Shared Word Translation
Leviticus 21
Priests and Contact with the Dead
The LORD said to Moses, “Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron, and say to them: No priest shall make himself unclean for a dead person among his people, except for his nearest relatives: his mother, father, son, daughter, brother, or his virgin sister who is near to him because she has had no husband; for her he may make himself unclean. He shall not make himself unclean as a husband among his people and so profane himself.
Priestly Holiness
They shall not make a bald place on their heads, shave off the edges of their beards, or make cuts in their flesh. They shall be holy to their God and shall not profane the name of their God, for they bring the offerings by fire to the LORD, the food of their God; therefore they shall be holy. They shall not marry a woman who is a prostitute or profaned, nor shall they marry a woman divorced from her husband, for the priest is holy to his God. You shall make him holy, for he brings the food of your God. He shall be holy to you, for I the LORD who makes you holy am holy. If the daughter of a priest profanes herself through prostitution, she profanes her father; she shall be burned with fire.
The High Priest
The priest who is greatest among his brothers, upon whose head the anointing oil has been poured and whose hand has been filled to wear the garments, shall not let his hair hang loose or tear his garments. He shall not go near any dead body; he shall not make himself unclean even for his father or mother. He shall not go out from the sanctuary and shall not profane the sanctuary of his God, for the consecration of the anointing oil of his God is upon him. I am the LORD. He shall take a wife in her virginity. A widow, a divorced woman, a woman who has been profaned, or a prostitute—these he shall not marry. He shall take as wife a virgin from his own people, so that he does not profane his offspring among his people, for I am the LORD who makes him holy.”
Priests with Physical Defects
The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron, saying: None of your offspring throughout their generations who has a physical defect may draw near to bring the food of his God. For no man who has a defect shall draw near: a man who is blind or lame, one with a disfigured face or a limb too long, a man who has a broken foot or broken hand, a hunchback, a man of unusually small stature, one with a defect in the eye, an itching disease or scabs, or damaged testicles. No man among the offspring of Aaron the priest who has a physical defect shall draw near to bring the offerings by fire to the LORD. He has a defect; he shall not draw near to bring the food of his God. He may eat the food of his God, both from the most holy and from the holy things. But he shall not enter through the curtain or approach the altar, because he has a defect, so that he does not profane my holy places, for I am the LORD who makes them holy.” So Moses spoke to Aaron and his sons and to all the Israelites.