Bible Commentaries

The cereal offering (2:1-16)

Products offered in the cereal offering (GNB: grain offering) came from the common food of the people. These offerings were the people's acknowledgment to God that they received their daily provisions from him. The products offered were therefore both a gift and a thanksgiving. The wine offering, sometimes called the drink offering, had similar significance (see 23:13,18,37).

It seems that cereal offerings and wine offerings were never offered alone, but always with burnt offerings and peace offerings (Numbers 15:1-10). This showed that consecration to God (as pictured in the burnt offering) and fellowship with God (as pictured in the peace offering) were not separate from the ordinary affairs of life. In the ritual of the cereal offering the priest burnt a handful of the food with the sacrifice; in the wine offering he poured some of the wine over the sacrifice. Any food that remained belonged to the priests (2:1-10).

Leaven and honey, because of their tendency to spoil, were not to be offered on the altar. However, like grain and other fruit, they could be offered as firstfruits in thanks to God for his provision of the produce of the land (11-16).

'The law of the cereal offering' emphasized that the priests had to be in a state of ceremonial holiness when they ate the portion of the sacrifice that was not burnt on the altar (6:14-18). Just as there was a continual burnt offering, so there was a continual cereal offering, which the priests took from their own food and offered morning and evening. The priests, as well as the people, had to acknowledge that God was their daily provider (6:19-23; Exodus 29:38-42).