Whosoever toucheth the dead body of any man that is dead, and purifieth not himself,.... With the ashes of the heifer, or water of purification, and so neglects the means which God has appointed for his cleansing:defileth the tabernacle of the Lord; that is, if he goes into it in his uncleanness, which it was not lawful for him to do: from the Jews the Assyrians seem to have borrowed some customs of theirs, as related by Lucian , who upon burying a dead cock reckoned seven days, see Nu 19:11; and then went into the temple, for before they might not go in, nor perform holy service; such laws they use, that if anyone sees a dead carcass, he may not go that day into the temple; but he goes in the day following, after he has purified himself:and that soul shall be cut off from Israel; either be excommunicated from the church, or die by the hand of the civil magistrate, or by the immediate hand of God; that is, if he knew he had touched a dead body, and wilfully neglected the means of his purification, and so sinned presumptuously; otherwise, if all this was done ignorantly, an atonement was made for it, Le 5:3because the water of separation was not sprinkled upon him, he shall be unclean; as all are who are not sprinkled with the blood of Christ:his uncleanness is yet upon him; and will remain, nothing can remove it; as nothing can remove the stain and blot of sin but the blood of Christ; and where that is not applied it will remain marked before God, and will lie upon the sinner to his utter condemnation and ruin; see Jer 2:22.
Bible Commentary
Numbers 19:13
Numbers 19:13
John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible · John Gill (1697–1771) · Public Domain
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Numbers 19 — OverviewNumbers 19 · Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole BibleThis chapter is only concerning the preparing and using of the ashes
which were to impregnate the water of purification. The people had
complained of the strictness of the law, which forbade their near
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We have in this chapter, spiritually, death, and the remedy for death. Death is treated of not as the mere physical change which is the end of life, nor as the social and domestic loss which breaks…Numbers 19:1-22Numbers 19:1-22 · The Pulpit CommentaryTHE WATER OF PURIFICATION, AND ITS LESSONS
The extreme difficulty of applying the details of this chapter to the spiritual truths of which they were a shadow forbids us attempting more than a general application of the…