Nadab and Abihu, the two eldest sons of Aaron, offered unauthorized incense—and died. The Hebrew Bible says fire "came out from the Lord and consumed them" (Leviticus 10:2). The Targum Jonathan provides a forensic description: the flame "divided itself into four streams, penetrated their nostrils, and burned their lives without destroying their bodies."
Their corpses were intact. Their souls were incinerated. The Targum specifies that the fire entered specifically through the nose—the organ of breath, the site where God first breathed life into Adam (Genesis 2:7). What God gave through the nostrils, God could take back through the nostrils.
The fire they had used came "from under the hearth-pots"—common fire, not the sacred fire from the altar. Moses explained this was foretold at Sinai: "In them who come near before Me I will have the tabernacle to be sacred." The Targum records Aaron's response: "he was silent, and he received a good reward for his silence." The Hebrew Bible says only that Aaron was silent. The Targum adds that this silence itself was an act of faith that earned divine reward.
Their cousins Mishael and Elzaphan removed the bodies "with hooks of iron in their garments"—another Targum addition, explaining how corpses could be moved without the carriers becoming contaminated.
God then spoke directly to Aaron—one of the rare moments God addresses Aaron without Moses as intermediary—commanding the priests never to drink wine or intoxicants before serving. The Targum connects this directly to Nadab and Abihu: "as thy sons did who have died by the burning of fire." The implication is unmistakable: they were drunk when they died.
The chapter ends with Aaron winning a legal argument against Moses about whether mourning priests could eat the sin offering. Moses admitted publicly: "I am he from whom the rite hath been hidden, and Aaron my brother hath brought its remembrance to me."