altar the whole night till the morning, and the fire of the altar be kept burning with it.” The verb תּוּקד is wanting in the first clause, and only introduced in the second; but it belongs to the first clause as well. The pronoun הוא at the opening of the sentence cannot stand for the verb to be in the imperative. The passages, which Knobel adduces in support of this, are of a totally different kind. The instructions apply primarily to the burnt-offering, which was offered every evening, and furnished the basis for all the burnt-offerings (Exo 29:38-39; Num 33:3-4).
verses 10-11
In the morning of every day the priest was to put on his linen dress (see Exo 28:42) and the white drawers, and lift off, i.e., clear away, the ashes to which the fire had consumed the burnt-offering upon the altar (אכל is construed with a double accusative, to consume the sacrifice to ashes), and pour them down beside the altar (see Lev 1:16). The ו in מדּו is not to be regarded as the old form of the connecting vowel, as in Gen 1:24 (Ewald, §211 b; see Ges. §90, 3b), but as the suffix, as in 2Sa 20:8, although the use of the suffix with the governing noun in the construct state can only be found in other cases in the poetical writings (cf. Ges. §121 b; Ewald, 291 b). He was then to take off his official dress, and having put on other (ordinary) clothes, to take away the ashes from the court, and carry them out of the camp to a clean place. The priest was only allowed to approach the altar in his official dress; but he could not go out of the camp with this.
Verse 12
The fire of the altar was also to be kept burning “with it” (בּו, viz., the burnt-offering) the whole day through without going out. For this purpose the priest was to burn wood upon it (the altar-fire), and lay the burnt-offering in order upon it, and cause the fat portions of the peace-offerings to ascend in smoke, - that is to say, whenever peace-offerings were brought, for they were not prescribed for every day.
Verse 13
Fire was to be kept constantly burning upon the altar without going out, not in order that the heavenly fire, which proceeded from Jehovah when Aaron and his sons first entered upon the service of the altar after their consecration, and consumed the burnt-offerings and peace-offerings, might never be extinguished (see at Lev 9:24); but that the burnt-offering might never go out, because this was the divinely appointed symbol and visible sign of the uninterrupted worship of Jehovah, which the
