10. On the following (the eighth) day he brings his sacrifice to the usual place, the entrance to the Tent of Meeting. In the Temple the leper, after bathing in a chamber at the N.W. corner of the Court of the Women, was brought to the gate of Nicanor, between the Court of the Women and the Court of Israel, where he presented his offerings.

tenth parts of an ephah] See on Leviticus 23:17. For ‘parts’ A.V. has ‘deals,’ a substantive of the same meaning, but now surviving as such only in the common phrase, ‘a great deal,’ although the verb is still in ordinary use. Cp. dole, and the German Teil, portion.

log] a liquid measure approximately equal to an English pint.

The ritual here enjoined is peculiar:

(1) The first offering is a Guilt-Offering—a he-lamb.

(2) The whole lamb is waved with the log of oil before the Lord.

(3) The blood of the sacrifice and the oil are applied to the leper with a ceremonial similar to that used at the consecration of the priests (Leviticus 8:12; Leviticus 8:23 f., Leviticus 8:30).

The he-lamb was of the first year, and younger than the ram usually brought for a Guilt-Offering; the waving of the whole animal was unusual; certain parts only of a sacrifice were waved, and the ceremony of waving was not practised with the Guilt-Offering and Sin-Offering. So that in respect of the animal employed, the act of waving, and the matter waved, this sacrifice was different from the ordinary Guilt-Offering.

The Nazirite who had been defiled by a dead body brought a Sin-Offering, a Burnt-Offering, and a Guilt-Offering; they were offered in this order, and no special regulations about the Guilt-Offering are given (Numbers 6:10-12). But in the case of the leper, the fact that the Guilt-Offering is brought first, with an accompanying ritual of marked significance, invests this sacrifice with a special importance and distinguishes it from the Guilt-Offering brought by the Nazirite. The Guilt-Offering with its accompanying ritual is the prominent feature in the leper’s sanctuary service. It seems to imply that the disease of leprosy had removed him who had been smitten from the ‘kingdom of priests’ (Exodus 19:6); that a re-consecration was necessary, before he could again take his place among his brethren. But it may also mean that leprosy was thought to imply some sin for which atonement must be made by fine or compensation.

The reason why this sacrifice should be a Guilt-Offering is not apparent. The distinctive character of the Guilt-Offering was that it involved restitution for wrong done, whether in respect of ‘the holy things of the Lord’ (Leviticus 5:15), or against a neighbour (Leviticus 6:2 f.). As the Nazirite had vowed a period of separation, it might be considered that the defilement of that separation (Numbers 6:12), though involuntary, was a wrong done in respect of ‘the holy things of the Lord’; but it seems doubtful whether the leper’s enforced absence from the sanctuary during the period of his uncleanness can be so regarded. If it is urged that every Israelite in virtue of his priesthood (Exodus 19:6) is dedicated to the service of God, then a Guilt-Offering would be required after any prolonged illness, and after cases of lengthened uncleanness such as those mentioned in chs. 12 and 15; but no Guilt-Offering is prescribed for these persons. Can there be here a remnant of some older practice of which no certain traces survive? The Heb. word ’âshâm, used for the Guilt-Offering in P, is applied in the older literature to certain offerings and fines (1 Samuel 6:3; 2 Kings 12:17). Was an ’âshâm or money payment required in earlier times on the recovery of a leper? This would explain the demand for a Guilt-Offering in P.

Verse 10. - On the eighth day he shall take two he lambs without blemish, and one ewe lamb of the first year without blemish, and three tenth deals of fine flour. Every sacrifice is to be provided and offered by the restored leper, except the peace offering. It is certainly singular that the peace offering should be omitted, and that the trespass offering should be required. The former fact may be accounted for by the supposition that though the peace offering was not required, the late leper was, after his other sacrifices, put in a position where he might offer it when he would of his own free will. But the requirement of the trespass offering is more difficult to explain. What wrong had the leper done? and what satisfaction had he to make? The usual answer to this question is that he had wronged Jehovah in that, however involuntarily, he had failed to bring him the offerings and service which he would have brought had he not been excluded from the camp. But this is a very forced explanation, and it is incompatible with other parts of the Law. For the leper was not the only unclean person who, owing to his uncleanness, was prevented from offering his gifts and worship at the tabernacle or temple. The woman who had an issue of blood for twelve years (Luke 8:43) during that time would have been excluded from the sanctuary. But no trespass offering is required of those that have been unclean through issues. We must therefore, look for some other explanation of the requirement in the case of the cleansed leper. And a simpler one is at hand. Leprosy was the type of sin - or all sin whatsoever. When, therefore, the expiatory sacrifices were demanded, both kinds - the trespass offering and the sin offering - had to be offered, because expiation had to be made for the uncleanness which represented all unrighteousness - trespasses as well as sins. It might be that the man had not committed a trespass; he might also not hive committed sin; but he had been stricken with the foul disease which symbolized both one and the other, and therefore he had to offer on his cleansing the sacrifice appropriate to each. There is a difference in the ritual of the trespass offering in the present ease, intended perhaps to distinguish it from those trespass offerings which were made when a man had in his mind a certain wrong or injury which he had committed, and for which he wished to make compensation. On this occasion

(1) the animal presented was not required to be of a particular value, as in the ordinary trespass offerings;

(2) it was waved, whereas the ordinary trespass offerings were not waved;

(3) it was waved by the priest, whereas other wave offerings were waved not by the priest, but by the offerer, whose bands were guided by the priests. Nor

(4) did the offering of oil accompany the presentation of other trespass offerings. For whatever reason it be, the most characteristic feature of the sacrificial cleansing of the leper is the trespass offering, and the way that it was dealt with. Leviticus 14:10The second act (Leviticus 14:9-20) effected his restoration to fellowship with Jehovah, and his admission to the sanctuary. It commenced on the seventh day after the first with a fresh purification; viz., shaving off all the hair from the head, the beard, the eyebrows - in fact, the whole body, - washing the clothes, and bathing the body. On the eighth day there followed a sacrificial expiation; and for this the person to be expiated was to bring two sheep without blemish, a ewe-lamb of a year old, three-tenths of an ephah of fine flour mixed with oil as a meat-offering, and a log (or one-twelfth of a hin, i.e., as much as six hens' eggs, or 1562 Rhenish cubic inches) of oil; and the priest was to present him, together with these gifts, before Jehovah, i.e., before the altar of burnt-offering. The one lamb was then offered by the priest as a trespass-offering, together with the log of oil; and both of these were waves by him. By the waving, which did not take place on other occasions in connection with sin-offerings and trespass-offerings, the lamb and oil were transferred symbolically to the Lord; and by the fat that these sacrificial gifts represented the offerer, the person to be consecrated to the Lord by means of them was dedicated to His service again, just as the Levites were dedicated to the Lord by the ceremony of waving (Numbers 8:11, Numbers 8:15). But a trespass-offering was required as the consecration-offering, because the consecration itself served as a restoration to all the rights of the priestly covenant nation, which had been lost by the mortal ban of leprosy.

(Note: Others, e.g., Riehm and Oehler, regard this trespass-offering also as a kind of mulcta, or satisfaction rendered for the fact, that during the whole period of his sickness, and so long as he was excluded from the congregation, the leper had failed to perform his theocratical duties, and Jehovah had been injured in consequence. But if this was the idea upon which the trespass-offering was founded, the law would necessarily have required that trespass-offerings should be presented on the recovery of persons who had been affected with diseased secretions; for during the continuance of their disease, which often lasted a long time, even as much as 12 years (Luke 8:43), they were precluded from visiting the sanctuary or serving the Lord with sacrifices, because they were unclean, and therefore could not perform their theocratical duties.)

Leviticus 14:10 Interlinear
Leviticus 14:10 Parallel Texts


Leviticus 14:10 NIV
Leviticus 14:10 NLT
Leviticus 14:10 ESV
Leviticus 14:10 NASB
Leviticus 14:10 KJV

Leviticus 14:10 Bible Apps
Leviticus 14:10 Parallel
Leviticus 14:10 Biblia Paralela
Leviticus 14:10 Chinese Bible
Leviticus 14:10 French Bible
Leviticus 14:10 German Bible

Bible Hub