John Gill Commentary Leviticus 24

And the Lord spoke to Moses
After he had delivered to him the laws concerning the purity of the priests, and the perfection of the sacrifices they were to offer, and concerning the feasts the people were to keep, he spoke to Moses of some other things which concerned both people and priests: saying ;
as follows.

Command the children of Israel
Moses was the chief magistrate under God, and being clothed with authority from him, had power to command the children of Israel to do what the Lord required of them:

that they bring unto thee pure oil olive, beaten, for the light ;
this was to be at the public expense, and it belonged to the community to supply the priests with oil for the light of the candlestick in the temple, (Exodus 25:6) ; and this oil was not to be any sort of oil, as train oil, or oil of nuts, almonds but oil of olives, and not any sort of that, but the purest, which was the first that was taken from them; it seems there were three sorts, the first of which was pure, and this beaten in a mortar, and not ground in a mill; (See Gill on Exodus 27:20);

to cause the lamps to burn continually ;
the lamps in the golden candlestick, which were seven, (Exodus 25:37) ; or "the lamp", in the singular number, as it is in the original text; the western lamp, which is said to be always kept lighted, from which the rest were lighted when out;

though the oil was undoubtedly for the supply of the lamps, that they might burn always, night and day; or from night tonight, as Jarchi; and both on sabbath days and working days, as the Targum of Jonathan.

Without the veil of the testimony
That is, on the outside of the veil which divided between the holy and holy of holies, and which was before the ark in which the testimony or law was: in the tabernacle of the congregation ;
which the apostle calls the first, namely, the holy place in which the candlestick, with its lamps, stood, (Hebrews 9:2) ;

shall Aaron order it from the evening until the morning, before the Lord
continually ,

that is, the lamp or lamps, or candlestick, in which they were, or the light of them; his business was, and so every priest's that succeeded him, to supply the lamps with oil, to dress, him, and snuff them, that they might burn clear, and burn always, and that before the Lord, in the presence of the Lord:

[it shall be] a statute for ever in your generations ;
until the Messiah should come, the true light, which would put out all such typical ones, and by his Gospel spread light in all his churches throughout the world; (See Gill on Exodus 27:20) and (See Gill on Exodus 27:21).

He shall order the lamps on the pure candlestick
So called, as Jarchi suggests, for these two reasons, partly because it was made of pure gold, and partly because it was to be kept pure and clean, and free from ashes, by the priest; see (Exodus 25:31) ; before the Lord continually ;
which both respects the situation of the candlestick, and the work about it, which Aaron was to do continually before and in the presence of the Lord. Jarchi thinks this ordering respects the measure of oil for every night, which he says, according to the wise men, was half a log for every lamp, which was about a quarter of a pint of oil.

And you shall take fine flour
Of wheat, and the finest of it: and bake twelve cakes of it ;
answerable to the twelve tribes, as the Targum of Jonathan, which were typical of the spiritual Israel of God; two tenth deals shall be in one cake ;
that is, two tenth parts of an ephah, which were two omers, one of which was as much as a man could eat in one day of the manna: so that one of these cakes was as much as two men could eat of bread in one day; each cake was ten hands' breadth long, five broad, and seven fingers its horns, or was so high ^F7 .

FOOTNOTES:

• F7: Menachot, c. 11. sect. 4.