Numbers 12:12

12 "Oh, do not let her be like one dead, whose flesh is half eaten away when he comes from his mother's womb!"

Numbers 12:12 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 12:12

Let her not be as one dead
As she was in a ceremonial sense, being to be shut up and excluded from the society of people, and as defiling by touching as a dead carcase; and, in a natural sense, her flesh, by the disease upon her, was become as dead flesh, putrid and rotten, and unless miraculously cured it would issue in her death:

of whom the flesh is half consumed, when he cometh out of his mother's
womb;
like an abortive, or one stillborn, that has been dead some time in its mother's womb; and therefore when brought forth its flesh is almost wasted away, or at least half consumed: and in such a plight and condition was Miriam already, or quickly would be, through the force of her disease.

Numbers 12:12 In-Context

10 But when the cloud had withdrawn from over the tent, behold, Miriam was leprous, as white as snow. As Aaron turned toward Miriam, behold, she was leprous.

11 Then Aaron said to Moses, "Oh, my lord , I beg you, do not account this sin to us, in which we have acted foolishly and in which we have sinned.

12 "Oh, do not let her be like one dead, whose flesh is half eaten away when he comes from his mother's womb!"

13 Moses cried out to the LORD , saying, "O God, heal her, I pray!"

14 But the LORD said to Moses, "If her father had but spit in her face, would she not bear her shame for seven days? Let her be shut up for seven days outside the camp, and afterward she may be received again."