Numbers 19

CHAPTER 19

Statute of the Red Heifer

¹Then Yahweh spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying,

²“This is the statute of the law which Yahweh has commanded, saying, ‘Speak to the sons of Israel that they take to you a ^ared heifer without blemish, in which is no defect and ^bon which a yoke has never ¹been placed.

³‘And you shall give it to ^aEleazar the priest, and it shall ^bbe brought outside the camp and be slaughtered in his presence.

⁴‘Next Eleazar the priest shall take some of its blood with his finger and ^asprinkle some of its blood toward the front of the tent of meeting seven times.

⁵‘Then the heifer shall be burned in his sight; ^aits hide and its flesh and its blood, with its refuse, shall be burned.

⁶‘And the priest shall take ^acedar wood and hyssop and scarlet material and cast it into the midst of the ¹burning heifer.

⁷‘The priest ^ashall then wash his clothes and bathe his ¹body in water and afterward come into the camp, but the priest shall be unclean until evening.

⁸‘The one who burns it shall also wash his clothes in water and bathe his ¹body in water and shall be unclean until evening.

⁹‘Now a man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer and deposit them outside the camp in a clean place, and ¹the congregation of the sons of Israel shall keep it as ^awater to remove impurity; it is ²purification from sin.

¹⁰‘And the one who gathers the ashes of the heifer ^ashall wash his clothes and be unclean until evening; and it shall be a perpetual statute to the sons of Israel and to the sojourner who sojourns among them.

¹¹‘^aThe one who touches the corpse of any ¹person shall be unclean for seven days.

¹²‘That one shall ^apurify himself from uncleanness with ¹the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and then he will be clean; but if he does not purify himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he will not be clean.

¹³‘^aAnyone who touches a corpse, the ¹body of a man who has died, and does not purify himself, ^2bmakes the ³tabernacle of Yahweh unclean; and that person shall be cut off from Israel. Because the water for impurity was not ^4csplashed on him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is still on him.

¹⁴‘This is the law when a man dies in a tent: everyone who comes into the tent and everyone who is in the tent shall be unclean for seven days.

¹⁵‘And every open vessel, which has no covering ¹tied down on it, shall be unclean.

¹⁶‘^aAlso, anyone who in the open field touches one who has been slain with a sword or who has died naturally, or a human bone or a grave, shall be unclean for seven days.

¹⁷‘Then for the unclean person they shall take some of the ¹ashes of the ²burnt ^3apurification from sin and ⁴flowing water shall be ⁵added to them in a vessel.

¹⁸‘And a clean person shall take hyssop and dip it in the water and sprinkle it on the tent and on all the furnishings and on the persons who were there and on the one who touched the bone or the one slain or the one dying naturally or the grave.

¹⁹‘Then the clean person ^ashall sprinkle on the unclean on the third day and on the seventh day; and on the seventh day he shall purify him from uncleanness, and he shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and shall be clean by evening.

²⁰‘But the man who is unclean and does not purify himself from uncleanness, that person shall be cut off from the midst of the assembly because he has ^1amade the sanctuary of Yahweh unclean; the water for impurity has not been ²splashed on him; he is unclean.

²¹‘So it shall be a perpetual statute for them. And he ^awho sprinkles the water for impurity shall wash his clothes, and he who touches the water for impurity shall be unclean until evening.

²²‘^aFurthermore, anything that the unclean person touches shall be unclean; and the person who touches it shall be unclean until evening.’”