Leviticus 15:16

16 'If any man has an emission of semen, then he shall wash all his body in water, and be unclean until evening.

Leviticus 15:16 Meaning and Commentary

Leviticus 15:16

And if any man's seed of copulation go out from him
Not in lawful cohabitation, nor voluntarily, but involuntarily, as Aben Ezra observes; not through any disorder, which came by an accident, or in any criminal way, but through a dream, or any lustful imagination; what is commonly called nocturnal pollution ^F3; then he shall wash all his flesh in water, and be unclean until the
even;
and so the Egyptian priests, when it happened that they were defiled by a dream, they immediately purified themselves in a laver ^F4 so the Jewish priests did when the like happened to them asleep in the temple ^F5; see ( Deuteronomy 23:10 Deuteronomy 23:11 ) .

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FOOTNOTES:

F3 "----& noctem flumine purgas." Pers. Satyr. 2.
F4 Chaeremon. apud Porphyr. de Abstinentia, l. 4. c. 7.
F5 Misn. Tamid. c. 1. sect. 1.

Leviticus 15:16 In-Context

14 On the eighth day he shall take for himself two turtledoves or two young pigeons, and come before the Lord, to the door of the tabernacle of meeting, and give them to the priest.

15 Then the priest shall offer them, the one as a sin offering and the other as a burnt offering. So the priest shall make atonement for him before the Lord because of his discharge.

16 'If any man has an emission of semen, then he shall wash all his body in water, and be unclean until evening.

17 And any garment and any leather on which there is semen, it shall be washed with water, and be unclean until evening.

18 Also, when a woman lies with a man, and there is an emission of semen, they shall bathe in water, and be unclean until evening.