The Fallible · Synthetic · Study Bible
The Monthly Offerings
Numbers 28:11–15 — The Monthly Offerings. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.
11At the beginning of every month, you are to present to the LORD a burnt offering of two young bulls, one ram, and seven male lambs a year old, all unblemished,
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ū·ḇə·rā·šê ḥā·ḏə·šê·ḵem taq·rî·ḇū Yah·weh ‘ō·lāh šə·na·yim bə·nê- ḇā·qār pā·rîm ’e·ḥāḏ wə·’a·yil šiḇ·‘āh kə·ḇā·śîm bə·nê- šā·nāh tə·mî·mim
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And at the heads of your months you shall bring near to YHWH an ascending-offering: two sons of the herd, bulls, one ram, seven lambs sons of a year — whole, without blemish.
Where the English smooths the original
At the beginnings of the month, i.e., at the new moons, a larger burnt-offering was to be added to the daily or continual burnt-offering, consisting of two bullocks (young oxen), one ram, and seven yearling lambs, with the corresponding meat and drink-offerings
The offerings in the new moons showed thankfulness for the renewing of earthly blessings: when we rejoice in the gifts of providence, we must make the sacrifice of Christ, that great gift of special grace, the fountain and spring-head of our joy.
This sacrifice to God is thought to have been ordained in opposition to the idolatry of the Gentiles, who were wont to worship the new moon with great rejoicings.
partly that by giving God the first-fruits of every month they should acknowledge him as the Lord of all their time, and own his providence, by which all times and seasons, and all the fruits and blessings of them, and actions done in them, are ordered; and partly that it might be a type of the future renovation of the world by Christ.
Increased respect was paid to the beginning of the month in later times. Trade was suspended ( Amos 8:5 ), and religious instruction appears to have been given at this time ( 2Kings 4:23 ).Ellicott is careful to date the rest-day and teaching customs to "later times" — they grew up around the rite, but the law in Numbers prescribes only the sacrifice, not the cessation of labor.
12along with three-tenths of an ephah of fine flour mixed with oil as a grain offering with each bull, two-tenths of an ephah of fine flour mixed with oil as a grain offering with the ram,
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ū·šə·lō·šāh ‘eś·rō·nîm sō·leṯ bə·lū·lāh ḇaš·še·men min·ḥāh hā·’e·ḥāḏ lap·pār ū·šə·nê ‘eś·rō·nîm sō·leṯ bə·lū·lāh ḇaš·še·men min·ḥāh lā·’a·yil hā·’e·ḥāḏ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And three tenth-parts of fine flour mingled with oil for a grain-offering for the one bull, and two tenth-parts of fine flour mingled with oil for a grain-offering for the one ram,
Where the English smooths the original
The quantities of flour in the meat offering, for each bullock, and for the ram, and for each lamb, are the same as in Numbers 15:4 only the quantity of oil for each is not here expressed, which for a bullock was half an hin of oil, for a ram the third part of an hin, and for a lamb the fourth part
And three tenth deals of flour for a meat offering, mingled with oil, for one bullock; and two tenth deals of flour for a meat offering, mingled with oil, for one ram
13and a tenth of an ephah of fine flour mixed with oil as a grain offering with each lamb. This is a burnt offering, a pleasing aroma, a food offering to the LORD.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·‘iś·śā·rōn ‘iś·śā·rō·wn sō·leṯ bə·lū·lāh ḇaš·še·men min·ḥāh hā·’e·ḥāḏ lak·ke·ḇeś ‘ō·lāh nî·ḥō·aḥ rê·aḥ ’iš·šeh Yah·weh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
and a tenth-part, a tenth-part, of fine flour mingled with oil for a grain-offering for the one lamb. An ascending-offering, a soothing aroma, a fire-offering to YHWH.
Where the English smooths the original
according to the Targum of Jonathan, was to be wine of grapes, and not any other: this is the burnt offering of every month throughout the year; or, "of the month in its month"
And a several tenth deal of flour mingled with oil for a meat offering unto one lamb; for a burnt offering of a sweet savor, a sacrifice made by fire unto the LORD.
14Their drink offerings shall be half a hin of wine with each bull, a third of a hin with the ram, and a quarter hin with each lamb. This is the monthly burnt offering to be made at each new moon throughout the year.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·nis·kê·hem yih·yeh ḥă·ṣî ha·hîn yā·yin lap·pār ū·šə·lî·šiṯ ha·hîn lā·’a·yil ū·rə·ḇî·‘iṯ ha·hîn lak·ke·ḇeś zōṯ ḥō·ḏeš ‘ō·laṯ bə·ḥā·ḏə·šōw lə·ḥā·ḏə·šê haš·šā·nāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And their drink-offerings shall be half a hin of wine for the bull, and a third of a hin for the ram, and a fourth of a hin for the lamb. This is the ascending-offering of a month in its month, for the months of the year.
Where the English smooths the original
And their {e} drink offerings shall be half an hin of wine unto a bullock, and the third part of an hin unto a ram, and a fourth part of an hin unto a lamb: this is the burnt offering of every month throughout the months of the year. (e) That is, the wine that will be poured on the sacrifice.
i.e. To be offered in the beginning of every month.Poole's whole comment on the verse — terse, fixing the libation-rite to each month's head.
The beginning of the month was known, not by astronomical calculations, but, according to Jewish writers, by the testimony of messengers appointed to watch the first visible appearance of the new moon; and then the fact was announced through the whole country by signal-fires kindled on the mountain tops.JFB describes later Second-Temple practice ("according to Jewish writers"), not a procedure given in the Numbers text; the verse fixes the rite to the new moon but is silent on how the moon was sighted.
15In addition to the regular burnt offering with its drink offering, one male goat is to be presented to the LORD as a sin offering.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
‘al- hat·tā·mîḏ ‘ō·laṯ wə·nis·kōw ’e·ḥāḏ ū·śə·‘îr ‘iz·zîm yê·‘ā·śeh Yah·weh lə·ḥaṭ·ṭāṯ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And one hairy male of the she-goats for a sin-offering to YHWH shall be made, upon the regular ascending-offering and its drink-offering.
Where the English smooths the original
This was an offering of a different sort, not a burnt offering, but a sin offering, typical of Christ, who was made an offering for sin
One kid of the goats; a he-goat. See Numbers 15:24 . Unto the Lord; not unto the moon, to which the Gentiles offered it.
One kid of the goats. "One hairy one ( שָׂעִיר ) of the she goats ( עֵן )." See on Numbers 7:16. This was probably offered first in order, according to the usual analogy of such sacrifices ( Exodus 29:10-14 ).
The sin-offering, which Numbers 15:22-26 had been contemplated in cases where a sin had been committed ignorantly without the knowledge of the congregation, was henceforth not to be offered merely at discretion, as circumstances might seem to require, but to be regularly repeated, not less frequently than once a month.
The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.
AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.
The unit opens not "at the beginning" but, in the Hebrew, bə-rāšê ḥāḏəšêḵem — "in the heads of your months" (rôʼsh, H7218). The month is reckoned by its head, the renewed moon, and at each head Israel is to cause to draw near (taqrîḇū, Hifil of qārab, H7126) a great burnt-offering: two bulls, a ram, seven lambs, all təmîmim — "whole" (H8549). Keil & Delitzsch register the plain scale of it — "a larger burnt-offering was to be added to the daily or continual burnt-offering, consisting of two bullocks (young oxen), one ram, and seven yearling lambs" — while Joseph Benson reads its direction: the rite "is thought to have been ordained in opposition to the idolatry of the Gentiles, who were wont to worship the new moon with great rejoicings." The new moon was the most universally observed of nature-festivals; Israel's law does not abolish it but bends it toward YHWH. Matthew Poole names the inward logic: by "giving God the first-fruits of every month they should acknowledge him as the Lord of all their time."
To each animal is assigned a measured grain-offering of sōleṯ (fine flour, H5560) bəlûlāh baš-šemen — "mingled with oil" (H1101) — and a poured libation of wine (nesek, H5262): three-tenths and half-a-hin for the bull, two-tenths and a third for the ram, one-tenth and a quarter for the lamb. The arithmetic is not new: John Gill notes "the quantities of flour in the meat offering... are the same as in Numbers 15:4," and indeed the Verifier finds the rare measure-word ‘iśśārōn ("tenth-part," H6241, in only 22 verses) shared verbatim with Numbers 15 — a recited formula, not a coincidence. The whole rite is then sealed by a fixed liturgical couplet in v. 13: rêaḥ nîḥōaḥ, "a soothing aroma" (H7381 + H5207), and ʼiššeh, a "fire-offering" (H801). The Geneva annotators preserve the old rendering — "a burnt offering of a sweet savor, a sacrifice made by fire unto the LORD" — and gloss the libation precisely as "the wine that will be poured on the sacrifice." Gill adds the rabbinic care that the wine be "wine of grapes, and not any other."
The movement closes with a single śə‘îr ‘izzîm — a "hairy one of the she-goats" (H8163/H5795) — lə-ḥaṭṭāʼṯ, "for a sin" (H2403), the one word naming both the offense and its remedy. Albert Barnes marks the structural innovation: the sin-offering, once reserved for Numbers 15's cases of unwitting communal sin, is "henceforth not to be offered merely at discretion... but to be regularly repeated, not less frequently than once a month." The Pulpit Commentary reads the Hebrew over the English — "One hairy one (שָׂעִיר) of the she goats" — and, by analogy with Exodus 29, judges it "probably offered first in order." Both Poole and Gill seize the polemic edge of la-YHWH: the goat is "unto the Lord; not unto the moon, to which the Gentiles offered it." And the goat does not stand alone — it is laid ‘al-hat-tāmîḏ, "upon the continual" (H8548): the daily offering keeps burning beneath every addition, the unbroken bass-line under the month's added chord.
Read whole, this little ledger of bulls and tenth-parts is a theology of time. The daily tāmîḏ sanctified the day; here the head of each month is claimed too, so that the smaller and larger cycles of the calendar are both surrendered — and, crucially, the monthly rite is built to never displace the daily one (‘al-hat-tāmîḏ, v. 15). Two notes the text itself sounds deserve weight. First, the order of the gifts is the order of the gospel grammar: the sin-offering goat clears the ground (atonement) and the ascending bulls, ram, and lambs then rise wholly to God (consecration). Barnes' point that the sin-offering moved from occasional to perpetual says something exact about fallen creatures — sin accrues with the passage of time itself, so the remedy must be calendared, not merely improvised. Second, the fixed couplet rêaḥ nîḥōaḥ — "aroma of rest" — is the same phrase the LORD smelled after the Flood (Genesis 8:21) and the same Paul applies to Christ's self-offering (Ephesians 5:2). The text is not embarrassed by the anthropomorphism: God is said to be quieted by the rising smoke. Held under Sola Scriptura, the new-moon offering testifies that no division of time — day, week, month, year — is exempt from worship, and that the rest God takes in His people is purchased, not presumed. This is the tool's fallible reading, offered to be tested against the Word, not above it.
The moon is renewed by a light not its own — and so is every month that Israel dares to call holy. (A reader's line, not Scripture.)
AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.
The flour-and-oil prescription of vv. 12-13 is not freshly composed; it recites the standing formula from Numbers 15. The rare measure-word ‘iśśārōn ("tenth-part," 22 vv) appears together with bālal ("mingle," 41 vv), sōleṯ ("fine flour," 52 vv) and shemen ("oil") in both — a cluster too specific to be accidental. Gill notes the identity outright: "the same as in Numbers 15:4."
Numbers 15:4 · Numbers 15:6 · Numbers 15:9
basis: rare shared lexemes recited verbatim between Numbers 28:13 and Numbers 15:4 — H6241 ʻissârôwn (only 22 vv), H1101 bâlal (41 vv), H5560 çôleth (52 vv), H8081 shemen; the grain-offering ration is quoted, not merely echoed
The hairy goat lə-ḥaṭṭāʼṯ of v. 15 reuses the exact vocabulary of the community sin-offering legislated in Numbers 15:24 — śā‘îr ("hairy one," 57 vv), ‘êz ("she-goat," 74 vv), nesek ("libation," 62 vv), ‘ōlāh. Barnes reads it as a development: what Numbers 15 contemplated for unwitting communal sin is here made a fixed monthly repetition. The Pulpit Commentary, however, expressly resists collapsing the two — "there is no authority for supposing that this sin offering superseded the one mentioned in Numbers 15:24"; one is calendared routine, the other occasional and contingent. The shared vocabulary is real and structural; whether the rites are one or two is an interpretive question the text leaves open.
Numbers 15:24 · Leviticus 4:23
basis: shared sin-offering vocabulary between Numbers 28:15 and Numbers 15:24 — H8163 sâʻîyr, H5795 ʻêz, H5262 neçek, H5930 ʻôlâh; same rite-pattern, no quotation asserted
The monthly festival (chôdesh, H2320) is repeatedly paired in the prophets with the sabbath as a recurring day of worship — most fully in Isaiah 66:23, "from one New Moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another." Jamieson-Fausset-Brown observe that "the Sabbath and the new moon are frequently mentioned together." The link rests on the single keyword chôdesh (224 vv), so it is thematic rather than a verbal quotation.
Isaiah 66:23 · Psalm 81:3 · Amos 8:5 · 2 Kings 4:23
basis: shared keyword H2320 chôdesh (new moon/month, 224 vv) between Numbers 28:14 and Isaiah 66:23 / Psalm 81:3; a common motif, not a quotation — tier held at thematic because the lexeme is frequent
Ezekiel's vision of the eschatological temple revives a new-moon burnt-offering of bullock, ram, and lambs təmîmim (Ezekiel 46:6), sharing the cluster tāmîym (85 vv), kebes (100 vv), par (119 vv), and ʼayil (170 vv) with this unit — though the proportions differ, showing reuse and adaptation rather than copy.
Ezekiel 46:6 · Ezekiel 46:1
basis: shared monthly-offering animal cluster between Numbers 28:11 and Ezekiel 46:6 — H8549 tâmîym, H3532 kebes, H6499 par, H352 ʼayil; same rite reconfigured for the visionary temple, no quotation claimed
The closing clause of v. 15, ‘al-hat-tāmîḏ — "upon the continual" (H8548) — reaches back within the same chapter to the twice-daily lamb prescribed in Numbers 28:3-6, the ‘ōlat tāmîḏ that opens the whole calendar. The new-moon offering is not freestanding: it is added on top of the unbroken daily fire, which alone is called tāmîḏ, "perpetual." The shared pair tāmîḏ (103 vv) + ‘ōlāh (261 vv) is a frequent legal vocabulary, not a rare quotation, so the link is structural — the architecture of Numbers 28 itself, where every festal addition (sabbath, new moon, feasts) presupposes and never displaces the daily base.
Numbers 28:3 · Numbers 28:6
basis: shared lexemes between Numbers 28:15 and Numbers 28:3-6 — H8548 tâmîyd (103 vv), H5930 ʻôlâh (261 vv); the new-moon rite is built syntactically 'upon' the daily continual offering of the same chapter, a structural relation, not a quotation
Paul lists "a New Moon celebration" (νεομηνία) among the festivals he calls "a shadow of the things to come" whose substance is Christ (Colossians 2:16-17), reading the very institution of this unit typologically. Because Colossians is Greek and Numbers Hebrew, there is no shared Strong's lexeme to ground the link — it cannot be tiered "verbal." The connection is conceptual (the new-moon festival as type), argued by the NT itself but flagged here for provenance since it rests on interpretation, not verbal identity.
Colossians 2:16 · Colossians 2:17
basis: cross-Testament (Greek↔Hebrew): no shared original-language lexeme is possible; the new-moon→Christ typology is asserted by Colossians 2:16-17 as interpretation, not by verbal quotation — flagged so the reader tests the figural claim
AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.
The fixed couplet rêaḥ nîḥōaḥ, "soothing aroma" (vv. 13), is the same phrase the LORD smelled when Noah's offering rose after the Flood (Genesis 8:21, sharing the rare pair nîḥōaḥ [43 vv] + rêaḥ [55 vv]). The New Testament gathers the whole sacrificial idiom into one figure: "Christ... gave Himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God" (Ephesians 5:2). Matthew Henry already saw the burnt-offering pointing past itself — "we must make the sacrifice of Christ, that great gift of special grace, the fountain and spring-head of our joy." The monthly fire that quieted God's face is read by the ancient church as a shadow of the one offering that truly does.
Numbers 28:13 · Genesis 8:21 · Ephesians 5:2
The monthly goat is named by the single word ḥaṭṭāʼṯ (H2403), which is at once "sin" and "sin-offering": the victim is the sin it carries away. Gill draws the line plainly — the goat is "typical of Christ, who was made an offering for sin." Paul presses the same paradox to its edge: God "made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf" (2 Corinthians 5:21). The perpetual, calendared sin-offering of v. 15 — never displacing the continual burnt-offering it is laid upon — foreshadows a single offering by which "He has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified" (Hebrews 10:14). This second reach (Hebrews) is cross-Testament Greek-to-Hebrew, so it is offered as typological reading, not verbal proof.
Numbers 28:15 · 2 Corinthians 5:21 · Hebrews 10:11 · Hebrews 10:14
Matthew Henry's reading of the new-moon rite is frankly figural and deserves to be named as such: "As the moon borrows light from the sun, and is renewed by its influences; so the church borrows her light from Jesus Christ, who is the Sun of righteousness, renewing the state of the church." This is a homiletical typology drawn from the occasion of the festival (the renewed moon) rather than from any word of the Hebrew text; it is widely held in the Reformed tradition but is interpretive analogy, not lexical demonstration.
Numbers 28:11 · Malachi 4:2 · Isaiah 66:23
The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.
Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:
This unit is legal-liturgical prescription, not narrative; the ⚙ synthesis layer is correspondingly restrained. Several voices in voices_raw are the same paragraph repeated across all five verses (Henry, Barnes, JFB, Keil & Delitzsch comment on the whole block 28:9-15), so this synthesis distributes distinct excerpts per verse to avoid quoting one author identically five times — every quoted excerpt is a verbatim contiguous substring of its verse's raw text. To broaden the witness beyond the two or three commentators who carried the draft, Ellicott (on the later rest-day custom) and Jamieson-Fausset-Brown (on how the new moon was sighted and signalled) are now quoted directly, each with an editorial note flagging that they describe later practice rather than what the Numbers text prescribes. Poole and Gill leave some verses bare ("No text from Poole on this verse"), so verses 12-14 still lean on Gill and Geneva. The thread bases come directly from the Verifier: the Numbers 15 grain-offering link clears the "verbal" bar on the strength of the rare ‘iśśārōn (22 vv) plus çôleth/bālal; the new-moon-festival links and the within-chapter tāmîḏ link rest on frequent legal vocabulary (chôdesh, tāmîḏ, ‘ōlāh) and are deliberately held at "thematic / structural." The Colossians 2:16 and Hebrews 10 connections are cross-Testament (Greek↔Hebrew): no shared Strong's number is possible, so they are flagged or tiered typological and never "verbal," with the reason stated. The Genesis 8:21 "soothing aroma" couplet in the Christ section is a true rare verbal pair (nîḥōaḥ 43 vv + rêaḥ 55 vv, Verifier-confirmed), but is presented under attestation rather than a thread badge because its force here is redemptive-typological, not merely lexical. One honest caution: commentators disagree on the goat's order in execution (Barnes and the Pulpit Commentary say it was likely offered first though listed last) and on whether this monthly sin-offering relates to the occasional one of Numbers 15:24 (the Pulpit Commentary expressly denies that it supersedes it); the synthesis reports both and notes that the text itself specifies neither sequence nor that relationship. This unit contains no Joshua 1:5 material, so the standing Joshua 1:5 → Hebrews 13:5 flag does not apply here.
✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)