Leviticus 14 Study Notes

14:1-32 God, in his grace, provided for the restoration of the person rendered unclean by a skin disease. The priests did not cure the person affected. They only diagnosed the disease and helped with the religious rituals subsequent to a person’s healing. Chapter 14 points to the grace of God, who made provision for the people affected by disease to return to the community of the faithful.

14:3 The examination of the person afflicted with a skin disease had to be done outside the camp in case the disease had not healed completely. The camp was a place of great ritual significance in Leviticus because it was the place where the tent of meeting was located. People or things rendered unclean had to be taken outside the camp—a place where ashes were dumped (4:12,21; 6:11; 8:17; 9:11; 16:27), corpses were buried (10:4-5), illegitimate sacrifices were offered (17:3), blasphemers were executed (24:14,23), and people with skin diseases were banished. Hebrews 13:11-13 declares that Jesus suffered outside the gate.

14:4 Although the person was healed, he had to go through a cleansing ritual that involved animal sacrifice. The scarlet yarn was a woolen yarn colored with a crimson-scarlet dye made from the kermes or cochineal scale insects. The plant known as hyssop had a good absorbing quality, was abundant in Israel, and was associated with purification (Ps 51:7).

14:7 The release of a live bird over the open countryside could be a parallel to the Day of Atonement rite of releasing the scapegoat (16:21-22), or it could represent the releasing of the healed person from the chains of death as he or she was allowed to live freely in the community.

14:10 The healed person was allowed in the camp on the eighth day, which marked a new beginning, and it has special significance in Leviticus. It is generally associated with rest and celebration (vv. 10,23; 9:1; 12:3; 15:14,29; 22:27; 23:36,39).

14:11-13 A guilt offering was necessary because the person afflicted was absent from the community and was separated from God by not being allowed in the sanctuary. This offering was unique in that it was the only blood sacrifice in which the entire animal had to undergo the presentation rite (see note at 7:30-31). Because the blood of the lamb was crucial for this offering, a person could not commute this sacrifice with money (1Pt 1:19-20).

14:14 The placing of blood on the healed person’s extremities symbolized that his entire being—his ear . . . hand, and foot—must be consecrated to God. The ears were important because people confessed their sin to the priest. The hands and the feet were part of the important rituals performed at the tabernacle (8:23-24).

14:18-20 The priest must also bring a burnt offering in order to make atonement for the person who had been healed. The verb translated “make atonement” can mean “to wipe away,” “to purge,” “to purify,” or “to atone for.” As a result, the healed person would be pronounced clean and thus forgiven, ready to enter God’s presence with confidence. The concept is important to the sacrificial theology of Leviticus because atonement cleansed a person from all sins, known and unknown. The language used affirms that physical impurity was purified, while moral impurity had to be forgiven.

14:21-32 In his grace, God provided concessions for the poor (Ex 22:25; 23:11; Dt 15:4).

14:33-53 As with mildew in fabric in 13:47-59, mildew in a house would compromise the ceremonial cleanness of the community and therefore was not allowed. Because it could spread, it was thoroughly eradicated (vv. 43-45). The ceremony for purifying a building with mildew was similar to that for a person with a skin disease, except that there was no guilt offering or sin offering for the building since it only had to be declared clean; it did not have to be prepared for communion with God.