1. I Will now, however, make mention of a few of our laws which belong
to purifications, and the like sacred offices, since I am accidentally
come to this matter of sacrifices. These sacrifices were of two sorts;
of those sorts one was offered for private persons, and the other for
the people in general; and they are done in two different ways. In the
one case, what is slain is burnt, as a whole burnt-offering, whence that
name is given to it; but the other is a thank-offering, and is designed
for feasting those that sacrifice. I will speak of the former. Suppose a
private man offer a burnt-offering, he must slay either a bull, a lamb,
or a kid of the goats, and the two latter of the first year, though of
bulls he is permitted to sacrifice those of a greater age; but all
burnt-offerings are to be of males. When they are slain, the priests
sprinkle the blood round about the altar; they then cleanse the bodies,
and divide them into parts, and salt them with salt, and lay them upon
the altar, while the pieces of wood are piled one upon another, and the
fire is burning; they next cleanse the feet of the sacrifices, and the
inwards, in an accurate manner and so lay them to the rest to be purged
by the fire, while the priests receive the hides. This is the way of
offering a burnt-offering.
2. But those that offer thank-offerings do indeed sacrifice the same
creatures, but such as are unblemished, and above a year old; however,
they may take either males or females. They also sprinkle the altar with
their blood; but they lay upon the altar the kidneys and the caul, and
all the fat, and the lobe of the liver, together with the rump of the
lamb; then, giving the breast and the right shoulder to the priests, the
offerers feast upon the remainder of the flesh for two days; and what
remains they burn.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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