Bible Dictionaries
Burnt offering

Bible Dictionary of Animals, Plants and other Objects

Credit: Rijksmuseum

License: CC0 1.0

Credit URL: https://commons.wikimedia.org...

Comments: Priest sacrifices bull on altar of burnt offering

 

Credit: Illustrators of the 1897 Bible Pictures and What They Teach Us by Charles Foster

License: Public Domain

Credit URL: https://commons.wikimedia.org...

Comments: Offering Up a Burnt Sacrifice to God. Caption: "This man is offering up a burnt sacrifice to God. When an Israelite wanted to thank God for having helped him, he took a lamb out of his flock, and killed it, and put it on an altar. Then he set fire to it and burned it up. This was called a burnt sacrifice. In the tabernacle which the Israelites built, the priests offered up a sacrifice of two lambs every day. This was for all the people."

 

From Easton: Hebrew _olah_; i.e., "ascending," the whole being consumed by fire, and regarded as ascending to God while being consumed. Part of every offering was burnt in the sacred fire, but this was wholly burnt, a "whole burnt offering." It was the most frequent form of sacrifice, and apparently the only one mentioned in the book of Genesis. Such were the sacrifices offered by Abel (Genesis 4:3, Genesis 4:4, here called _minhah_; i.e., "a gift"), Noah (Genesis 8:20), Abraham (Genesis 22:2, Genesis 22:7, Genesis 22:8, Genesis 22:13), and by the Hebrews in Egypt (Exodus 10:25).

The law of Moses afterwards prescribed the occasions and the manner in which burnt sacrifices were to be offered. There were "the continual burnt offering" (Exodus 29:38-Luke :; Leviticus 6:9-13), "the burnt offering of every sabbath," which was double the daily one (Numbers 28:9, Numbers 28:10), "the burnt offering of every month" (28:11-15), the offerings at the Passover (19-23), at Pentecost (Leviticus 23:16), the feast of Trumpets (23:23-25), and on the day of Atonement (Leviticus 16:0).

On other occasions special sacrifices were offered, as at the consecration of Aaron (Exodus 29:0) and the dedication of the temple (1 Kings 8:5, 1 Kings 8:62-3 John :).

Free-will burnt offerings were also permitted (Leviticus 1:13), and were offered at the accession of Solomon to the throne (1 Chronicles 29:21), and at the reformation brought about by Hezekiah (2 Chronicles 29:31-Habakkuk :).

These offerings signified the complete dedication of the offerers unto God. This is referred to in Romans 12:1. (See ALTAR, SACRIFICE.)

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Bibliography Information
Bible Diciontary of Animals, Plants, and other Objects. https://www.studylight.org/​dictionaries/​eng/​apo/​b/burnt-offering.html. 2024.