Leviticus 1

12 Jul 2026 - Theology

A Call Uttered in Love

A Call Uttered in Love

The Hebrew name for the book of Leviticus is Vayikra, from the first two words of the Hebrew scroll, “He called”. Many rabbis have noted the interesting opening to the first chapter of the book:

Leviticus 1:1 - “The Lord [He] called Moses and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying…”

There are no less than three verbs for speech here: calling, speaking, and saying. Given the terseness of the Torah, especially in legal contexts, the redundancy cries for attention.

The entire phrase in Hebrew, “He called to Moses,” is clearly a prelude. Once we get to “the Lord spoke to him, saying,” we know we are about to hear substantive details. God is summoning Moses, and through him the Israelites, to a vocation - originially meaning, “a task to which one is called.” This was originally a deeply religious idea, not a secular, work-related one. It as if God were saying, “What I am about to tell you is not only about what you should do. It is also about what you are called on to be.” We sense already that Vayikra (Leviticus) is about Israel’s vocation as a holy people dedicated to God.

The last letter of the opening word, vayikra, is an aleph, and is written small - almost to the point of invisibility. The standard-size letters spell out the word vayikar, meaning, “He encountered, chanced upon.” Unlike vayikra, which refers to a call, a meeting by request, vayikar suggests the opposite: an accidental meeting, a mere happenstance.

Rabbi Hama bar Hanina notes that while Moses (a prophet of Israel) and the people of Israel were called by the Lord (vayikra), the Lord reveals Himself to the pagan nations by vayikar. One such example is in the book of Numbers:

Numbers 23:16 - “And the Lord met [vayikar] Balaam…”

Rashi explains that the verb “to call” denotes something more than mere speech. It implies affection, intimacy, a relationship of love. Vayikra is a call uttered in love, the opposite of vayikar, mere chance, a fortuitous happening.

Burnt Offerings

This first chapter of Leviticus details the types of burnt offerings that people would sacrifice before the Lord. Bernard Bamberger (1904-1980), a modern commentator, notes that ancient people thought the gods lived not by eating the food offered to them, but by inhaling it.

There are a few types of burnt offering listed here in Leviticus 1:

Leviticus 1:3 - “If his offering be a burnt sacrifice of the herd…”

Leviticus 1:10 - “And if his offering be of the flocks, namely, of the sheep, or of the goats…”

Leviticus 1:14 - “And if the burnt sacrifice for his offering to the Lord be of fowls…”

These three groups of sacrifices are all to be “a burnt sacrifice, an offering made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the Lord.” (9,13,17)

Israelites often brought a burnt-offering when they thought they had sinned and wanted to atone, so it was usually voluntary. The rich brought bulls, rams, or male goats, while the people who were poor could bring turtledoves or young pigeons. The sages of the Talmud say, “Whether you offer much [a bull or ram] or little [a pigeon or a turtledove] makes no difference, if only your heart is turned toward God.”

Why Sacrifices?

Why does the Lord require sacrifices? We know God is the creator of all things, and He can not be bribed or placated. So why would God require something that He doesn’t need or can get Himself?

1 Chronicles 29:14 (NIV) - “…Everything comes from you [God], and we have given you only what comes from your hand.”

The usual Hebrew word for “sacrifice” is korban, meaning “approaching” or “drawing closer to”. While the world was created by God as a place for humans to dwell, the people of Israel created the Tabernacle so they would know that God dwelt among them. In the word korban we get a better sense of the reason for sacrifices in ancient Israel. We can understand the idea of sacrifice as a way of “approaching” or “drawing closer to” the Lord.

The answer to the question of why God requires sacrifice seems obvious once we take seriously the central image of God as father and the Israelites as His children. Children know how dependent they are on their parents. They know that when they give their parents a present, it is usually a token gesture. It is not that the parent lacks anything or that the child has genuinely given something he owns. One of the greatest gifts a parent can give a child is the dignity of being able to give. The significance of sacrifice is that it is a gesture of love - of acknowledgement, thanksgiving, and reciprocity.

In the case of the sin or guilt offerings, we seek not just to put right the moral disorder caused by sin, but also to restore our damaged relationship with our Father who created us. At other times, sacrifice is a way of expressing thanks to God of the kind a child feels towards the parents who brought him into being and shelter him from harm. It is love that gives sacrifice a new, transfigured meaning, for we make sacrifices for those we love.

From a human perspective, the act of sacrifice is a process of opening ourselves to God by renouncing something of ourselves. We bring a gift of love, as a child to a parent. We offer something in our possession, our power, our will, our self-sufficiency. We engage in a symbolic act of renunciation, acknowledging our dependency on God. By renouncing our ownership of something (an animal, part of the harvest, or money), we acknowledge God’s ownership of the world.

Here more than anywhere else, intention was vital, as it is possible the Israelites could lapse into idolatry. They could come to see sacrifices as a way to placate God, leaving them free to act ruthlessly towards others in the world outside of the Tabernacle. The wrong intention while offering sacrifices could turn a holy act into a pagan one.

For this reason, when the Second Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 AD, other forms of renunciation could be substituted in place of the sacrifices - some rabbis said prayer should replace the sacrifices, other rabbis said that doing good deeds (particularly without any hope for reward) was a better replacement for the sacrifices.

In the case of prayer, we renounce the will. In the case of good deeds for others, we often renounce the will and sometimes property. Both are denial of the self.

Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi noticed a grammatical oddity about the second verse of the chapter:

Leviticus 1:2 - “Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, If any man of you bring an offering unto the Lord, ye shall bring your offering of the cattle, even of the herd, and of the flock.”

In Hebrew, the word order of the sentence is strange and unexpected. We would expect it to read: adam mikem ki yakriv, “if any man of you bring an offering.” Instead, what it says is adam ki yakriv mikem, “if any man bring an offering of you.”

The essence of sacrifice, said Rabbi Shneur Zalman, is that we offer ourselves. We bring to God our faculties, our energies, our thoughts and emotions. The physical form of sacrifice - an animal offered on the altar - is only an external manifestation of an inner act. The real sacrifice is mikem, “of you.” We give God something of ourselves.

References

1. The Hebrew - Greek Key Study Bible (KJV Version)
2. The Torah Portion-by-Portion by Rabbi Seymour Rossel (2007)
3. Covenant & Conversation, Volume 3: Leviticus, the Book of Holiness