Leviticus: And He Called (Vayikra)
Lesson 3: The Peace Offering — A Feast with God and Neighbor
Explore shalom and shelamim, and the peace with God, neighbor, and community embodied in a shared meal.
Leviticus 3:1-17EnglishThe edited PDF edition is in preparation.
In this article 2
Lesson 3 · The Peace Offering
A Feast with God and Neighbor
When in life do we feel that things could not possibly be better?
Perhaps it is when we share good food and peaceful fellowship with people we love. Leviticus presents an offering that embodies the height of this joy: the peace offering (zebach shelamim).
1. A Table Shared by God and His People
Leviticus describes several kinds of offerings. Unlike the sin offering for forgiveness or the burnt offering in which a person gives himself wholly to God, the peace offering has a distinctive feature:
It is shared.
The peace offering is the only sacrifice in which the worshiper gives one portion to God and shares the rest in a meal with others.
Other offerings focus on personal devotion, gratitude in everyday life, or the resolution of sin. The peace offering goes beyond all these as a feast.
It is fellowship at the table where God, the priest, and the worshiper enjoy peace together. For this reason, the peace offering is among the noblest gifts a person can present to God.
2. The Meaning of Shelamim and Shalom
The Hebrew word for peace offerings, shelamim (שְׁלָמִים), is the plural form of the familiar word shalom.
We often think of peace as a calm state of mind. Biblical shalom, however, is far deeper and broader.
Shalom includes:
- Wholeness and freedom from blemish
- Fullness and a lack of nothing
- Bringing everything to completion
- Harmony and well-being
- Peace
- Restoration of broken relationships
Scripture uses the concept of shalom in many settings:
- Wholeness and freedom from blemish — Leviticus 3:1
- A full and honest weight — Deuteronomy 25:15
- The completion of all God’s work — Genesis 2:3
- Well-being — Genesis 43:27
Shalom is not only an absolute state of perfection; it is also relational. It describes harmony between me and God, between me and other people, and between me and my surroundings.
True peace goes beyond inner calm. It is the state in which a restored relationship with God brings our relationships with our neighbors and our surroundings toward wholeness as well.
3. Zebach: A Sacred Meal Shared Together
In the term “peace offering,” the Hebrew word for sacrifice is zebach. It means more than an offering placed on an altar; it carries the sense of a meal shared together.
Zebach: a meal eaten in company A meal shared together
In the burnt offering, the whole animal is consumed on the altar and offered to God alone. The peace offering is different.
- The fat is offered to God.
- The breast and right thigh go to the priest.
- The remaining meat is eaten by the worshiper together with family and neighbors.
The offering joins the vertical relationship of giving to God with the horizontal relationship of sharing with one’s neighbors.
4. From Personal Peace to a Community Feast
The peace offering cannot be completed alone. Scripture presents it as a communal meal.
True peace—shalom—is not merely a private state in which I lack nothing. No individual can attain complete happiness in isolation. Genuine shalom comes to completion when people are joined in community and share their joy with one another.
If we think only of our relationship with God but do not share our joy with our neighbors, the offering remains only half complete.
When my gratitude and joy overflow onto the community’s table, they become a true peace offering.
5. Kinds of Peace Offerings and the Fat Given to God
Peace offerings fall into three main categories.
The Thanksgiving Offering (Todah)
The thanksgiving offering is given in grateful response to grace already received. It may be presented after deliverance from illness or danger, with the grace received then shared joyfully in the community.
The Vow Offering (Neder)
The vow offering is presented in connection with a promise made to God in a particular circumstance.
“If You bring this to pass, I will do this.”
It is a commitment joined to an earnest prayer, and once the vow has been fulfilled, the worshiper must carry out what was promised.
The Freewill Offering (Nedavah)
The freewill offering is a devotion that arises from voluntary love and joy. It is presented without a particular occasion, simply from a heart overflowing with love for God.
The Fat Given to God
The fat tail, the fat covering the entrails, all the fat attached to the entrails, the two kidneys with the fat on them, and the long lobe of the liver — Leviticus 3:9-10
The Hebrew word for fat, חֵלֶב (chelev), refers to the richest, most nourishing part of an animal and symbolizes the energy of life.
Offering this portion to God acknowledges that human strength comes from Him. It also expresses the voluntary resolve not to use that strength and energy only for personal satisfaction, but to direct and restrain it for the sake of God and the community.
6. Why Are the Kidneys Offered?
In the peace offering, not only the fat around the kidneys but both kidneys themselves are removed and offered to God.
The Talmud portrays the two kidneys within a person as counselors, one counseling good and the other evil.1 The kidneys were understood as more than physical organs; they represented the inner place where moral choices and decisions are made.
Rabbi Hirsch interprets the fat as the energy and vitality of life and the kidneys as the center that decides how that energy will be used.
| Symbol | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Fat | The energy of life |
| Kidneys | The center that decides where that energy will be directed |
Offering the kidneys means entrusting to God not only the energy of life but also the innermost center that decides how to use it.
7. Food Offered to the LORD: The Mystery of Table Fellowship
Leviticus 3 calls the peace offering “food offered to the LORD.”
“It is food offered to the LORD.” — Leviticus 3:11
The burnt offering and grain offering are also “pleasing aromas” that God gladly receives. Yet the peace offering alone is called “God’s food.”
In the burnt and grain offerings, when God gladly receives the smoke rising from the offering, it becomes a pleasing aroma—a re’ach nichoach. This signifies God’s acceptance.
In the peace offering, calling the sacrifice food offered to the LORD signifies that fellowship with God has taken place.
Imagine a family moving into a new home and taking a plate of rice cakes to their next-door neighbors. When the neighbors receive the gift, the door to fellowship opens. The peace offering is a marvelous sign of grace: God joins the worshiper’s table in fellowship.
As Revelation 3:20 says, the Lord desires to come in and eat with us, and for us to eat with Him.
8. Christ and the Sacrifice of Peace
The burnt offering is the sacrifice in which I devote myself wholly and raise my life to God. Placing the peace offering on top of the burnt offering shows that without complete devotion, the shalom God gives cannot fill us or flow from us to others.
When we give ourselves wholly to God, He grants us the true peace that the world cannot give.
The placing of the peace offering upon the burnt offering also points to the ministry of Jesus.
“Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” — Hebrews 10:7
Jesus poured out everything He had, like a burnt offering, to accomplish what God desired. Having given Himself completely, He then became the eternal atoning sacrifice that makes peace for us.
“He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins…” — 1 John 2:2
9. Living Out the Peace Offering Today
Worship Offered by Those Who Already Have Enough
The peace offering is presented by a person who already enjoys contentment in God.
Do I approach God because something is missing? Or do I approach because God has already made me content?
We often seek God because we are anxious and in need. That too is a place of grace. Yet the peace offering takes us one step further.
The peace offering is “worship offered by those for whom God is already enough.”
Do we encounter God only as the One we need? Or do we live in the enjoyment of the One who is already sufficient?
An Offering Whose Feast Is Shared
The peace offering does not end when the act of worship is over. It is an offering of eating, sharing, and rejoicing together.
Are we a community that worships and then simply disperses? Or are we a community that shares life?
A church shaped by the peace offering looks like this:
- A church where people ask about and share one another’s lives even after worship
- A church where relationships deepen around meals
- A church that gives practical help in times of hardship
- A church that rejoices together in times of joy
Peace Reveals the Kingdom of God
N. T. Wright describes reconciliation not merely as the restoration of a relationship but as an event through which God renews the world.
Jesus eats with sinners. Those meals are not merely fellowship; they are a declaration that the kingdom of God has begun.
The church is not merely a gathering but a signpost that the kingdom of God has come. Our lives are to bear witness in the world, showing how God’s kingdom differs from the kingdoms of this age.
Today we no longer sacrifice animals, but the heart of the peace offering remains. As we offer ourselves to God with the heart of the burnt offering and live each day presenting grain offerings of gratitude, we come to confess, “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.”
Then may you welcome God as the honored guest and share the table with the members of His household and your community.2