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Numbers 19

1Yahweh spoke to Moses and Aaron: 2“This is the statute of the instruction Yahweh has commanded: Tell the sons of Israel to bring you a red cow without defect, in which there is no blemish and on which a yoke has never been laid. 3You must give it to Eleazar the priest. It must be taken outside the camp and slaughtered in his presence. 4Eleazar the priest must take some of its blood with his finger and sprinkle some of its blood seven times toward the front of the tent of meeting. 5The cow must be burned before his eyes—its hide, its flesh, its blood, and its dung must be burned. 6The priest must take cedar wood, hyssop, and scarlet material and throw them into the burning cow. 7The priest must wash his clothes and bathe his body in water. Afterward he may enter the camp, but the priest will be unclean until evening. 8The one who burns the cow must wash his clothes in water and bathe his body in water, and will be unclean until evening. 9A clean man must gather the cow's ashes and deposit them outside the camp in a clean place. They must be kept for the congregation of the sons of Israel for water of purification. It is a purification offering. 10The one who gathers the cow's ashes must wash his clothes and will be unclean until evening. This is to be a lasting statute for the sons of Israel and for the resident foreigner living among them.

11“Anyone who touches a dead human body will be unclean for seven days. 12They must purify themselves with the water on the third day, and on the seventh day they will be clean. But if they do not purify themselves on the third day and the seventh day, they will not be clean. 13Anyone who touches the dead body of a person who has died and does not purify themselves has made Yahweh's dwelling unclean. That person must be cut off from Israel. Because the water of purification has not been splashed on them, they remain unclean; their uncleanness is still on them.

14“This is the instruction when a person dies in a tent: everyone who enters the tent and everyone in the tent will be unclean for seven days. 15Every open vessel without a cover fastened over it is unclean. 16Anyone in the open field who touches someone killed by a sword, a dead body, a human bone, or a grave will be unclean for seven days. 17Some ashes from the burned purification offering must be taken for the unclean person, and fresh water must be put over them in a vessel. 18A clean man must take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle the tent, all the vessels, and the persons who were there, as well as the one who touched a bone, someone killed, a dead body, or a grave. 19The clean man must sprinkle the unclean person on the third day and the seventh day, and purify that person on the seventh day. The person being purified must wash their clothes and bathe in water, and will be clean at evening. 20But anyone who becomes unclean and does not purify themselves must be cut off from among the assembly, because they have made Yahweh's sanctuary unclean. The water of purification has not been splashed on them; they are unclean. 21This is to be a lasting statute for them. The one who sprinkles the water of purification must wash his clothes, and anyone who touches the water of purification will be unclean until evening. 22Anything the unclean person touches becomes unclean, and the person who touches it will be unclean until evening.”

Translation notes 5

19:2–6 — Red cow; unnamed workers. The Hebrew specifies a female bovine, its color, absence of defects, and lack of a yoke, but gives no numerical age. “Heifer” is the familiar alternative. Several slaughtering and burning verbs have no named subject; the priest supervises and handles blood, while other workers are involved. The draft does not make Eleazar perform every act personally. The cedar, hyssop, and scarlet material are named without a complete explanation of their symbolism.

19:9, 17 — Purification offering; water. The offering term is the same word traditionally called “sin offering,” though this rite addresses corpse-related uncleanness. “Water of purification” renders an expression literally involving water for impurity. The ashes are kept for that use. “Fresh water” is literally “living water,” ordinarily water from a flowing source. The text does not identify corpse contact itself as a moral offense.

19:11–19 — Third and seventh days. Verse 12 is compressed; verse 19 expressly requires sprinkling on both the third and seventh days, followed by washing and bathing. Becoming clean at evening is distinct from merely completing the sprinkling. The persons, vessels, bone, grave, and different kinds of corpse contact remain separately named.

19:13, 20 — Cut off. The penalty is severe, but the wording does not specify its mechanism. Exclusion, divine punishment, and death are among interpretations. The stated concern is making Yahweh's dwelling or sanctuary unclean. The draft does not reduce the penalty to an emotion of guilt or supply a particular judicial procedure.

19:18–22 — Purifying and becoming unclean. A clean person performs the sprinkling, yet the workers and those contacting the water receive uncleanness rules. The text retains those results without explaining them through a fully stated theory of transferred impurity. The verbs for splashing in verses 13 and 20 and sprinkling in verses 18–19 differ, though they concern the same purification setting.