2_This is the ordinance of the law. _Because it could not but occur that, whilst the faithful were engaged in the world, they should often contract some pollution by their contact with its many impurities, the composition of the water is here described, by the sprinkling of which they might wash awa... [ Continue Reading ]
3_And ye shall give her unto Eleazar. _A clear distinction is here made between two offerings; for the people are not permitted to kill the heifer, but this is the peculiar office of the priest. Thus the people offered vicariously by the hand of the priest; and in this way also at present, although... [ Continue Reading ]
6_And the priest shall take cedar-wood. _That the sprinkling of the blood might be conjoined with that of the water, the cedar-wood, and hyssop, and scarlet, thread, with which the sprinkling was wont to be made, were cast into the fire; for, unless the Israelites had been admonished by this visible... [ Continue Reading ]
7_Then the priest shall wash his clothes. _At first sight there seems to be a discrepancy in the facts, that the heifer was sacred to God, and pure, and still that the priest was polluted by touching it; yet they accord very well with each other. But that both the priest as well as the minister who... [ Continue Reading ]
11._He that toucheth the dead body. _He now recites certain forms of pollution in which the washing was necessary; all of them, however, come to the point, that men are defiled by the touch of a corpse or, bones, or a grave. Nor is there here any distinction between the body of a person who is slain... [ Continue Reading ]
13._Whosoever toucheth the dead body. _The severity of. the capital punishment shews how very pleasing to God is purity. If any one bad forgotten to sprinkle himself on the third or the seventh day, he might redeem his negligence by a prolongation of the term, because he only postponed his purificat... [ Continue Reading ]
22._And whatsoever the unclean person toucheth. _Others translate _it, _— “Whosoever toucheth an unclean thing shall be unclean.” for, since the Hebrew is without a neuter gender, (26) the relative אשר, _asher, _and the noun הטמא _, hattame, _may be either masculine or neuter; and either sense would... [ Continue Reading ]