The rich shall not give more and the poor shall not give less than the half shekel, when you bring this offering to the Lord to make atonement for your lives.
“When you take a census of the Israelites to register them, at registration all of them shall give a ransom for their lives to the Lord, so that no plague may come upon them for being registered.
You shall take the atonement money from the Israelites and shall designate it for the service of the tent of meeting; before the Lord it will be a reminder to the Israelites of the ransom given for your lives.”
a beka a head (that is, half a shekel, measured by the sanctuary shekel) for everyone who was counted in the census, from twenty years old and up, for six hundred three thousand, five hundred fifty men.
For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you for making atonement for your lives on the altar, for, as life, it is the blood that makes atonement.
And we have brought the Lord’s offering, what each of us found, articles of gold, armlets and bracelets, signet rings, earrings, and pendants, to make atonement for ourselves before the Lord.”
And, masters, do the same to them. Stop threatening them, for you know that both of you have the same Lord in heaven, and with him there is no partiality.