Leviticus 27: Good or Bad Is the Priest's Call, Not the Owner's

The word "estimation" shows up twenty times in the thirty-four verses of Leviticus 27. I counted it twice because I didn't believe the first number. It's in the age table, in the rules for houses and fields, and in the redemption clauses near the end, and eighteen times it reads "thy estimation" and twice "thine." Some of the figures are fixed in the text itself. Verses 3 through 7 give them outright, fifty shekels down to three. But the possessive never belongs to the man who vowed. He is "he" in every verse, and the estimation is always somebody else's. Verse 12 switches voice partway through a sentence: "And the priest shall value it, whether it be good or bad: as thou valuest it, who art the priest, so shall it be." It starts out describing the priest and ends up speaking to him.

What happens to the man who can't pay the table?

The table runs from verse 3 through verse 7, a man first and then a woman in each age bracket. A man from twenty to sixty is fifty shekels of silver "after the shekel of the sanctuary," a woman of that age thirty. Five to twenty is twenty and ten. A child from a month to five years is five and three. Over sixty is fifteen and ten. The chapter gives no reason for any of the differences, and I'm not going to supply one.

Then verse 8, which is the line I'd have the most trouble giving up if I had to keep one:

But if he be poorer than thy estimation, then he shall present himself before the priest, and the priest shall value him; according to his ability that vowed shall the priest value him.

People tend to remember this as a discount for the poor. The verse doesn't say that, because it doesn't name a lower table or a percentage. It sends the man to the priest, and the only standard it gives is "according to his ability." Five verses of fixed numbers, and the very next verse puts a judgment call in the middle of them.

I saw a small version of that in September. Our Cub Scout committee charges twelve dollars a boy for the fall campout, and at the pack meeting a dad told the committee chairman that this month was going to be tight. The chairman said to come find him afterward. They stood by the stacked chairs for maybe two minutes, and I was folding a table and didn't hear any of it. I print the roster, and the following week that family's line had a check in the paid column and nothing else.

I never learned what the dad handed over, or whether he handed over anything.

The gap in verse 8 is the same kind, with no number in it, no cap and no second reviewer. The poor man stands in front of one person, and what he ends up owing is whatever that person decides he can manage.

Why does everything come back with a fifth added?

Five times the chapter says that if you want something back, you add a fifth. A beast in verse 13, a house in verse 15, a field in verse 19, an unclean firstling in verse 27, and a piece of your tithe in verse 31. If the priest valued the house at a hundred shekels, getting it back cost a hundred and twenty. The arithmetic is as simple as it looks.

There's a catch in who gets to redeem, and it sits in verses 9 through 13. A clean beast, the kind people bring as an offering, becomes holy the moment it's given, and verse 10 shuts the door on any swapping: "a good for a bad, or a bad for a good." No redemption is offered for it at all. The fifth shows up first in verse 13, and it's attached to the unclean beast, the one "of which they do not offer a sacrifice unto the Lord." The animal that can be bought back is the one that couldn't have gone on the altar anyway.

Fields are priced by seed, and verse 16 has "an homer of barley seed shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver," the same figure as the working-age man in verse 3, and verses 17 and 18 knock the price down by the years left until the jubilee. I covered that arithmetic in Leviticus 25 and it works the same way here.

One more number from this section, and it comes from somewhere else. Numbers 18:15 is about the firstborn of man, not about a person vowed to the Lord, and verse 16 says those "to be redeemed from a month old shalt thou redeem, according to thine estimation, for the money of five shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary, which is twenty gerahs." Leviticus 27:6 gives five shekels for a male from a month to five years, with the same sanctuary shekel and the same twenty gerahs named in verse 25. Different cases, same figure for the youngest bracket. Numbers 18:16 doesn't separate male from female, and Leviticus 27:6 does.

What can't a man vow?

Here's a case that's easy to skip because it's so specific, in verses 22 through 24. A man buys a field, one that isn't "of the fields of his possession," and then sanctifies it. The priest reckons its worth only "unto the year of the jubilee," he gives that amount "as a holy thing unto the Lord," and then verse 24 sends the field home: "In the year of the jubilee the field shall return unto him of whom it was bought, even to him to whom the possession of the land did belong."

So the vow runs only as long as the man's own claim does. He gives what he has, which is a number of harvests, and the field goes back to the family it never stopped belonging to. Verse 21 is the contrast. A field that was his own and wasn't redeemed goes out at the jubilee "as a field devoted" and becomes the priest's. The same year does two different things, depending on whose land it was.

Then there's the short one at 26: "Only the firstling of the beasts, which should be the Lord's firstling, no man shall sanctify it; whether it be ox, or sheep: it is the Lord's." You can't vow a thing that was never yours to give. Numbers 18:17 says the same about the clean ones: "the firstling of a cow, or the firstling of a sheep, or the firstling of a goat, thou shalt not redeem; they are holy." The unclean firstling is the exception. Verse 27 lets the owner redeem it at the estimate and a fifth, or sell it at the estimate if he doesn't.

The devoted thing in 28 and 29 is a different category from a vow. No devoted thing "shall be sold or redeemed," verse 28 says, and verse 29 adds of persons devoted that they "shall surely be put to death." Verse 30 goes back to ordinary ground: "all the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land, or of the fruit of the tree, is the Lord's."

Who checks the tenth animal?

The last real instruction in the chapter is about the herd. Verse 32 says the tenth of the herd or flock, "whatsoever passeth under the rod," is holy, and then verse 33:

He shall not search whether it be good or bad, neither shall he change it: and if he change it at all, then both it and the change thereof shall be holy; it shall not be redeemed.

Set that beside what the chapter had the priest do earlier on. In verse 12 the priest looks at the beast and rules on it, "whether it be good or bad." In verse 14 he does the same for a house, "as the priest shall estimate it, so shall it stand," and a man who sanctified his house has no appeal from that. The words "good or bad" are the priest's job, and the chapter has told us he has to do it. Then in verse 33 the same two words come back with a prohibition on them, aimed at the owner. The man with the herd isn't to search. Each animal passes under the rod, and the tenth is the tenth.

Back in verse 10 the temptation was already named, when the man was told not to change "a good for a bad, or a bad for a good." Nothing in this verse assumes the man is honest. It makes cheating a bad deal. If he swaps the animal, he doesn't get the better one back. He ends up with two holy animals, "both it and the change thereof," and the verse closes on "it shall not be redeemed."

Compare 31, where a man who wants to redeem "ought of his tithes" adds a fifth and gets it back. Nothing like that is offered here. The land's tithe can be bought back at a price. The owner's judgment of which animal is good or which is bad has no price, because it isn't his to exercise at all.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is the age and sex table saying some people are worth less?

I don't read it that way, and the chapter never says so. It's a table of what a vow of a person costs to redeem, and verse 8 hands the poor man to the priest's judgment instead of the table.

What is the "fifth part" in Leviticus 27?

It's the amount added when an owner buys back something he vowed. You pay the priest's estimate plus one more fifth of it (verses 13, 15, 19, 27 and 31). On a hundred shekels that's a hundred and twenty.

Does Leviticus 27 set a tithe of income?

No, not in this chapter. Verse 30 speaks of the seed of the land and the fruit of the tree, and verse 32 of the herd and the flock. The Church teaches tithing today as a tenth of income, and the Gospel Topics essay on tithing says so, but that is a separate teaching from this chapter and I'd keep the two apart when you read it.

Why can't the tenth animal be swapped?

Verse 33 says a swapped animal and its replacement both become holy, and it ends "it shall not be redeemed." So the man who tries it loses the animal he wanted to keep and the one he put in its place, and verse 31's fifth doesn't apply to him.

— D.