Leviticus 6:16

And the remainder thereof shall Aaron and his sons eat: with unleavened bread shall it be eaten in the holy place; in the court of the tabernacle of the congregation they shall eat it.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(16) With unleavened bread shall it be eaten.—Better, unleavened shall it be eaten. That is, the remainder of the meal is to be made into unleavened cakes, and thus be eaten. (See Leviticus 10:12.) By adding the word with, which is not in the original, the Authorised Version says that the priests are to eat the meat offering with the addition of unleavened cakes.

Benson Commentary

Leviticus 6:16. The remainder shall Aaron and his sons eat — Unless they had some legal uncleanness upon them, Leviticus 22:6. His sons — The males only might eat these, because they were most holy things; whereas the daughters of Aaron might eat other holy things. In the court — In some special room appointed for that purpose. The reason why this was to be eaten only by holy persons, and that in a holy place, is given, (Leviticus 6:17,) because it is most holy.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

6:14-23 The law of the burnt-offerings put upon the priests a great deal of care and work; the flesh was wholly burnt, and the priests had nothing but the skin. But most of the meat-offering was their own. It is God's will that his ministers should be provided with what is needful.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

With unleavened bread shall it be eaten - This should be, it (the remainder) shall be eaten unleavened.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

Le 6:14-18. The Law of the Meat Offering.

14-18. this is the law of the meat offering—Though this was a provision for the priests and their families, it was to be regarded as "most holy"; and the way in which it was prepared was: on any meat offerings being presented, the priest carried them to the altar, and taking a handful from each of them as an oblation, he salted and burnt it on the altar; the residue became the property of the priests, and was the food of those whose duty it was to attend on the service. They themselves as well as the vessels from which they ate were typically holy, and they were not at liberty to partake of the meat offering while they labored under any ceremonial defilement.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The males only might eat these, because they were most holy things; whereas the daughters of Aaron might eat other holy things, Numbers 18:11.

With unleavened bread; or rather, unleavened, for with is not in the Hebrew, and it disturbs the sense; for since the meat-offering itself was fine flour, Leviticus 2:1, it is not likely that they eat it with unleavened bread.

In the court of the tabernacle of the congregation; in some special room appointed for that purpose. See Leviticus 8:31 1 Samuel 3:3 Ezekiel 42:13 46:19,24. The reason why this was to be eaten only by holy persons, and that in a holy place, is given Leviticus 6:17, because it is most holy, and therefore to be treated with greater reverence.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And the remainder thereof shall Aaron and his sons eat,.... What quantity of fine flour the meat offering consisted of is not said; very probably it was left to the offerer to bring what he would, since it was a freewill offering:

with unleavened bread shall it be eaten in the holy place; or rather, "unleavened shall it be eaten"; for it cannot well be thought that bread of any sort should be eaten with this offering, which, properly speaking, was itself a bread offering, and so it should be called, rather than a meat offering; and certain it is, that no meat offering was to be made of leaven, but of fine flour unleavened, and so to be eaten, not by the priests in their own houses, but in the tabernacle; not in that part of it properly called the holy place, in distinction from the holy of holies, but as it follows:

in the court of the tabernacle of the congregation they shall eat it; in a room provided in that court for that purpose, as afterwards in the temple.

Geneva Study Bible

And the remainder thereof shall Aaron and his sons eat: with unleavened bread shall it be eaten in the holy place; in the court of the tabernacle of the congregation they shall eat it.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Leviticus 6:16

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Law of the Meat-Offering. - The regulations in Leviticus 6:14, Leviticus 6:15, are merely a repetition of Leviticus 2:2 and Leviticus 2:3; but in Leviticus 6:16-18 the new instructions are introduced with regard to what was left and had not been burned upon the altar. The priests were to eat this as unleavened, i.e., to bake it without leaven, and to eat it in a holy place, viz., in the court of the tabernacle. תּאכל מצות in Leviticus 6:16 is explained by "it shall not be baken with leaven" in Leviticus 6:17. It was the priests' share of the firings of Jehovah (see Leviticus 1:9), and as such it was most holy (see Leviticus 2:3), like the sin-offering and trespass-offering (Leviticus 6:25, Leviticus 6:26; Leviticus 7:6), and only to be eaten by the male members of the families of the priests. This was to be maintained as a statute for ever (see at Leviticus 3:17). Every one that touches them (the most holy offerings) becomes holy." יקדּשׁ does not mean he shall be holy, or shall sanctify himself (lxx, Vulg., Luth., a Lap., etc.), nor he is consecrated to the sanctuary and is to perform service there (Theodor., Knobel, and others). In this provision, which was equally applicable to the sin-offering (Leviticus 6:27), to the altar of the burnt-offering (Exodus 29:37), and to the most holy vessels of the tabernacle (Exodus 30:29), the word is not to be interpreted by Numbers 17:2-3, or Deuteronomy 22:9, or by the expression "shall be holy" in Leviticus 27:10, Leviticus 27:21, and Numbers 18:10, but by Isaiah 65:5, "touch me not, for I am holy." The idea is this, every layman who touched these most holy things became holy through the contact, so that henceforth he had to guard against defilement in the same manner as the sanctified priests (Leviticus 21:1-8), though without sharing the priestly rights and prerogatives. This necessarily placed him in a position which would involve many inconveniences in connection with ordinary life.