers differ over how far that letter binds a Christian today, and the command is one Scripture does repeat after the cross.
Does the rule against eating fat still apply?
Many Bible teachers hold that it no longer binds, since no book after the Law renews it. The three animals named in Leviticus 7:23-25 are the ones Israel offered in sacrifice, and the rule belonged to the era when every slaughter happened at the tabernacle. When Deuteronomy 12:15-16 later released Israel to kill and eat at home, it repeated the ban on blood and said nothing about fat.
What is the difference between a sin offering and a trespass offering?
They differ in the wrong they answer. The sin offering dealt with sin committed unintentionally against God’s commands (Leviticus 4:2), while the trespass offering dealt with wrongs that called for repayment, including damage done to the holy things of the LORD, and it required the value restored with a fifth added (Leviticus 5:15-16). Leviticus 7:7 puts them under one law only for how the priest’s portion is settled.
Who was allowed to eat the peace offering meat?
Anyone ceremonially clean whom the worshipper invited. Leviticus 7:19 says “all that be clean shall eat thereof”, so the meal was not limited to the offerer’s household or to the priests. The priests received the breast and the right shoulder as their own portion, and the rest of the animal belonged to the worshipper and his guests, provided it was eaten inside the deadline.
Leviticus 7, The Full Text (KJV)
Read the full chapter below for reference.
1 Likewise this is the law of the trespass offering: it is most holy.
2 In the place where they kill the burnt offering shall they kill the trespass offering: and the blood thereof shall he sprinkle round about upon the altar.
3 And he shall offer of it all the fat thereof; the rump, and the fat that covereth the inwards,
4 And the two kidneys, and the fat that is on them, which is by the flanks, and the caul that is above the liver, with the kidneys, it shall he take away:
5 And the priest shall burn them upon the altar for an offering made by fire unto the LORD: it is a trespass offering.
6 Every male among the priests shall eat thereof: it shall be eaten in the holy place: it is most holy.
7 As the sin offering is, so is the trespass offering: there is one law for them: the priest that maketh atonement therewith shall have it.
8 And the priest that offereth any man’s burnt offering, even the priest shall have to himself the skin of the burnt offering which he hath offered.
9 And all the meat offering that is baken in the oven, and all that is dressed in the fryingpan, and in the pan, shall be the priest’s that offereth it.
10 And every meat offering, mingled with oil, and dry, shall all the sons of Aaron have, one as much as another.
11 And this is the law of the sacrifice of peace offerings, which he shall offer unto the LORD.
12 If he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, and unleavened wafers anointed with oil, and cakes mingled with oil, of fine flour, fried.
13 Besides the cakes, he shall offer for his offering leavened bread with the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace offerings.
14 And of it he shall offer one out of the whole oblation for an heave offering unto the LORD, and it shall be the priest’s that sprinkleth the blood of the peace offerings.
15 And the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings for thanksgiving shall be eaten the same day that it is offered; he shall not leave any of it until the morning.
16 But if the sacrifice of his offering be a vow, or a voluntary offering, it shall be eaten the same day that he offereth his sacrifice: and on the morrow also the remainder of it shall be eaten:
17 But the remainder of the flesh of the sacrifice on the third day shall be burnt with fire.
18 And if any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings be eaten at all on the third day, it shall not be accepted, neither shall it be imputed unto him that offereth it: it shall be an abomination, and the soul that eateth of it shall bear his iniquity.
19 And the flesh that toucheth any unclean thing shall not be eaten; it shall be burnt with fire: and as for the flesh, all that be clean shall eat thereof.
20 But the soul that eateth of the flesh of the sacrifice of peace offerings, that pertain unto the LORD, having his uncleanness upon him, even that soul shall be cut off from his people.
21 Moreover the soul that shall touch any unclean thing, as the uncleanness of man, or any unclean beast, or any abominable unclean thing, and eat of the flesh of the sacrifice of peace offerings, which pertain unto the LORD, even that soul shall be cut off from his people.
22 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
23 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, Ye shall eat no manner of fat, of ox, or of sheep, or of goat.
24 And the fat of the beast that dieth of itself, and the fat of that which is torn with beasts, may be used in any other use: but ye shall in no wise eat of it.
25 For whosoever eateth the fat of the beast, of which men offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD, even the soul that eateth it shall be cut off from his people.
26 Moreover ye shall eat no manner of blood, whether it be of fowl or of beast, in any of your dwellings.
27 Whatsoever soul it be that eateth any manner of blood, even that soul shall be cut off from his people.
28 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
29 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, He that offereth the sacrifice of his peace offerings unto the LORD shall bring his oblation unto the LORD of the sacrifice of his peace offerings.
30 His own hands shall bring the offerings of the LORD made by fire, the fat with the breast, it shall he bring, that the breast may be waved for a wave offering before the LORD.
31 And the priest shall burn the fat upon the altar: but the breast shall be Aaron’s and his sons’.
32 And the right shoulder shall ye give unto the priest for an heave offering of the sacrifices of your peace offerings.
33 He among the sons of Aaron, that offereth the blood of the peace offerings, and the fat, shall have the right shoulder for his part.
34 For the wave breast and the heave shoulder have I taken of the children of Israel from off the sacrifices of their peace offerings, and have given them unto Aaron the priest and unto his sons by a statute for ever from among the children of Israel.
35 This is the portion of the anointing of Aaron, and of the anointing of his sons, out of the offerings of the LORD made by fire, in the day when he presented them to minister unto the LORD in the priest’s office;
36 Which the LORD commanded to be given them of the children of Israel, in the day that he anointed them, by a statute for ever throughout their generations.
37 This is the law of the burnt offering, of the meat offering, and of the sin offering, and of the trespass offering, and of the consecrations, and of the sacrifice of the peace offerings;
38 Which the LORD commanded Moses in mount Sinai, in the day that he commanded the children of Israel to offer their oblations unto the LORD, in the wilderness of Sinai.
