(spoken with special reference to Aaron) tlie altar of incense (Ex 30"). Only an Aaronite, and 'no stranger' may offer incense at all (Nu 17° [Eng. IB*"]). The Aaronites alone have charge of the table of shewbread (Lv 24', siioken specially of Aaron) and the candlestick (Ex 27*'). From Ex 30"-, Lv 24', Nu 8^- it does not result that, accord- ing to another older enactment, onl}' the high priest had charge of the candlestick (Vogelstein, p. 63). Wlien ' Aaron ' alone is spoken of here. It is as the representative of the priesthood in general. As such he performs in the Priests' Code the whole of the priestly sen-ice, and in other passages as well he is named alone as stand- ing for the ]iriests in general. E.\ 27-' * Aaron and his sons ' will not be incorrect, then, as the explana- tion of tlie other passages which speak of Aaron alone. Only the priests may go within the sanc- tuary (Ex 30™). A ' stranger,' i.e. a non-Aaronite, who ajiproaches the altar or the space inside the curtain shall die (Nu 18'). Amongst the holie.st articles which may be approached only by holy persons, i.e. only by the priests, is reckoned even the laver in the fore-court CE.x 30^).
Even outside the sanctuary there are special duties assigned to the priests. They have to remove the ashes from the altar to a clean place without the camp (Lv 6^ [Eng. "]) ; they have (specially Eleazar, but this while Aaron was yet alive) charge of the holy anointing oil (Nu 4", which is perhaps to be assigned to a redactor, see Dillm. Nunwri, etc., 1886, p. 14 f.). They alone may pronounce the blessing upon the people (Nu 6'°"), and in war or at the festivals are to blow with the sacred trumpets (Nu lO'*- 3P). They have to watch over the distinction between holy and profane, unclean and clean, and to instruct the children of Israel in all statutes which Jahweh has s|>oken to them through Moses (Lv 10""-), whereby probably those statutes are specially in- tended which have regard to holy and profane, clean and unclean.
The priests have, further, to pronounce the curse on the woman who is accused of adulterj', and to give her the water of bitterness to drink (Nu 5"*-); they have to reconsecrate the head of the Nazirite who has been defiled (Nu 6"), to determine the presence of leprosy in human beings, in houses, and in clothes, as well as to pronounce the declara- tion of cleanness from leprosj', and, in the latter case, to carry out the sprinkling of the man to be cleansed with the sacrificial blood, as well aa the sjirinkling and pouring out of oil (Lv 13 f.). At tlie slaying and burning of the red heifer, frora whose ashes the water of purification for those who have been defiled by touching a dead body is to be prepared, the priest (Eleazar in the lifetime of Aaron) is to be present; he has to sprinkle the blood, and to throw various ingredients into the burning (Nu Iff'"-). The priests have, further, to determine the valuation of persons that have been vowed (Lv 27'), of vowed unclean beasts (v.'"-), of the consecrated house (v.") or field (v.'""-).
Aaron and Iiis sons are itutnlletl in office by a solemn consecration, with ' filling of the hand,' i.e. by the presenting of a dedicatory oH'cring jilaced in their hand, the ' fill-oll'cring' (Ex 29, Lv 8 al.; cf. on the filling of the hand, above, § 2). That this act of consecration is to bu repeated in the case of every priest afterwards is not said, and how far this was actually done is questionable (Sihiirer, p. 231 f., note 25). In other passages an anointing of the priests is spoken of (Ex 28" 30»° al.). But at the same time the title 'the anointed' as an oxpressioD of honour is used only of the high priest
(Lv 4'- '• "«/.). At the ceremony of consecrating the priests there is mention only of the anointing of Aaron (Ex 20'), and the anointing is viewed as the sign of the high-priestly succession (v.^).
Clearly we have to do here (as Wellhausen was the first to see) with two strata of the Priests' Code ; one of which assumes the anointing of all priests, the other only that of the high priest. Through combining the two views, thedescri]ition has ongin.ated which makes it appear as if origin- allj" all priests were anointed, while in future the high priest alone is to be anointed {Gesch. jpp. 25, 48 f.). Nowhere in the OT outside the Priests' Code is the anointing of ordinary priests assumed, but that of the high priest is assumed in several passages (Weinel in ZATW, 1S98, p. 28).
Full priestly rights belong to such Aaronites as are free from bodily defects. No one who suffers from any such blemish is to go within the sanctu- ary or approach the altar. On the other hand, even such persons are entitled, like the other Aaronites, to eat of the holy and the most holy offerings (Lv 21"'''). On pain of being cut off, the priests have to refrain from sacrificing and from eating of the sacrificial Hesh as long as they are tt'iintcd with any Levitical unclcanness (Lv 22-'''). The prohibition which applied to all Israelites (Lv 17"'') against eating the flesh of an animal that had died of itself or been torn, is addressed with special emphasis to the priests (Lv 22'). Before performing the sacred ofhce they have to wash their hands and feet in the brazen laver (Ex 3Qi»ff. 4031'.)^ and may not, before going into the sanctuary to perform their duties, drink wine or strong drink (Lv 10"-). They are forbidden to marry a harlot, a polluted, or a divorced woman (Lv 21'). A priest's daughter who by harlotry has profaned the office of her father is to be bunied with fire (v."). The priests are forbidden to defile themselves through the dead, with the exception of defilement by the corpse of the nearest blood relations (Lv 21"'-). In all cases of bereavement they are forbidden to exhibit signs of mourning by niakin" a baldness upon their heads, cutting their beards at the comers, or making cuttings in their flesh (v.°). — These prescriptions for the main- taining of purity on the part of the priests are found to a large extent in the Law of Holiness, and may already have belonged to its main stock, and thus have been merely adopted by the Priests' Code.