Leviticus 15:31

31 "Thus you shall keep the sons of Israel separated from their uncleanness, so that they will not die in their uncleanness by their 1defiling My tabernacle that is among them."

Leviticus 15:31 Meaning and Commentary

Leviticus 15:31

Thus shall ye separate the children of Israel from their
uncleanness
Or because of it, and while they are in it, as from other persons, even their nearest relations, and from the house of God, as the next clause shows; or teach them, by observing the above laws and rules, to separate themselves, and that they be careful and cautions to keep themselves apart while in such impurities; and the children of Israel are only made mention of, because these laws are only binding upon them, with their proselytes and servants, free or not free F12, but not upon Gentiles; (See Gill on Leviticus 15:2): that they die not in their uncleanness, when they defile my tabernacle
that [is] among them;
from whence it appears, that men and women, in the above circumstances, might not go into the tabernacle; and it was chiefly to prevent their access to it that these laws were given, for the greater reverence and honour of it; and that for such persons to enter there was a pollution of it, and the punishment was cutting off, or death; and for one to die in his impurity, without purification and sacrifice, was a dreadful thing, and to be deprecated, and to be guarded against by an observance of the above laws. But the Jews now say F13, that forasmuch as the reason of these precepts was, because such persons were forbidden to enter into the temple, that being destroyed, all these precepts of uncleanness are ceased also.


FOOTNOTES:

F12 Misn. Zabim, c. 2. sect. 1.
F13 Leo Modena's History of Rites, Customs of the present Jews, par. 1. c. 8.

Leviticus 15:31 In-Context

29 'Then on the eighth day she shall take for herself two turtledoves or two young pigeons and bring them in to the priest, to the doorway of the tent of meeting.
30 'The priest shall offer the one for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering. So the priest shall make atonement on her behalf before the LORD because of her impure discharge.'
31 "Thus you shall keep the sons of Israel separated from their uncleanness, so that they will not die in their uncleanness by their defiling My tabernacle that is among them."
32 This is the law for the one with a discharge, and for the man who has a seminal emission so that he is unclean by it,
33 and for the woman who is ill because of menstrual impurity, and for the one who has a discharge, whether a male or a female, or a man who lies with an unclean woman.

Cross References 1

  • 1. Leviticus 20:3; Numbers 19:13, 20; Ezekiel 5:11; Ezekiel 36:17

Footnotes 1

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