Deuteronomy 23:10

10 "If [there] is among you a man that is not clean because of a seminal emission {during the night}, he shall go outside the camp; he shall not come within the camp.

Deuteronomy 23:10 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 23:10

If there be among you any man that is not clean
Any unclean person in the army, that was even ceremonially unclean in any of the instances the law makes so, one of which put for the rest is mentioned:

by reason of uncleanness that chanceth him by night;
through pollution by a nocturnal flux, as the Septuagint version, or a gonorrhoea, an involuntary one, occasioned by impure thoughts and imaginations in dreams; the same case as in ( Leviticus 15:16 )

then shall he go abroad out of the camp;
out of the army, lest others should be defiled by such; they not having houses to retire to, and chambers to keep themselves in separate from others, as when at home:

he shall not come within the camp;
that is, not till he has done what is prescribed him in the next verse. Jarchi says, he might not come into the camp of the Levites, and much less into the camp of God.

Deuteronomy 23:10 In-Context

8 The children [that] are born to them [in] the third generation may come {representing them} in the assembly of Yahweh.

9 "If you go out to encamp against your enemies, then you shall guard against [doing] anything evil.

10 "If [there] is among you a man that is not clean because of a seminal emission {during the night}, he shall go outside the camp; he shall not come within the camp.

11 {And then} toward the {coming} of the evening, he shall bathe with water, and at the going down of the sun, he may come to the midst of the camp.

12 "And there shall be for you a designated place outside the camp; {and you shall go there to relieve yourself},

Footnotes

• [a]. Literally "of the night"