Ezekiel 44:24 → Leviticus 21:1

Ezekiel 44:24-27 echoes Leviticus 21:1-3's regulations about priestly contact with the dead. Leviticus 21:1 prohibits priests from defiling themselves (יִטַּמָּא, yittamma) for a dead person except for close relatives (mother, father, son, daughter, brother, unmarried sister). Ezekiel 44:25 preserves the same list of permitted exceptions for corpse contact, using nearly identical kinship terminology. However, Ezekiel adds the requirement that after such defilement the priest must undergo a seven-day purification period and offer a חַטָּאת (chattat, "sin offering") before returning to inner-court service (44:26-27), formalizing the restoration process more explicitly than the Levitical source. Verse 24 itself first assigns the priests a judicial role — to "officiate as judges" (שֹׁפְטִים) and "judge according to My ordinances" — showing that Ezekiel expands the priestly office from Leviticus 21's passive avoidance of defilement to an active governing function in the restored community.