The Structure of Leviticus

These charts are explained in detail here.

A shorter explaination is found here.

The structured Hebrew text of Leviticus is found here.

The Holy Way

Unit 1 [1-3]	Unit 2 [4-5]	Unit 3 [6-7]
Unit 4 [8-10]	Unit 5 [11]	Unit 6 [12]
Unit 10 [16]	Unit 11 [17]	Unit 12 [18]
ARK Unit 13 [19]
Unit 14 [20]	Unit 15 [21]	Unit 16 [22:1-25]
Unit 17 [22:26-end]	Unit 18 [23]	Unit 19 [24]
Unit 20 [25]	Unit 21 [26]	Unit 22 [27]

[Chapter numbers in parentheses]

The Impure Who Must Leave the Holy Place
(Used as a smokescreen in the text to hide the Holy of Holies)

First Block: The Inner Way, Purification
Second Block: The Outer Way, Redemption
The two blocks are mirror images.


	Public Transcendent	Life Force Animals	Private Immanent
Outside Sacrifice	Unit 1 [1-3] Courtyard	Unit 2 [4-5] Large/Small	Unit 3 [6-7] Job
Middle Purity	Unit 4 [8-10] Holy Place	Unit 5 [11] Clean/Unclean	Unit 6 [12] Children
Inside Sanctity	Unit 10 [16] Holy of Holies	Unit 11 [17] Blood	Unit 12 [18] Sex/Land
	THE ARK Unit 13 [19]
Inside/ Private Holiness	Unit 14 [20] Sanctity of Private Individuals	Unit 15 [21] The Priest and his Family Generations	Unit 16 [22:1-25] The Priestly Family and Consecrated Things
Middle Time	Unit 17 [22:26-end] Private Observances	Unit 18 [23] Individual and Group: Public Holidays Cyclical Historical	Unit 19 [24] Priestly Functions within the holy place
Outside/ Public Redemption	Unit 20 [25] Personal Redemption	Unit 21 [26] God and Israel: National Redemption	Unit 22 [27] Redemption from Consecration
	Immanent Private	History	Transcendent Public Consecrated Things

Table of Paired Units

1	22
2	21
3	20
4	19
5	18
6	17
10	16
11	15
12	14

The Paired Units Schematic

The Public Realm	For God	1	22
	Between Man and God	2	21
	For Man	3	20

Between Public and Private	Public	4	19
	Public Meets Private	5	18
	Private	6	17

The Private Realm	Intimacy with the Holy	10	16
	Blood	11	15
	Profane Intimacy	12	14

The Paired Units Details

The Public Realm: Objective	For God	1 Offerings	22 Consecrating and Redeeming Consecrated Things
	Between Man and God	2 Sin Offerings	21 Divine Rewards and Punishments
	For People	3 The Priests’ Shares of Offerings	20 Redeeming Non-consecrated People and Property

Between Public and Private Formal Similarity	Divine Revelation Death (Narrative with unique case)	4 Priestly Investment Divine Fire and Strange Fire Death by God’s Hand	19 Priestly Functions God Reveals the Law to Moses Death by Human Hand
	Mundane Meets Divine (Set Pieces with Closure; foci of the two sections)	5 Animals Edible and Inedible Pure and Impure	18 God’s Holydays as social events and their Sacrifices
	Mundane Birth (short-8 verses)	6 Childbirth and its Purification/Sacrifice	17 Animal Birth and its Sacrifice

The Private Realm: Intimacy	Intimacy with the Holy	10 The High Priest enters the Holy of Holies	16 The Priests and Holy Food
	Between the Holy and the Profane Sanctity of Blood	11 Animal Blood	15 Priestly “Blood” Relationships
	Profane Intimacy	12 Forbidden Relationships	14 Capital Punishment for Forbidden Relationships

The following table (like those above) is offered more as an example of how to study the text according to its structure than as a finished work. Each reader, ideally, should try to work out similar tables for herself.

The Structure of Each Unit

U n I t	C h a p t e r		R o w		C o l u m n		Description
1	1-3						The first unit describes three classes of offerings: the burnt offering, the meal (cereal) offering and the well-being (peace) offering, and the specific ritual associated with each. They are ordered according to the inverse of their availability as food.
			I				The burnt offering- only the altar “eats”
			II<