5 And it shall be, when he shall be guilty in one of these things, that he shall confess that he hath sinned in that thing:

6 And he shall bring his trespass offering unto the Lord for his sin which he hath sinned, a female from the flock, a lamb or a kid of the goats, for a sin offering; and the priest shall make an atonement for him concerning his sin.

Having been given examples of the sort of simple trespasses that people might commit, we now hear the offering to be made in such cases. As with other offerings, there will be alternative options for those that are poorer, but today we look at the richest option.

For this offering, a female lamb or kid was to be offered. The method of its slaughter, cleaning, and burning are not here described, but we assume that it was very similar to other animal offerings that we have already read.

This highlights the fact that in the grammar of sacrifice, the same process with the same animal can have the same general meaning (atonement for something amiss), but different specifics according to the context. This makes sense when we think of acts that we might do today, and how they can have different meanings under different contexts. If I give something to my neighbor, I might be restoring something of his that I broke, or giving him a gift to commemorate a moment of celebration, or being thoughtful during a moment of personal tragedy, or performing an act of charity when he’s having a hard time making ends meet. It’s all the same act, giving him something, but it could be for restitution, celebration, compassion, or charity.

So, too, when the ancient Israelite brought something to the altar, he was giving a part of himself to the Lord for some reason, and what that reason was could be different on different according to the context.