Levites

Levites , a religious caste among the ancient Hebrews, descended from Jacob's son Levi and figuring prominently in the Bible. There were three divisions of Levites—Kohathites, Merarites, and Gershonites. Loyal to Moses during the Golden Calf incident, they were rewarded with special religious privileges. The Levites replaced the firstborn, who devoutly served God for having been saved at the Passover. They alone of the tribes received no allotment of land; instead they received revenues from certain cities, and each city had its quota of Levites to support. With the unification of worship at Jerusalem, the Levites became temple servants with hereditary assignments, and later were teachers of the Law. The Book of Leviticus is named for them.

Levites Clan of religious officials in ancient Israel. It is possible that they once constituted one of the 12 tribes of Israel mentioned in the Old Testament, descended in this case from Levi, the third son of Jacob by his first wife Leah. After the building of the Temple of Jerusalem, Levites performed the lesser religious services. By the time of Jesus Christ, the Levites ran the entire Temple organization with the sole exception of the actual priesthood.

Levites. According to the biblical accounts, members of a tribe descended from Levi, one of the sons of Jacob, who had been specially set aside as ministers of the sanctuary. Some scholars doubt the existence of such a tribe. In the Deuteronomic legislation ‘priest’ and ‘Levite’ are virtually interchangeable; in the 7th–8th cents. BC ‘priest’ came to be restricted to those of Levitical descent who could trace their ancestry through Zadok; the Levites were allotted other duties in the Temple.