Numbers 31:20

20 and of all the prey, whether it is cloth, or vessel, and anything made ready to things pertaining to use, of the skins and hairs of goats, and wood, it shall be cleansed. (and all the spoils, whether it is a cloak, or a vessel, or anything made out of skin, or of goat hair, or of wood, must also be made clean, or purified.)

Numbers 31:20 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 31:20

And purify all your raiment
By washing them; and this may intend not so much their own wearing apparel, as the raiment they took off of the dead bodies of the Midianites, since the person that touched a dead body was not obliged to wash his clothes, but the clean person that sprinkled the water of purification on him, ( Numbers 19:19 Numbers 19:21 ) , some render the words, "purify yourselves" ^F4, "together with the raiment" which seems to be the best version of them:

and all that is made of skins;
of any sort of creatures, as the covering of tents, shoes, bottles see ( Leviticus 11:32 )

and all work of goats' hair;
such as the covering of tents was also made of: and this, according to Jarchi and other Jewish writers ^F5 includes vessels made of the horns, hoofs, and bones of these creatures: and all things made of wood; as beds, cups, dishes all which might be purified by washing; see ( Leviticus 15:12 ) .

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FOOTNOTES:

F4 (wajxtt) "purgatote vos", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; Vid. L'Empereur, Not. ad Kimchii (odoiporia) , p. 130.
F5 Maimon. & Bartenora in Misn. Celim, c. 2. sect. 1.

Numbers 31:20 In-Context

18 soothly keep ye to you the young damsels, and all women virgins, (but you can keep for yourselves the young girls, and all the women who still be virgins,)

19 and dwell ye without the tents seven days. He that slayeth a man, or toucheth a slain man, shall be cleansed in the third [day], and the seventh day; (and then stay ye away from the tents for seven days. He who killeth a man, or toucheth a dead man, must cleanse both himself, and his captives, on the third day, and on the seventh day;)

20 and of all the prey, whether it is cloth, or vessel, and anything made ready to things pertaining to use, of the skins and hairs of goats, and wood, it shall be cleansed. (and all the spoils, whether it is a cloak, or a vessel, or anything made out of skin, or of goat hair, or of wood, must also be made clean, or purified.)

21 And Eleazar, the priest, spake thus to the men of the host that fought, This is the commandment of the law, which the Lord commanded to Moses,

22 The gold, and silver, and brass, and iron, and tin, and lead,