bloodguilt. dām. In this sense, it is equivalent to dāmîm (Num 35:27; Ezek 33:5; cf. Exod
22:1; Ps 51:16). The word dām is used
to create a linguistic balance with dām
(šāpak), thereby enhancing the
ideological balance of the measure-for-measure principle, employed chiefly by
God (see note on “life for life,” 24:18): The offender has shed dām; therefore, God shall impute dām against him (Schwartz, forthcoming).
The accusation is one of murder, “equivalent to the one who by spilling blood
of a human being forfeits his life” (Rashi; cf. Tgs. Neof., Ps.-J.,
Saadiah, Ramban, Rashbam, who declares explicitly “guilty of death”).
shall be imputed. yēḥāšēb. This is a legal apronouncement (cf. von
Rad 1966) that, however, is punishable by God (cf. 7:15; Num 15:27, 30; Ps
32:2), in contrast with dāmāyw / dāmô bô ‘his bloodguilt is upon him’
(e.g., 20:9, 11, 12, 13, 16, 27; Ezek 18:13; 33:5) or dām / dāmîm lô ‘there is
bloodguilt in his case’ (Num 35:27; cf. Exod 22:1), which connotes execution by
a human court.
I disagree with Schwartz (1996b:
21), who interprets this pronouncement “as
if the (antediluvian) prohibition of theriocide were still in force, though
no real if bloodguilt exists.” This
primordial law is indeed restored, but not for the entire animal kingdom—only
for three sacrificeable animals: the ox, the sheep, and the goat. The
formulation dām yēḥāśēb lāʾîš hahûʾ
implies a final sentence that will issue from the (divine) court based on
existing law. Incidentally, the expression kĕšôpēk
dām in Ramban and Sforno (n. 16) means “equivalent
to murder,” not “as if it were murder.”
he has shed blood. dām šāpak. Elsewhere this phrase connotes the
intentional murder of a human being (Gen 9:6; 37:22; Num 35:33; Zeph 1:17; Prov
1:16). In Ezekiel, it is linked with the sins of idolatry, sexual violations,
blood consumption, and ethical wrongs (Ezek 16:38; 18:10; 22:3, 4, 6, 9, 12,
27; 23:45; 33:25; 36:18). Bloodshed disqualifies David from building the Temple
(1 Chr 22:8), and iron, the instrument of violence, is similarly invalidated
(Exod 20:22). Paran (1989: 270–71) notes, however, that when this expression is
followed by the prepositions ʾel or ʿal, the blood shedding is legitimate
(e.g., 4:30, 34; Deut 12:16, 27; contrast 19:10 and see note on v. 13).
The murderer—indeed, the
perpetrator of any premeditated crime—is banned from the sanctuary (Milgrom
1990a: 122). Hence the priestly legists abolished altar asylum for fear it
would be polluted by murderers and assorted criminals. Instead, they invented the
asylum city, but limited its use to the involuntary homicide (Milgrom 1990a:
504–9). Greek Orphics who totally eschewed blood regarded all sacrifice as
murder (Detienne 1979). Blum (1990: 324, n. 139) objects to my interpretation
on the grounds that slaying wild animals is not considered murder (v. 13).
True, but this precisely is the point: only animals eligible for the altar,
which excludes game, are subject to the charge of murder and the penalty of kārēt (see below). Game, however, is
treated like all animals in the Noahide laws: its blood must not be ingested,
but drained (vv. 13–14; Gen 9:4).
It is hardly accidental that the
prohibition against ingesting blood in the Noahide laws is the obverse of the
law prohibiting and punishing homicide (Gen 9:5–6; note the same idiom as in
our verse, šōpēk dām, dāmô yiššāpēk).
That is, theriocide becomes equivalent to homicide if the animal’s blood is
ingested. Here, however, H has applied this universal Noahide law to Israel,
but insisting that the altar must be the depository of the animal’s blood.
H adds a rationale (in an aside
to Moses, vv. 5–7), to prevent Israel from engaging in chthonic worship (see >notes
and comment a), and later in the chapter offers an additional rationale (again,
only to Moses, v. 11) for the indispensability of the altar as the blood’s
recipient—as ransom for the murder of the animal. This rationale is already
intimated in early Sumerian myths (vol. 1.713). The difference between P and H,
then, is reduced to this: H bans all
nonsacrificial slaughter (except for sacrificially unqualified animals, vv.
13–14). It is an incremental and logical development from P. What is radical is
not the law itself, but its implementation (see comment d). (Jacob
Milgrom, Leviticus 17–22: A New
Translation with Introduction and Commentary [AYB 3A; New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2008], 1456-58)
