---
title: "Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible -  Leviticus 5"
description: "CHAPTER 5   :-. TRESPASS
OFFERINGS FOR CONCEALING
KNOWLEDGE. 1. if a soul . . . hear the voice of
swearing—or, according to some, \"the words of adjuration"
image: "/images/missing.jpg"
url: "https://realbiblebelievers.com/commentaries/commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/leviticus/5"
---

CHAPTER 5

. TRESPASS
OFFERINGS FOR CONCEALING
KNOWLEDGE.

**1. if a soul . . . hear the voice of
swearing**—or, according to some, "the words of adjuration."
A proclamation was issued calling any one who could give information,
to come before the court and bear testimony to the guilt of a
criminal; and the manner in which witnesses were interrogated in the
Jewish courts of justice was not by swearing them directly, but
adjuring them by reading the words of an oath: "the voice of
swearing." The offense, then, for the expiation of which this
law provides, was that of a person who neglected or avoided the
opportunity of lodging the information which it was in his power to
communicate.
[Leviticus 5:2](../../../kjv/leviticus/5/2);
[Leviticus 5:3](../../../kjv/leviticus/5/3). TOUCHING
ANY THING
UNCLEAN.

**2. if a soul touch any unclean
thing**—A person who, unknown to himself at the time, came in
contact with any thing unclean, and either neglected the requisite
ceremonies of purification or engaged in the services of religion
while under the taint of ceremonial defilement, might be afterwards
convinced that he had committed an offense.
. FOR SWEARING.

**4. if a soul swear**—a rash
oath, without duly considering the nature and consequences of the
oath, perhaps inconsiderately binding himself to do anything wrong,
or neglecting to perform a vow to do something good. In all such
cases a person might have transgressed one of the divine commandments
unwittingly, and have been afterwards brought to a sense of his
delinquency.

**5. it shall be, when he shall be
guilty . . . that he shall confess that he hath sinned in that
thing**—make a voluntary acknowledgment of his sin from the
impulse of his own conscience, and before it come to the knowledge of
the world. A previous discovery might have subjected him to some
degree of punishment from which his spontaneous confession released
him, but still he was considered guilty of trespass, to expiate which
he was obliged by the ceremonial law to go through certain
observances.

**6-14. he shall bring his trespass
offering unto the Lord for his sins which he hath sinned**—A
trespass offering differed from a sin offering in the following
respects: that it was appointed for persons who had either done evil
unwittingly, or were in doubt as to their own criminality; or felt
themselves in such a special situation as required sacrifices of that
kind [BROWN]. The trespass
offering appointed in such cases was a female lamb or kid; if unable
to make such an offering, he might bring a pair of turtledoves or two
young pigeons—the one to be offered for a sin offering, the other
for a burnt offering; or if even *that* was beyond his ability,
the law would be satisfied with the tenth part of an ephah of fine
flour without oil or frankincense.

**15, 16. sin through ignorance, in
the holy things of the Lord,** &c.—This is a case of
sacrilege committed ignorantly, either in not paying the full due of
tithes, first-fruits, and similar tribute in eating of meats, which
belonged to the priests alone—or he was required, along with the
restitution in money, the amount of which was to be determined by the
priest, to offer a ram for a trespass offering, as soon as he came to
the knowledge of his involuntary fraud.

**17-19. if a soul sin . . . though he
wist it not, yet is he guilty**—This also refers to holy things,
and it differs from the preceding in being one of the *doubtful*
cases,—that is, where conscience suspects, though the understanding
be in doubt whether criminality or sin has been committed. The Jewish
rabbis give, as an example, the case of a person who, knowing that
"the fat of the inwards" is not to be eaten, religiously
abstained from the use of it; but should a dish happen to have been
at table in which he had reason to suspect some portion of that meat
was intermingled, and he had, inadvertently, partaken of that
unlawful viand, he was bound to bring a ram as a trespass offering
[[Leviticus 5:16](../../../kjv/leviticus/5/16)]. These provisions were
all designed to impress the conscience with the sense of
responsibility to God and keep alive on the hearts of the people a
salutary fear of doing any secret wrong.

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