The altar
13 These are the dimensions of the altar, according to a twenty-one-inch unit of measure. The base is twenty-one inches high and twenty-one inches wide, with an outer curb measuring one and a half inches all around. This is the altar's height.
14
From the base at ground level to the lower ledge is forty-two inches; the lower ledge is twenty-one inches wide. The distance from the lower to the upper ledge is seven feet; the upper ledge is twenty-one inches wide.
15
The hearth is seven feet high, with four horns projecting upward from the hearth.
16
The hearth is twenty-one feet square; each side is equal to the others.
17
The ledge around the hearth is twenty-four and a half feet long by twenty-four and a half feet wide, a square. Its outer rim is ten and a half inches, and its base all around is twenty-one inches. Its ramp faces east.
Purification of the altar
18 He said to me, Human one, the LORD God proclaims: These are the regulations established for the altar on the day when it is prepared for making entirely burned offerings and dashing blood on it.
19
You will provide a young bull as a purification offering to the levitical priests who are descendants of Zadok, the ones who may draw near to minster to me. This is what the LORD God says.
20
You will take some of its blood and set it on the four horns of the altar and on the four sides of the ledge and on the curb all around. So you will purify it and purge it.
21
Then you will take the bull selected as the purification offering, and the priests will burn it in a designated place of the temple outside of the sanctuary.
22
On the second day, you will present a flawless male goat as a purification offering. The priests will purify the altar just as they purified the altar with the bull.
23
When you have completed the purification, you will present a flawless bull from the herd and a flawless ram from the flock.
24
You will present them to the LORD. The priests will throw salt on them and offer them as entirely burned offerings to the LORD.
25
Daily, for seven days, you will present a male goat for a purification offering. You will also present a bull from the herd and a ram from the flock, both flawless.
26
For seven days the priests will purge the altar in order to purify it and to dedicate it.
27
When the seven days are completed, the priests will offer your entirely burned offerings and your well-being sacrifices on the altar from the eighth day on, and I will accept you with pleasure. This is what the LORD God says.