offerings (see at Lev 3:1) for Jehovah,” for which purpose פּרים, bullocks, or young oxen, were used. The young men were not first-born sons, who had officiated as priests previous to the institution of the Levitical priesthood, according to the natural right of primogeniture, as Onkelos supposes; nor were they the sons of Aaron, as Augustine maintains: they simply acted as servants of Moses; and the priestly duty of sprinkling the blood was performed by him as the mediator of the covenant. It is merely as young men, therefore, i.e., as strong and active, that they are introduced in this place, and not as representatives of the nation, “by whom the sacrifice was presented, and whose attitude resembled that of a youth just ready to enter upon his course” (Kurtz, O. C. iii. 143). For, as Oehler says, “this was not a sacrifice presented by the nation on its own account. The primary object was to establish that fellowship, by virtue of which it could draw near to Jehovah in sacrifice. Moreover, according to Exo 24:1 and Exo 24:9, the nation possessed its proper representatives in the seventy elders” (Herzog's Cyclopaedia). But even though these sacrifices were not offered by the representatives of the nation, and for this very reason Moses selected young men from among the people to act as servants at this ceremony, they had so far a substitutionary position, that in their persons the nation was received into fellowship with God by means of the sprinkling of the blood, which was performed in a peculiar manner, to suit the unique design of this sacrificial ceremony.
verses 6-8
The blood was divided into two parts. One half was swung by Moses upon the altar (זרק to swing, shake, or pour out of the vessel, in distinction from הזּה to sprinkle) the other half he put into basins, and after he had read the book of the covenant to the people, and they had promised to do and follow all the words of Jehovah, he sprinkled it upon the people with these words: “Behold the blood of the covenant, which Jehovah has made with you over all these words.” As several animals were slaughtered, and all of them young oxen, there must have been a considerable quantity of blood obtained, so that the one half would fill several basins, and many persons might be sprinkled with it as it was being swung about. The division of the blood had reference to the two parties to the covenant, who were to be brought by the covenant into a living unity; but it had no connection whatever with the heathen
