A guilt offering (; plural ), also referred to as a trespass offering (

KJV The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version (AV), is an Early Modern English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and published in 1611, by ...

, 1611), was a type of Biblical sacrifice, specifically a sacrifice made as a

compensation Compensation may refer to: *Financial compensation *Compensation (chess), various advantages a player has in exchange for a disadvantage *Compensation (essay), ''Compensation'' (essay), by Ralph Waldo Emerson *Compensation (film), ''Compensation'' ...

payment for unintentional and certain intentional transgressions. It was distinct from the Biblical

sin offering A sin offering (, ''korban ḥatat'', , lit: "purification offering") is a sacrificial offering described and commanded in the Torah (Lev. 4.1-35); it could be fine flour or a proper animal.Leviticus 5:11 A sin offering also occurs in 2 Chronicl ...

Hebrew Bible

Guilt offerings or trespass offerings were mandated in Leviticus, chapters 5 to 7, where references are made to the offering "for sin" or "for sins". In the Greek

Septuagint The Septuagint ( ), sometimes referred to as the Greek Old Testament or The Translation of the Seventy (), and abbreviated as LXX, is the earliest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the original Biblical Hebrew. The full Greek ...

, the phrase used is the offering ''peri tes plemmeleias'' (περὶ τῆς πλημμελείας). The transgressor furnished an unblemished ram for sacrifice at the

Temple in Jerusalem The Temple in Jerusalem, or alternatively the Holy Temple (; , ), refers to the two religious structures that served as the central places of worship for Israelites and Jews on the modern-day Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. Accord ...

, as well as (in cases of sins against holy items, theft, commission of fraud or false oaths) monetary compensation to the victim for their loss, plus a mark-up of 20% of the value to cover the priest's earnings. Monetary restitution had to be given in the pre-exile version of the currency (the ''

shekel A shekel or sheqel (; , , plural , ) is an ancient Mesopotamian coin, usually of silver. A shekel was first a unit of weight—very roughly 11 grams (0.35 ozt)—and became currency in ancient Tyre, Carthage and Hasmonean Judea. Name The wo ...

of the sanctuary''), rather than the currency of the time, giving rise to a need for currency exchange in the Temple (hence the

New Testament The New Testament (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus, as well as events relating to Christianity in the 1st century, first-century Christianit ...

narrative of

Jesus and the Money Changers In all four canonical gospels of the Christian New Testament, the cleansing of the Temple narrative tells of Jesus expelling the merchants and the money changers from the Temple in Jerusalem. The scene is a common motif in Christian art. In thi ...

). Such compensation payments were given on occasion of: "The final offering is the guilt offering, also called the restitution or reparation offering. ... Three cases are given in which a person had to offer a guilt offering: sinning against a holy item, committing an unknown sin, and swearing falsely in a matter concerning money." *infringing the rights of

the priests The Priests are a Classical music, classical musical group, made up of three Roman Catholic priests from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Down and Connor, Diocese of Down and Connor in Northern Ireland. Fr. Eugene and his brother Fr. Martin O'Hag ...

to portions of other sacrifices (referred to in the text as ''God's holy things'') *committing an unknown sin - as these infringements were uncertain and possibly had not occurred at all, this was voluntary (''just in case'') and there was no restitution element *swearing falsely in a matter concerning money This was also given as part of the purification process for ''tzaraath''. Guilt offerings are mentioned in . The Philistines are told by priests and fortune-tellers to make an offerings of five golden mice and five golden hemorrhoids in hopes of ending the mice and hemorrhoids that had plagued them since taking the ark of God from Israel. The images of golden mice and golden hemorrhoids are used in the offering.

English Translations

Translations of the Old Testament which use the phrase 'Guilt Offering' include the English Standard Version (ESV), New International Version (NIV) and Revised Standard Version (RSV). Translations which use the phrase 'Trespass Offering' include the 1599

Geneva Bible The Geneva Bible, sometimes known by the sobriquet Breeches Bible, is one of the most historically significant translations of the Bible into English, preceding the Douay Rheims Bible by 22 years, and the King James Version by 51 years. It was ...

, King James Version (KJV) and

New King James Version (NKJV) The New King James Version (NKJV) is a translation of the Bible in contemporary English, working as a revision of the King James Version. Published by Thomas Nelson (publisher), Thomas Nelson, the complete NKJV was released in 1982. With regard ...

, the

Wycliffe Bible Wycliffe's Bible (also known as the Middle English Bible ''MEB Wycliffite Bibles, or Wycliffian Bibles) is a sequence of orthodox Middle English Bible translations from the Latin Vulgate which appeared over a period from approximately 1382 to ...

and the American Standard Version (ASV). The Good News Bible (GNT) uses the phrase 'Repayment Offering'.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Guilt Offering Hebrew Bible words and phrases Jewish sacrificial law Law of Moses Book of Leviticus