Numbers 15:20

20 Set aside from your first dough a cake as a gift; set it aside as you would set aside a portion of the grain from the threshing-floor.

Numbers 15:20 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 15:20

Ye shall offer up a cake of the first of your dough [for] an
heave offering
Of the first dough made of the first corn that was threshed, winnowed and ground, they were to make a cake, and offer it an heave offering unto the Lord; the quantity of it is not expressed, but was left to the people's generosity; no stinted measure was fixed by the law; but according to the Scribes, or the traditions of the elders, the quantity of the cake was the twenty fourth part of the first dough that was kneaded; not the forty fourth, as Buxtorf F16 through mistake says; so the Targum of Jonathan,

``of the first of your dough, one out of twenty four (i.e. the twenty fourth part of it), ye shall separate a separation for the priests,''

with which agrees the Misnah F17, though according to that, if made to sell publicly it was the forty eighth part of it. Some, because ( Numbers 15:21 ) begins and ends with (m) , "mem", which numerically signifies "forty", think this is an instruction to a bountiful person to give the fortieth part F18:

as [ye do] the heave offering of the threshing floor, so shall ye
heave it;
as the two wave loaves and firstfruits of their harvest, ( Leviticus 23:16 Leviticus 23:17 ) .


FOOTNOTES:

F16 Synagog. Jud. c. 34. p. 602.
F17 Challah, c. 2. sect. 7. so Schulchan Aruch, par. 2. c. 322. so Jarchi & Ben Gersom in loc.
F18 Baal Hatturim in loc.

Numbers 15:20 In-Context

18 "Speak to the people of Isra'el; tell them, 'When you enter the land where I am bringing you
19 and eat bread produced in the land, you are to set aside a portion as a gift for ADONAI.
20 Set aside from your first dough a cake as a gift; set it aside as you would set aside a portion of the grain from the threshing-floor.
21 From your first dough you will give ADONAI a portion as a gift through all your generations.
22 "'If by mistake you fail to observe all these mitzvot that ADONAI has spoken to Moshe,
Complete Jewish Bible Copyright 1998 by David H. Stern. Published by Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.