פירוש על ויקרא 8:12

וימשח … ‎‏ ויצק‎ AND HE POURED [THE ANOINTING OIL UPON AARON'S HEAD] AND ANOINTED |HIM| — First he poured some oil upon his head and afterwards he put a drop between his eyebrows, and he drew the oil with his finger from this place to that (this drawing the oil from one place to the other was the anointing here spoken of) (Keritot 5b; Horayot 12a; cf. also Rashi on Exodus 29:7).

ויצוק על ראש אהרן, “he then poured it on the head of Aaron, etc.” Nachmanides writes that in this instance too, Moses performed the procedures in the correct order, as he had been commanded to perform these steps in this order when first told about the oil of anointing (Exodus 30,26-30) This was the reason that Moses did not want to anoint the Tabernacle itself until he could immediately thereafter anoint Aaron and his sons and their garments. The entire procedure of anointing took place as a continuous sequence. This was all necessary to enable the party who offered the sacrifices to be invited into the Tabernacle to perform the duties that could be performed only inside the Sanctuary, such as lighting the Menorah, burning the incense, and sprinkling the blood of certain of the sin-offerings on the golden altar. In those verses Moses had been told to first anoint he Tabernacle followed by the command to anoint and thereby to sanctify Aaron and his sons. [No mention is made in the text of the sons of Aaron having been anointed with oil. Ed.] Aaron and his sons were also to be sprinkled with some of the blood from the altar of the inaugural consecration offerings that had been presented by Moses as the High Priest prior to Aaron’s induction. Normally, [i.e. when the occasion should arise again to anoint a Tabernacle or Temple, I presume, Ed.] this would not take place until after the priests had already donned the garments in which they would perform their service. Anyone perusing the text of Nachmanides as we have it nowadays will note that it is substantially different from that which had been at the disposal of the Tur. It is not my task as a translator to reconcile these versions, and if the reader on comparing texts, finds fault with my translation this may be due to my following the Tur’s quote of Nachmanides, as he had it. Ed.] Personally, I am nonplussed why the anointing of Aaron’s sons is mentioned here at all. [An alternate version adds the word “not” i.e. why the anointing of the sons of Aaron was not mentioned here at all. Ed.] Nachmanides writes [in our versions on verse 11. Ed.] that there was no need for mentioning the anointing of the sons of Aaron at all, as it is clear from the tenor of the text that the sons underwent the same procedures as their father. After all, the Torah wrote when detailing the instructions to Moses: ומשחת אותם, “you are to anoint them.” (Exodus 28,41) The fact that Moses had carried out these instructions is confirmed when the Torah writes that Moses carried out the instructions G’d had given him. (End of verse 13) It appears to me (Nachmanides writing) that the anointment of Aaron’s sons was not performed by pouring oil of anointment on their heads, seeing that this detail has not been mentioned except in connection with Aaron himself even in the instructions to Moses, (compare Exodus 29,7) whereas in that verse the Torah does not mention anointment of his sons at all. It is therefore possible that the sons were not anointed with oil at all, but that they were only sprinkled with some of the blood and the oil of the inaugural offering as described in Exodus 29,21 [a sprinkling which stained their garments, not their bodies. Ed.] In that paragraph no mention is made of either pouring oil on the sons of Aaron or of anointing their heads with it. However, in the paragraph dealing with the erection of the Tabernacle in Parshat Pekudey (40,15) the Torah does speak of Moses having to anoint Aaron’s sons with the words: “as you have done to their father.” On that occasion no mention is made of their being sprinkled at all. No mention is made of this anointing with oil of the sons of Aaron in the paragraph dealing with the oil of anointing and its subjects, either. This leads me to believe that the sons were only sprinkled with oil.