Levitical, a.
(lɪˈvɪtɪkəl)
[f. as prec. + -al1.]
1. Pertaining to the Levites or the tribe of Levi.
| 1535 Coverdale Mal. iii. heading, Off the abrogation of the olde leuiticall priestheade. 1650 Trapp Comm. Exod. 74 The Sacrifice of Consecration shewed the difference between the Levitical Priests and Christ. 1776 G. Horne Ps. II. 297 We read, 1 Chron. ix. 33 that the Levitical singers were ‘employed in their work day and night’. 1867 M. E. Herbert Cradle L. vii. 168 Later, it became a Levitical city. 1898 Expositor Oct. 255 Deuteronomy 18. 6–8 does not invest a Levite with priestly but Levitical functions. |
2. Of or pertaining to the ancient Jewish system of ritual administered by the Levites; also, pertaining to the book of Leviticus.
Levitical degrees: the degrees of consanguinity within which marriage is forbidden in
Lev. xviii. 6–18.
| 1540 Act 32 Hen. VIII, c. 32 §2 Any mariage without the leuiticall degrees. a 1665 Goodwin Filled w. the Spirit (1867) 140 Framers of the whole Mosaical economy and Levitical dispensation. 1726 Ayliffe Parergon 52 By the Levitical Law, both the Man and the Woman were stoned to death. 1892 E. P. Barrow Regni Evangel. i. 56 The proselyte's bath of Levitical purification. 1895 J. A. Beet New Life in Christ iii. xiii. 103 We have here under levitical forms important Gospel truth. |
† b. nonce-use. Pertaining to ritual.
Obs.| 1670 Milton Hist. Eng. iv. Wks. (1847) 515/2 Austin..sent to Rome..to acquaint the pope of his good success in England, and to be resolved of certain theological, or rather levitical, questions. |
Hence
Leˈviticalism = Leviticism.
Levitiˈcality nonce-wd., Levitical character or obligation.
Leˈvitically adv., in a Levitical manner, according to Levitical law.
† Leˈviticalness, Levitical character or quality.
| 1892 A. B. Bruce Apologetics ii. vii. 204 *Leviticalism..may be conceived of as a husk to protect the kernel of ethical monotheism. 1900 Speaker 8 Sept. 624/1 We do not find in St. Paul any conception of Leviticalism as possessing a religious significance. |
| 1621 Bp. R. Montagu Diatribæ 387 The *Leuiticality..of Tithing, being confined vnto place, the Land of Promise. |
| 1641 Milton Ch. Govt. i. v, What right of jurisdiction soever can be from this place *Levitically bequeath'd, must descend upon the Ministers of the Gospell equally. 1892 Times 4 Feb. 6/2 An example of any Levitically clean animal. |
| 1639 F. Robartes God's Holy Ho. vii. 48 The *Leviticalnesse of things of the Tabernacle, or Temple, consisted not in their materials..but in their typical relation to Christ. |