Leviticus 13:3

_AND THE PRIEST SHALL LOOK ON THE PLAGUE IN THE SKIN OF THE FLESH: AND WHEN THE HAIR IN THE PLAGUE IS TURNED WHITE, AND THE PLAGUE IN SIGHT BE DEEPER THAN THE SKIN OF HIS FLESH, IT IS A PLAGUE OF LEPROSY: AND THE PRIEST SHALL LOOK ON HIM, AND PRONOUNCE HIM UNCLEAN._ The priest shall look ... The leprosy, as covering the person with a white scaly scurf, has always been accounted an offensive blemish rather than a serious malady in the East, unless when it assumed its less common and malignant forms. When a Hebrew priest, after a careful inspection, discovered under the cutaneous blemish the distinctive signs of contagious leprosy, the person was immediately pronounced unclean, and is supposed to have been sent out of the camp to a lazaretto provided for that purpose. If the symptoms appeared to be doubtful, he ordered the person to be kept in domestic confinement for seven days, when he...

1-17 The plague of leprosy was an uncleanness, rather than a disease. Christ is said to cleanse lepers, not to cure them. Common as the leprosy was among the Hebrews, during and after their residence in Egypt, we have no reason to believe that it was known among them before. Their distressed state and employment in that land must have rendered them liable to disease. But it was a plague often inflicted immediately by the hand of God. Miriam's leprosy, and Gehazi's, and king Uzziah's, were punishments of particular sins; no marvel there was care taken to distinguish it from a common distemper. The judgment of it was referred to the priests. And it was a figure of the moral pollutions of men's minds by sin, which is the leprosy of the soul, defiling to the conscience, and from which Christ alone can cleanse. The priest could only convict the leper, (by the law is the knowledge of sin,) bu...

Verse Leviticus 13:3. _THE PRIEST SHALL - PRONOUNCE HIM UNCLEAN._] וטמא אתו _vetimme otho_; literally, _shall pollute him_, i. e., in the Hebrew idiom, shall _declare_ or _pronounce_ him _polluted_; and in Leviticus 13:23, it is said, _the priest shall pronounce him clean_, וטהרו הכהן vetiharo haccohen, the _priest shall cleanse him_, i. e., _declare_ him _clean_. In this phrase we have the proper meaning of Matthew 16:19: _Whatsoever ye bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven; and_ _whatsoever ye loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven_. By which our Lord intimates that the disciples, from having the _keys_, i. e., the _true knowledge_ of th...

THE HAIR IN THE PLAGUE IS TURNED WHITE - The sparing growth of very fine whitish hair on leprous spots in the place of the natural hair, appears to have been always regarded as a characteristic symptom. THE PLAGUE IN SIGHT BE DEEPER THAN THE SKIN OF HIS FLESH - Rather The stroke appears to be deeper than the scarf skin. The bright spot changed to a brownish color with a metallic or oily luster, and with a clearly-defined edge. This symptom, along with the whitish hair, at once decided the case to be one of leprosy....

EXPOSITION UNCLEANNESS DERIVED FROM LEPROSY OR CONTACT WITH LEPERS AND LEPROUS THINGS (Leviticus 13:1, Leviticus 14:1). A third cause of uncleanness is found in a third class of offensive or repulsive objects. There is no disease which produces so foul an appearance in the human form as leprosy. There was, therefore, no disease so suitable for creating ceremonial, because representing spiritual, uncleanness. The name leprosy has been made to cover a number of diseases similar but not identical in character. There are many spurious forms of leprosy, and many diseases akin to leprosy which do not

AND THE PRIEST SHALL LOOK ON THE PLAGUE IN THE SKIN OF THE FLESH,.... Whether it be a swelling, scab, or a bright spot that appears, and judge of it by the following rules, and none but a priest might do this: AND [WHEN] THE HAIR IN THE PLAGUE IS TURNED WHITE; it arising in a place where hair grows, and which hair is not naturally white, but of another colour, but changed through the force of the plague; and there were to be two hairs at least, which were at first black, but turned white; so Jarchi and Ben Gersom: and these hairs, according to the Misnah e, must be white at bottom; if the root (or bottom) is black, and the head (or top) white, he is clean; if the root white, and the head black, he is defiled; for hairs turning white is a sign of a disorder, of weakness, of a decay of nature, as may be observed in ancient persons: AND THE PLAGUE IN SIGHT [BE] DEEPER THAN THE SKIN OF HIS...

PRIEST Some have found in the regulations of this chapter concerning an inquest by the priest of a case of leprosy, elaborate provisions for the exercise of discipline in the local church. No little self-righteousness and cruelty have come in thereby. The explicit instructions of the New Testament are the alone and sufficient rule of discipline....

3. LEPROSY: TYPE OF INDWELLING SIN CHAPTER 13 _ 1. Leprosy in a person (Leviticus 13:1)_ 2. The infected garment. (Leviticus 13:47) 3. The cleansing of the garment (Leviticus 13:58) The entire chapter treats of leprosy. It has been argued from the side of critics that the disease described here is not the one we know as leprosy, but only a similar disease of the skin. The arguments advanced to support this objection are silenced by Matthew 8:1. The man who came to our Lord had leprosy. The Lord told him “show thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testi

GENERAL PROCEDURE. Certain classes of signs arouse suspicion. The priest is to inspect. If he sees them to be distinctly leprous, the patient is to be so treated; otherwise he is to be secluded for one or two periods of seven days; if there is no further spreading, he is discharged clean. LEVITICUS 13:1. FIRST CASE. A ring or scab on the flesh. If there are white hairs more than skin-deep, the disease is present. LEVITICUS 13:9. RECOVERY OF CLEANNESS. The grounds for deciding as to whether the leprosy has run its course are as follows; if the hair is white and there is raw flesh, the patient needs no isolation for inspection purposes, the decision can be made at once; but if he is white all over, the disease is regarded as at an end; probably a case of leucoderma is in m

PRONOUNCE. Hebrew "shall make him". Figure of speech _Metonymy_ (of Subject). pronounce or declare him to be. App-6. Compare Ezekiel 43:3, &c....