Chapter 19
1 And HaShem spoke unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying:
2 This is the statute of the law which HaShem hath commanded,
saying: Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring thee a red heifer,
faultless, wherein is no blemish, and upon which never came yoke.
3 And ye shall give her unto Eleazar the priest, and she
shall be brought forth without the camp, and she shall be slain before his face.
4 And Eleazar the priest shall take of her blood with his
finger, and sprinkle of her blood toward the front of the tent of meeting seven
times.
5 And the heifer shall be burnt in his sight; her skin, and
her flesh, and her blood, with her dung, shall be burnt.
6 And the priest shall take cedar-wood, and hyssop, and
scarlet, and cast it into the midst of the burning of the heifer.
7 Then the priest shall wash his clothes, and he shall bathe
his flesh in water, and afterward he may come into the camp, and the priest
shall be unclean until the even.
8 And he that burneth her shall wash his clothes in water,
and bathe his flesh in water, and shall be unclean until the even.
9 And a man that is clean shall gather up the ashes of the
heifer, and lay them up without the camp in a clean place, and it shall be kept
for the congregation of the children of Israel for a water of sprinkling; it is
a purification from sin.
10 And he that gathereth the ashes of the heifer shall wash
his clothes, and be unclean until the even; and it shall be unto the children of
Israel, and unto the stranger that sojourneth among them, for a statute for
ever.
11 He that toucheth the dead, even any man's dead body, shall
be unclean seven days;
12 the same shall purify himself therewith on the third day
and on the seventh day, and he shall be clean; but if he purify not himself the
third day and the seventh day, he shall not be clean.
13 Whosoever toucheth the dead, even the body of any man that
is dead, and purifieth not himself--he hath defiled the tabernacle of HaShem--that
soul shall be cut off from Israel; because the water of sprinkling was not
dashed against him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is yet upon him.
14 This is the law: when a man dieth in a tent, every one
that cometh into the tent, and every thing that is in the tent, shall be unclean
seven days.
15 And every open vessel, which hath no covering close-bound
upon it, is unclean.
16 And whosoever in the open field toucheth one that is slain
with a sword, or one that dieth of himself, or a bone of a man, or a grave,
shall be unclean seven days.
17 And for the unclean they shall take of the ashes of the
burning of the purification from sin, and running water shall be put thereto in
a vessel.
18 And a clean person shall take hyssop, and dip it in the
water, and sprinkle it upon the tent, and upon all the vessels, and upon the
persons that were there, and upon him that touched the bone, or the slain, or
the dead, or the grave.
19 And the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean on
the third day, and on the seventh day; and on the seventh day he shall purify
him; and he shall wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and shall be
clean at even.
20 But the man that shall be unclean, and shall not purify
himself, that soul shall be cut off from the midst of the assembly, because he
hath defiled the sanctuary of HaShem; the water of sprinkling hath not been
dashed against him: he is unclean.
21 And it shall be a perpetual statute unto them; and he that
sprinkleth the water of sprinkling shall wash his clothes; and he that toucheth
the water of sprinkling shall be unclean until even.
22 And whatsoever the unclean person toucheth shall be
unclean; and the soul that toucheth him shall be unclean until even.
Sources: Portions copyright © 1997 by Benyamin Pilant, All Rights Reserved
JPS Electronic Edition, based on the 1917 JPS translation, Copyright © 1998 by Larry Nelson, All Rights Reserved
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