¹⁴ So you are to make the Levites separate from the children of Israel, and the Levites will be mine.

⁴⁵ Take the Levites in place of all the first sons of the children of Israel, and the cattle of the Levites in place of their cattle; the Levites are to be mine; I am the Lord.

²⁶ It was right for us to have such a high priest, one who is holy and without evil, doing no wrong, having no part with sinners, and made higher than the heavens:

¹⁵ But when it was the good pleasure of God, by whom I was marked out even from my mother's body, through his grace,

¹ Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, an Apostle by the selection of God, given authority as a preacher of the good news,

¹⁷ And they will be mine, says the Lord, in the day when I make them my special property; and I will have mercy on them as a man has mercy on his son who is his servant.

⁸ At that time the Lord had the tribe of Levi marked out to take up the ark of the Lord's agreement, to be before the Lord and to do his work and to give blessings in his name, to this day.

⁶ Now, see, I have taken your brothers the Levites from among the children of Israel: they are given to you and to the Lord, to do the work of the Tent of meeting.

⁹ Does it seem only a small thing to you that the God of Israel has made you separate from the rest of Israel, letting you come near himself to do the work of the House of the Lord, and to take your place before the people to do what has to be done for them;

¹⁰ Letting you, and all your brothers the sons of Levi, come near to him? and would you now be priests?

¹⁷ For every mother's first son among the children of Israel is mine, the first male birth of man or beast: on the day when I sent death on all the first sons in the land of Egypt, I made them mine.

² Say to the children of Israel, If a man or a woman takes an oath to keep himself separate and give himself to the Lord;

¹² See, I have taken the Levites out of the children of Israel to be mine in place of the first sons of the children of Israel;