Numbers 6:12

12 and shall dedicate to the LORD his days as a Nazirite, and shall bring a male lamb a year old for a guilt offering; but the former days will be void because his separation was defiled.

Numbers 6:12 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 6:12

And he shall consecrate unto the Lord the days of his
separation
He was to begin his account again, from the time of his shaving his head, and devote as many days to the service of the Lord as what he had vowed before:

and shall bring a lamb of the first year for a trespass offering;
we see how much trouble and expense were brought by a single act of pollution, and that involuntary too; how much more need is there of an atoning sacrifice for the sins of men, even for all of them, and for which only the sacrifice of Christ is sufficient?

but the days that were before shall be lost;
which were before the pollution, how near soever the time of Nazariteship being at an end was, whether his vow was for thirty days, or a hundred, or a whole year; be it what it will, and the pollution happened on the last of those days, all were lost; he was obliged to begin again, and go through the whole time he at first vowed; and this was the case if he drank the least quantity of wine, or shaved ever so little of the hair of his head, or was any ways polluted by the dead; and this severity, as it may seem, was used to make him cautious that he broke not his vow by any means:

because his separation was defiled;
in the case instanced in, by the dead, but it was the same if he broke the law of Nazariteship in any of the other articles of it.

Numbers 6:12 In-Context

10 'Then on the eighth day he shall bring two turtledoves or two young pigeons to the priest, to the doorway of the tent of meeting.
11 'The priest shall offer one for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering, and make atonement for him concerning his sin because of the dead person. And that same day he shall consecrate his head,
12 and shall dedicate to the LORD his days as a Nazirite, and shall bring a male lamb a year old for a guilt offering; but the former days will be void because his separation was defiled.
13 'Now this is the law of the Nazirite when the days of his separation are fulfilled, he shall bring the offering to the doorway of the tent of meeting.
14 'He shall present his offering to the LORD : one male lamb a year old without defect for a burnt offering and one ewe-lamb a year old without defect for a sin offering and one ram without defect for a peace offering,

Footnotes 2

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