— Footnote
1. Ezekiel xvi. 13, 19, xlvi. 14; I Chronicles ix. 29, xxiii. 22;
Ecclus. xxxv.2, xxxviii. 11, xxxix. 32; Isaiah i. 13 (LXX); lxvi. 3 (LXX).
In the Priestly Code slt occurs more than forty times.
— Footnote
So also a striking preference is shown for incense. With every meal-offering incense is offered upon the altar; in the inner sanctuary a special mixture of spices is employed, the accurately given recipe for which is not to be followed for private purposes. The offering of incense is the privilege of the higher priesthood; in the ritual of the great Day of Atonement, the sole one in which Aaron must discharge the duties in person, it occupies a conspicuous place. It has an altogether dangerous sanctity; Aaron's own sons died for not having made use of the proper fire. It is the cause of death and destruction to the Levites of Korah's company who are not entitled to use it, while immediately afterwards, in the hands of the legitimate high priest, it becomes the means of appeasing the anger of Jehovah, and of staying the plague. Now of this offering, thus invested with such a halo of sanctity, the older literature of the Jewish Canon, down to Jeremiah and Zephaniah, knows absolutely nothing. The verb Q++R there used invariably and exclusively of the BURNING of fat or meal, and thereby making to God a sweet-smelling savour; it is never used to denote the OFFERING OF INCENSE, and the substantive Q+RT as a sacrificial term has the quite general signification of that which is burnt on the altar. /2/
— Footnote 2. The verb is used in piel by the older writers, in hiphil by the Priestly Code (Chronicles), and promiscuously in both forms during the transition period by the author of the Books of Kings. This is the case, at least, where the forms can with certainty be distinguished, namely, in the perfect, imperative, and infinitive; the distinction between YQ+R and YQ+YR, MQ+R and MQ+YR rests, as is well known, upon no secure tradition. Compare, for example, qatter jaqtirun, 1Samuel ii. 16; the transcribers and punctuators under the influence of the Pentateuch preferred the hiphil. In the Priestly Code (Chronicles) HQ+YR has both meanings alongside of each other, but when used without a qualifying phrase it generally means incensing, and when consuming a sacrifice is intended HMZBXH is usually added, "on the altar," that is, the place on which the incense-offering strictly so called was NOT offered. The substantive Q+RT in the sense of "an offering of incense" in which it occurs exclusively and very frequently in the Priestly Code, is first found in Ezekiel (viii. 11, xvi. 18, xxiii. 41) and often afterwards in Chronicles, but in the rest of the Old Testament only in Proverbs xxvii. 9, but there in a profane sense. Elsewhere never, not even in passages so late as 1Samuel ii.28; Psalms lxvi. 15, cxli. 2. In authors of a certainly pre-exilian date the word occurs only twice, both times in a perfectly general sense. Isaiah i. 13: "Bring me no more oblations; it is an abominable incense to me." Deuteronomy xxxiii. 10: "The Levites shall put incense (i.e.,the fat of thank-offerings) before thee, and whole burnt-offerings upon thine altar." The name LBNT (frankincense) first occurs in Jeremiah (vi. 20, xvii. 26, xli. 5); elsewhere only in the Priestly Code (nine times), in Isaiah xl.-lxvi. (three times), in Chronicles and Nehemiah (three times), and in Canticles (three times). Compare Zephaniah iii. 10; 1Kings ix. 25. — Footnote
In enumerations where the prophets exhaust everything pertaining to sacred gifts and liturgic performances, in which, for the sake of lengthening the catalogue, they do not shrink from repetitions even, there is not any mention of incense-offerings, neither in Amos (iv. 4 seq., v. 21 seq.) nor in Isaiah (i. 11 seq.) nor in Micah (vi. 6 seq.). Shall we suppose that they all of them forget this subject by mere accident, or that they conspired to ignore it? If it had really existed, and been of so great consequence, surely one of them at least would not have failed to speak of it. The Jehovistic section of the Hexateuch is equally silent, so also the historical books, except Chronicles, and so the rest of the prophets, down to Jeremiah, who (vi.20) selects incense as the example of a rare and far-fetched offering: "To what purpose cometh there to me incense from Sheba, and the precious cane from a far country?" Thenceforward it is mentioned in Ezekiel, in Isaiah (xl.-lxvi.), in Nehemiah, and in Chronicles; the references are continuous. The introduction of incense is a natural result of increased luxury; one is tempted to conjecture that its use must have first crept into the Jehovah worship as an innovation from a more luxuriously-developed foreign cultus. But the importance which it has attained in the ritual legislation of the Pentateuch is manifest above all from this, that it has led to the invention of a peculiar new and highly sacred piece of furniture, namely, the golden altar in the inner tabernacle, which is unknown to history, and which is foreign even to the kernel of the Priestly Code itself.
We expect to find the altar of incense in Exodus xxv.-xxix., but find it instead as an appendix at the beginning of Exodus xxx. Why not until now? why thus separated from the other furnishings of the inner sanctuary? and not only so, but even after the ordinances relating to the adornment of the priests, and the inauguration of the divine service? The reason why the author of chaps. xxv.-xxix. is thus silent about the altar of incense in the passage in which the furniture of the tabernacle, consisting of ark, table, and candlestick, is described, is, that he does not know of it. There is no other possibility; for he cannot have forgotten it. /1/
— Footnote 1. There is a peculiar perversity in meeting the objection by alleging other singularities in the ordinance as for example, that the vessels of the tabernacle are appointed (chap. xxv.) before the tabernacle itself (chap. xxvi.). This last is no eccentricity; the order in commanding is first the end, and then the means; but in obeying, the order is reversed. In like manner, it is not at all surprising if subsidiary implements, such as benches for slaughtering. or basins for washing, which have no importance for the cultus, properly so called, should be either passed over altogether, or merely brought in as an appendix. The case is not at all parallel with the omission of the most important utensil of the sanctuary from the very passage to which it necessarily belongs. — Footnote
And the phenomenon is repeated; the altar of incense occurs only in certain portions of the Priestly Code, and is absent from others where it could not possibly have been omitted, had it been known. The rite of the most solemn atoning sacrifice takes place in Leviticus iv. indeed on the golden altar, but in Exodus xxix., Leviticus viii., ix., without its use. A still more striking circumstance is, that in passages where the holiest incense-offering itself is spoken of, no trace can be discovered of the corresponding altar. This is particularly the case in Leviticus xvi. To burn incense in the sanctuary, Aaron takes a censer, fills it with coals from the altar of burnt-offering (ver. 12, 18-20), and lays the incense upon them in the adytum. Similarly in Leviticus x., Numbers xvi., xvii., incense is offered on censers, of which each priest possesses one. The coals are taken from the altar of burnt-offering (Numbers xvii. 11; [A.V. xvi. 46]), which is plated with the censers of the Korahite Levites (xvii. 3, 4; [A.V. xvi. 38, 39]); whoever takes fire from any other source, incurs the penalty of death (Leviticus x. 1 seq.). The altar of incense is everywhere unknown here; the altar of burnt-offering is the only altar, and, moreover, is always called simply 'the altar', as for example, even in Exodus xxvii., where it would have been specially necessary to add the qualifying expression. Only in certain later portions of the Priestly Code does the name altar of burnt-offering occur, viz, in those passages which do recognise the altar of incense. In this connection the command of Exodus xxvii. as compared with the execution in Exodus xxxviii. is characteristic.
The golden altar in the sanctuary is originally simply the golden table; the variation of the expression has led to a doubling of the thing. Ezekiel does not distinguish between the table and the altar in the temple, but uses either expression indifferently. For he says (xii.21 seq. ): "Before the adytum stood what looked like an altar of wood, three cubits in height, two cubits in length and breadth, and it had projecting corners, and its frame and its walls were of wood; this is the table which is before the Lord." In like manner he designates the service of the priests in the inner sanctuary as table-service (xliv.16); table is the name, altar the function. /1/
— Footnote 1. Malachi, on the other hand, designates the so-called altar of burnt-offering as a table. — Footnote
In 1Kings vii. 48, it is true that the golden altar and the golden table are mentioned together. It seems strange, however, that in this case the concluding summary mentions one piece of furniture more— and that piece one of so great importance—than the preceding detailed description; for in the latter only the preparation of the golden altar is spoken of, and nothing is said of the golden table (vi. 20-22). As matters stand, nothing is less improbable than that some later transcriber should have interpolated the golden table in vii. 48, regarding it, in accordance with the Pentateuch, as distinct from the golden altar, and therefore considering its absence as an omission. From other considerations also, it is clear that the text of the whole chapter is in many ways corrupt and interpolated.