Leviticus 15:31

31 docebitis ergo filios Israhel ut caveant inmunditiam et non moriantur in sordibus suis cum polluerint tabernaculum meum quod est inter eos

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 et octavo die offeret pro se sacerdoti duos turtures vel duos pullos columbae ad ostium tabernaculi testimonii
30 qui unum faciet pro peccato et alterum in holocaustum rogabitque pro ea coram Domino et pro fluxu inmunditiae eius
31 docebitis ergo filios Israhel ut caveant inmunditiam et non moriantur in sordibus suis cum polluerint tabernaculum meum quod est inter eos
32 ista est lex eius qui patitur fluxum seminis et qui polluitur coitu
33 et quae menstruis temporibus separatur vel quae iugi fluit sanguine et hominis qui dormierit cum ea
The Latin Vulgate is in the public domain.