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Numbers 19:12-14
New English Translation
Numbers 19:12-14
New English Translation
12 He must purify himself[a] with water on the third day and on the seventh day, and so will be clean. But if he does not purify himself on the third day and the seventh day, then he will not be clean. 13 Anyone who touches the corpse of any dead person and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle of the Lord. And that person must be cut off from Israel,[b] because the water of purification was not sprinkled on him. He will be unclean; his uncleanness remains on him.
14 “‘This is the law: When a man dies[c] in a tent, anyone who comes into the tent and all who are in the tent will be ceremonially unclean seven days.
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Numbers 19:12 tn The verb is the Hitpael of חָטָא (khataʾ), a verb that normally means “to sin.” But the Piel idea in many places is “to cleanse; to purify.” This may be explained as a privative use (“to un-sin” someone, meaning cleanse) or denominative (“make a sin offering for someone”). It is surely connected to the purification offering, and so a sense of purify is what is wanted here.
- Numbers 19:13 sn It is in passages like this that the view that being “cut off” meant the death penalty is the hardest to support. Would the Law prescribe death for someone who touches a corpse and fails to follow the ritual? Besides, the statement in this section that his uncleanness remains with him suggests that he still lives on.
- Numbers 19:14 tn The word order gives the classification and then the condition: “a man, when he dies….”
New English Translation (NET)
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