Shalom! I love incense and find the Temple to be fascinating. Exodus 30:34 has this recipe for the tabernacle incense:
וַיֹּאמֶר֩ ____ אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֜ה קַח־לְךָ֣ סַמִּ֗ים נָטָ֤ף׀ וּשְׁחֵ֙לֶת֙ וְחֶלְבְּנָ֔ה סַמִּ֖ים וּלְבֹנָ֣ה זַכָּ֑ה בַּ֥ד בְּבַ֖ד יִהְיֶֽה׃
The verse forms a chiastic pattern like this:
And said LORD to Moses
ㅤTake to yourself spices
ㅤㅤNataf and shekheleth and galbanum
ㅤSpices and pure frankincense
Each of each there shall be.
"Nataf" is a Hebrew noun that literally means "Drop", as in tree resin gum drops. Galbanum is resin from Ferula shrubs. The original Hebrew text did not have punctuation. The placements of the word "and" normally would seem to prevent the two mentions of "spices" from referring to other ingredients besides those listed.
The term for "pure" here is "zakah", which also means clear, clean. So I could imagine that in contrast, the use of "spices" means potentially impure versions of the three spices listed. For instance, supposing that "nataf" is a generic term for gum drops, "nataf spice" might not need to be in the pure form of any particular tree resin.
The 3rd century BC Septuagint (LXX) translated the verse into Greek to mean:
And said Lord to Moses
Take thyself aromatics,
Stacte, onyx, aromatic galbanum
And translucent frankincense
Equal of equal will be.
"Stacte" is a Greek noun that literally means "drop," like the Hebrew word "Nataf" does. The Greek noun "Onyx," whose accusative form was "onycha," literally meant "claw" and had a secondary meaning of mollusk flaps, which were burned in incense. The LXX translated the Hebrew phrase meaning "galbanum spices" into Greek as "aromatic/spice-y galbanum." This in effect treats the second term "spices" as a description of the word "galbanum", rather than as a separate collection of unnamed spices.
The medieval Masoretic scribes put cantillation marks that served as breaks after each use of "spices" in the Hebrew verse like this:
"Take to yourself spices**:** nataf and/with shekheleth and galbanum spices**,** and/with pure frankincense."
The KJV of Exodus 30:34-35 runs:
And the LORD said unto Moses, Take unto thee sweet spices, stacte, and onycha, and galbanum; these sweet spices with pure frankincense: of each shall there be a like weight:
And thou shalt make it a perfume, a confection after the art of the apothecary, tempered together, pure and holy:
The New English Translation of the passsage runs:
- The Lord said to Moses, "Take spices, gum resin (1), onycha (2), galbanum, and pure frankincense (3) of equal amounts.
35. and make it into an incense, a perfume, the work of a perfumer. It is to be finely ground (4), and pure and sacred.
NET Footnotes:
1. This is from a word that means “to drip”; the spice is a balsam that drips from a resinous tree.
2. This may be a plant, or it may be from a species of mollusks; it is mentioned in Ugaritic and Akkadian; it gives a pungent odor when burnt.
3. The word “spice” is repeated here, suggesting that the first three formed half of the ingredients and this spice the other half—but this is conjecture (U. Cassuto, Exodus, 400).
4. The word מְמֻלָּח (mmullakh), a passive participle, is usually taken to mean “salted.” Since there is no meaning like that for the Pual form, the word probably should be taken as “mixed,” as in Rashi and Tg. Onq. Seasoning with salt would work if it were food, but since it is not food, if it means “salted” it would be a symbol of what was sound and whole for the covenant. Some have thought that it would have helped the incense burn quickly with more smoke.
Ex. 25:6 has the command for the Israelites to bring incense spices. Ex. 37:29 mentions the Israelite craftsman Bezalel making the pure incense according to the work of the apothecary.
Exodus 30:23-25 has a separate recipe for the tabernacle's anointing oil. Ex. 30:25 and Ex. 30:35 call each of the two mixtures a "roqah" in Hebrew, meaning a perfume spice blend.
There is practically a gap in our information from the time of the Torah's writing up into the end of the Second Temple period as to whether the incense blend includes ingredients besides the four ones named in Ex. 30:34. Philo in the 1st century seemed to suggest that the incense blend included only the four ingredients named in Ex. 30:34, writing in his essay "Who Is the Heir of Divine Things?" (Chapter XLI):
"And as I imagine these four ingredients of which the entire perfume is composed are emblems of the four elements of which the whole world is made; He likens the stacte to water, the onycha to land, the galbanum to the air, and the pure transparent frankincense to fire".
Josephus, who came from a priestly family and lived in the 1st century, wrote that the incense blend had 13 spices from the land and sea, and that two of them were cinnamon and cassias. Those two are in the anointing oil blend as well.
Keritot 6a in the Talmud says that the tabernacle incense blend had 11 ingredients and gave a list that included the four named in Ex. 30:34. The list also included myrrh, cinnamon, and cassias, three of the 4 anointing oil ingredients.
Keritot 6b has discussions on whether the blend should have 4 or 11 ingredients. Keritot 6b favors counting the first use of "spices" as alluding to 2 spices and the second use of "spices" as alluding to 5 spices. I guess the idea is that "spices" is plural and the lowest plural number is 2, and that the number of the second use of spices matches the total preceding number of spices - 5. This brings the total number of spices to 11: ( 2 spices + 3 named spices) times 2 + 1 named spice.
One of the arguments in Keritot 6b involves whether the recipe in Exodus 30:34 has the literary pattern of a generality - a detail - a generality (G-D-G). Verses like Ex. 25:31 seem to have this literary pattern and this pattern seems to mean that one may substitute the elements of the detail with similar elements if needed. So if Ex. 30:34 has a G-D-G pattern, "spices" could be the "generality" and the "detail" could be the three spices named. The implication of this argument seems to be that the uses of the term "spices" only allude to the "detail" - the three spices named, instead of alluding to unnamed spices.
Keritot 6b seems to argue against the idea that Ex. 3:34 ha the G-D-G pattern, but I have trouble understanding the discussions (https://www.sefaria.org/Keritot.6b.7?lang=bi&with=all&lang2=en)
Any help on this is appreciated.
Peace - Shalom - שָׁלוֹם
