Leviticus 13:51

51 He shall examine the disease on the seventh day. If the disease has spread in the cloth, in warp or woof, or in the skin, whatever be the use of the skin, this is a spreading leprous disease; it is unclean.

Leviticus 13:51 Meaning and Commentary

Leviticus 13:51

And he shall look on the plague on the seventh day
To see whether there is any alteration in it in that space of time:

if the plague be spread in the garment, either in the warp or in the
woof, or in a skin, [or] in any work that is made of skin;
the green and red spot be spread more and more in either of them, whether the colour remains the same or not, be changed, the green into red, or the red into green, yet if there was a spreading, it was a sign of leprosy. According to the Jewish canon F19, if the plague was green and spread red, or red and spread green, it was unclean; that is, as Bartenora F20 explains it, if it was red in the size of a bean, and at the end of the week the red had spread itself to green; or if at the beginning it was green like a bean, and at the end of the week had spread itself to the size of a shekel, and the root or spread of it was become red;

the plague [is] a fretting leprosy;
according to Jarchi, a sharp and pricking one, like a thorn; which signification the word has in ( Ezekiel 28:24 ) . Ben Gersom explains it, which brings a curse, corruption, and oldness into the thing in which it is; an old "irritated, exasperated" leprosy, as Bochart F21, from the use of the word in the Arabic tongue, translates it:

it [is] unclean;
and the garment or thing in which it is.


FOOTNOTES:

F19 Misn. Negaim, c. 11. sect. 3, 4.
F20 In ib.
F21 Hierozoic. par. 1. l. 2. c. 45. col. 493.

Leviticus 13:51 In-Context

49 if the disease shows greenish or reddish in the garment, whether in warp or woof or in skin or in anything made of skin, it is a leprous disease and shall be shown to the priest.
50 The priest shall examine the disease, and put the diseased article aside for seven days.
51 He shall examine the disease on the seventh day. If the disease has spread in the cloth, in warp or woof, or in the skin, whatever be the use of the skin, this is a spreading leprous disease; it is unclean.
52 He shall burn the clothing, whether diseased in warp or woof, woolen or linen, or anything of skin, for it is a spreading leprous disease; it shall be burned in fire.
53 If the priest makes an examination, and the disease has not spread in the clothing, in warp or woof or in anything of skin,

Footnotes 1

  • [a]. A term for several skin diseases; precise meaning uncertain
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.