_THE CLEANSING OF THE LEPER._
LEV. xiv. 1-32.
The ceremonies for the restoration of the leper, when healed of his
disease, to full covenant privileges, were comprehended in two
distinct series. The first part of the ceremonial took place without
the camp, and sufficed only to terminate his condition as one
ceremonially dead, and allow of his return into the camp, and his
association, though still under restriction, with his fellow-Israelites.
The second part of the ceremonial took up his case on the eighth day
thereafter, where the former ceremonial had left him, as a member,
indeed, of the holy people, but a member still under defilement such
as debarred him from approach to the presence of Jehovah; and, by a
fourfold offering and an anointing, restored him to the full enjoyment
of all his covenant privileges before God.
This law for the cleansing of the leper certainly implies that the
disease, although incurable by human skill, yet, whether by the direct
power of God, as in several instances in Holy Scripture, or for some
cause unknown, might occasionally cease its ravages. In this case,
although the visible effects of the disease might still remain, in
mutilations and scars, yet he would be none the less a healed man.
That occasionally instances have occurred of such arrest of the
disease, is attested by competent observers, and the law before us
thus provides for the restoration of the leper in such cases to the
position from which his leprosy had excluded him.
The first part of the ceremonial (vv. 3-9) took place without the
camp; for until legally cleansed the man was in the sight of the law
still a leper, and therefore under sentence of banishment from the
congregation of Israel. Thus, as the outcast could not go to the
priest, the priest, on receiving word of his desire, went to him. For
the ceremony which was to be performed, he provided himself with two
living, clean birds, and with cedar-wood, and scarlet, and hyssop;
also he took with him an earthen vessel filled with living
water,--_i.e._, with water from some spring or flowing stream, and
therefore presumably pure and clean. One of the birds was then killed
in such a manner that its blood was received into the vessel of water;
then the living bird and the hyssop--bound, as we are told, with the
scarlet band to the cedar-wood--were dipped into the mingled blood and
water, and by them the leper was sprinkled therewith seven times by
the priest, and was then pronounced clean; when the living bird,
stained with the blood of the bird that was killed, was allowed to fly
away. Thereupon, the leper washed his clothes, shaved off all his
hair, bathed in water, and entered the camp. This completed the first
stadium of his restoration.
Certain things about this symbolism seem very clear. First of all,
whereas the leper, afflicted, as it were, with a living death, had
become, as regards Israel, a man legally dead, the sprinkling with
blood, in virtue of which he was allowed to take his place again in
the camp as a living Israelite, symbolized the impartation of life;
and, again, inasmuch as death is defiling, the blood was mingled with
water, the uniform symbol of cleansing. The remaining symbols
emphasise thoughts closely related to these. The cedar-wood (or
juniper), which is almost incorruptible, signified that with this new
life was imparted also freedom from corruption. Scarlet, as a colour,
is the constant symbol, again, like the blood, of life and health.
What the hyssop was is still in debate; but we can at least safely say
that it was a plant supposed to have healing and purifying virtues.
So far all is clear. But what is the meaning of the slaying of the one
bird, and the loosing afterward of the other, moistened with the blood
of its fellow? Some have said that both of the birds symbolised the
leper: the one which was slain, the leper as he was,--namely, as one
dead, or under sentence of death by his plague; the other, naturally,
then, the leper as healed, who, even as the living bird is let fly
whither it will, is now set at liberty to go where he pleases. But
when we consider that it is by means of being sprinkled with the blood
of the slain bird that the leper is cleansed, it seems quite
impossible that this slain bird should typify the leper in his state
of defilement. Indeed, if this bird symbolised him as under his
disease, this supposition seems even absurd; for the blood which
cleansed must then have represented his own blood, and his blood as
diseased and unclean!
Neither is it possible that the other bird, which was set at liberty,
should represent the leper as healed, and its release, his liberation;
however plausible, at first thought, this explanation may seem. For
the very same ceremony as this with the two birds was also to be used
in the cleansing of a leprous house (vv. 50-53), where it is evident
that the loosing of the living bird could not have any such
significance; since the notion of a liberty given would be wholly
inapplicable in the case of a house. But whatever the true meaning of
the symbolism may be, it is clear that it must be one which will apply
equally well in each of the two cases, the cleansing of the leprous
house, no less than that of the leprous person.
We are therefore compelled to regard the slaying of the one bird as a
true sacrifice. No doubt there are difficulties in the way, but they
do not seem insuperable, and are, in any case, less than those which
beset other suppositions. It is true that the birds are not presented
before Jehovah in the tabernacle; but as the ceremony took place
outside the camp, and therefore at a distance from the tabernacle,
this may be explained as merely because of the necessity of the case.
It is true, again, that the choice of the bird was not limited, as in
the tabernacle sacrifices, to the turtle-dove or pigeon; but it might
easily be that when, as in this case, the sacrifice was elsewhere than
at the tabernacle, the rules for service there did not necessarily
apply. Finally and decisively, when we turn to the law for the
cleansing of the leprous house, we find that atoning virtue is
explicitly ascribed to this rite with the birds (ver. 53): "He shall
make atonement for the house."
But sacrifice is here presented in a different aspect from elsewhere
in the law. In this ceremonial the central thought is not consecration
through sacrifice, as in the burnt-offering; nor expiation of guilt
through sacrifice, as in the sin-offering; nor yet satisfaction for
trespass committed, as in the guilt-offering. It is sacrifice as
procuring for the man for whom it is offered purity and life, which is
the main thought.
But, according to vv. 52, 53, the atonement is made with both the dead
and the living bird. The special thought which is emphasised by the
use of the latter, seems to be merely the full completeness of the
work of cleansing which has been accomplished through the death of the
other bird. For the living bird was represented as ideally identified
with the bird which was slain, by being dipped in its blood; and in
that it was now loosed from its captivity, this was in token of the
fact that the bird, having now given its life to impart cleansing and
life to the leper, has fully accomplished that end.
Obviously, this explanation is one that will apply no less readily to
the cleansing of the leprous house than of the leprous person. For the
leprosy in the house signifies the working of corruption and of decay
and death in the wall of the house, in a way adapted to its nature, as
really as in the case of the person; and the ceremonial with the birds
and other material prescribed means the same with it as with the
other,--namely, the removal of the principle of corruption and
disease, and impartation of purity and wholesomeness. In both cases
the sevenfold sprinkling, as in analogous cases elsewhere in the law,
signified the completeness of the cleansing, to which nothing was
lacking, and also certified to the leper that by this impartation of
new life, and by his cleansing, he was again brought into covenant
relations with Jehovah.
With these ceremonies, the leper's cleansing was now in so far
effected that he could enter the camp; only he must first cleanse
himself and his clothes with water and shave his hair,--ceremonies
which, in their primary meaning, are most naturally explained by the
importance of an actual physical cleansing in such a case. Every
possible precaution must be taken that by no chance he bring the
contagion of his late disease into the camp. Of what special
importance in this connection, besides the washing, is the shaving of
the hair, will be apparent to all who know how peculiarly retentive is
the hair of odours and infections of every kind.
The cleansed man might now come into the camp; he is restored to his
place as a living Israelite. And yet he may not come to the
tabernacle. For even an Israelite might not come, if defiled for the
dead; and this is precisely the leper's status at this point. Though
delivered from the power of death, there is yet persisting such a
connection of his new self with his old leprous self as precludes him
from yet entering the more immediate presence of God. The reality of
this analogy will appear to any one who compares the rites which now
follow (vv. 10-20) with those appointed for the Nazarite, when defiled
by the dead (Numb. vi. 9-12).
Seven days, then, as in that case, he remains away from the
tabernacle. On the seventh day, he again shaves himself even to the
eyebrows, thus ensuring the most absolute cleanness, and washes
himself and his clothes in water. The final restoration ceremonial
took place on the eighth day,--the day symbolic of the new
creation,--when he appeared before Jehovah at the tent of meeting with
a he-lamb for a guilt-offering, and another for a sin-offering, and a
ewe-lamb for a burnt-offering; also a meal-offering of three
tenth-deals, one tenth for each sacrifice, mingled with oil, and a log
(3·32 qts.) of oil. The oil was then waved for a wave-offering before
the Lord, as also the whole lamb of the guilt-offering (an unusual
thing), and then the lamb was slain and offered after the manner of
the guilt-offering.
And now followed the most distinctive part of the ceremonial. As in
the case of the consecration of the priests was done with the blood of
the peace-offering and with the holy oil, so was it done here with the
blood of the guilt-offering and with the common oil--now by its waving
consecrated to Jehovah--which the cleansed leper had brought. The
priest anoints the man's right ear, the thumb of his right hand, and
the great toe of his right foot, first with the blood of the
guilt-offering, and then with the oil, having previously sprinkled of
the oil seven times with his finger before the Lord. The remnant of
the oil in the hand of the priest he then pours upon the cleansed
leper's head; then offers for him the sin-offering, the
burnt-offering, and the meal-offering; and therewith, at last, the
atonement is complete, and the man is restored to his full rights and
privileges as a living member of the people of the living God.
The chief significance of this ceremonial lies in the prominence given
to the guilt-offering. This is evidenced, not only by the special and
peculiar use which is made of its blood, in applying it to the leper,
but also in the fact that in the case of the poor man, while the other
offerings are diminished, there is no diminution allowed as regards
the lamb of the guilt-offering, and the log of oil. Why should the
guilt-offering have received on this occasion such a place of special
prominence? The answer has been rightly given by those who point to
the significance of the guilt-offering as representing reparation and
satisfaction for loss of service due. By the fact of the man's
leprosy, and consequent exclusion from the camp of Israel, God had
been, for the whole period of his excision, defrauded, so to speak, of
His proper dues from him in respect of service and offerings; and the
guilt-offering precisely symbolised satisfaction made for this default
in service which he had otherwise been able to render.
Nor is it a fatal objection to this understanding of the matter that,
on this principle, he also that for a long time had had an issue
should have been required, for his prolonged default of service, to
bring a guilt-offering in order to his restoration; whereas from him
no such demand was made. For the need, before the law, for the
guilt-offering lay, not in the duration of the leprosy, as such
apprehend it, but in the nature of the leprosy, as being, unlike any
other visitation, in a peculiar sense, a death in life. Even when the
man with an issue was debarred from the sanctuary, he was not, like
the leper, regarded by the law as a dead man; but was still counted
among them that were living in Israel. And if precluded for an
indefinite time from the service and worship of God at the tabernacle,
he yet, by his public submission to the demands of the law, in the
presence of all, rendered still to God the honour due from a member of
the living Israel. But in that the leper, unlike any other defiled
person, was reckoned ceremonially dead, obviously consistency in the
symbolism made it impossible to regard him as having in any sense
rendered honour or service to God so long as he continued a leper, any
more than if he had been dead and buried. Therefore he must bring a
guilt-offering, as one who had, however unavoidably, committed "a
trespass in the holy things of the Lord." And so this guilt-offering,
in the case of the leper, as in all others, represented the
satisfaction of debt; and as the reality or the amount of a debt
cannot be affected by the poverty of the debtor, the offering which
symbolised satisfaction for the debt must be the same for the poor
leper as for the rich leper.
And the application of the blood to ear, hand, and foot meant the same
as in the case of the consecration of the priests. Inducted, as one
now risen from the dead, into the number of the priestly people, he
receives the priestly consecration, devoting ear, hand, and foot to
the service of the Lord. And as it was fitting that the priests,
because brought into a relation of special nearness to God, in order
to be ministers of reconciliation to Israel, should therefore be
consecrated with the blood of the peace-offering, which specially
emphasised the realisation of reconciliation,--so the cleansed leper,
who was re-established as a living member of the priestly nation, more
especially by the blood of the guilt-offering, was therefore fittingly
represented as consecrated in virtue, and by means of that fact.
So, like the priests, he also was anointed by the priest with oil; not
indeed with the holy oil, for he was not admitted to the priestly
order; yet with common oil, sanctified by its waving before God, in
token of his consecration as a member of the priestly people.
Especially suitable in his case was this anointing, that the oil
constantly stands as a symbol of healing virtue, which in his
experience he had so wondrously received.
Remembering in all this how the leprosy stands as a pre-eminent type
of sin, in its aspect as involving death and corruption, the
application of these ceremonies to the antitypical cleansing, at least
in its chief aspects, is almost self-evident. As in all the Levitical
types, so in this case, at the very entrance on the redeemed life
stands the sacrifice of a life, and the service of a priest as
mediator between God and man. Blood must be shed if the leper is to be
admitted again into covenant standing with God; and the blood of the
sacrifice in the law ever points to the sacrifice of Christ. But that
great Sacrifice may be regarded in various aspects. Sin is a
many-sided evil, and on every side it must be met. As often repeated,
because sin as guilt requires expiation, hence the type of the
sin-offering; in that it is a defrauding of God of His just rights
from us, satisfaction is required, hence the type of the
guilt-offering; as it is absence of consecration, life for self
instead of life for God, hence the type of the burnt-offering. And yet
the manifold aspects of sin are not all enumerated. For sin, again, is
spiritual death; and, as death, it involves corruption and defilement.
It is with special reference to this fact that the work of Christ is
brought before us here. In the clean bird, slain that its blood may be
applied to the leper for cleansing, we see typified Christ, as giving
Himself, that His very life may be imparted to us for our life. In
that the blood of the bird is mingled with water, the symbol of the
Word of God, is symbolised the truth, that with the atoning blood is
ever inseparably united the purifying energy of the Holy Ghost through
the Word. Not the water without the blood, nor the blood without the
water, saves, but the blood with the water, and the water with the
blood. So it is said of Him to whom the ceremony pointed (1 John v.
6): "This is He that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not
with the water only, but with the water and with the blood."
But the type yet lacks something for completeness; and for this reason
we have the second bird, who, when by his means the blood has been
sprinkled on the leper, and the man is now pronounced clean, is
released and flies away heavenward. What a beautiful symbol of that
other truth, without which even the atonement of the Lord were nought,
that He who died, having by that death for us procured our life, was
then released from the bonds of death, rising from the dead on the
third day, and ascending to heaven, like the freed bird, in token that
His life-giving, cleansing work was done. Thus the message which, as
the liberated bird flies carolling away, sweet as a heavenly song,
seems to fall upon the ear, is this, "Delivered up for our trespasses,
and raised for our justification" (Rom. iv. 25; see _Gr._).
But although thus and then restored to his standing as a member of the
living people of God, not yet was the cleansed leper allowed to appear
in the presence of God at the tent of meeting. There was a delay of a
week, and only then, on the eighth day, the day typical of
resurrection and new creation, does He appear before God. Is there
typical meaning in this delay? We would not be too confident. It is
quite possible that this delay of a week, before the cleansed man was
allowed to present himself for the completion of the ceremonial which
reinstated him in the plenary enjoyment of all the rights and
privileges of a child of Israel, may have been intended merely as a
precautionary rule, of which the purpose was to guard against the
possibility of infection, and the defilement of the sanctuary by his
presence, through renewed activity of the disease; while, at the same
time, it would serve as a spiritual discipline to remind the man, now
cleansed, of the extreme care and holy fear with which, after his
defilement, he should venture into the presence of the Holy One of
Israel; and thus, by analogy, it becomes a like lesson to the
spiritually cleansed in all ages.
But perhaps we may see a deeper significance in this week of delay,
and his appointed appearance before the Lord on the eighth day. If the
whole course of the leper, from the time of his infection till his
final reappearing in the presence of Jehovah at the tent of meeting,
be intended to typify the history and experience of a sinner as saved
from sin; and if the cleansing of the leper without the camp, and his
reinstatement thereupon as a member of God's Israel, represents in
type the judicial reinstatement of the cleansed sinner, through the
application of the blood and Spirit of Christ, in the number of God's
people; one can then hardly fail to recognise in the week's delay
appointed to him, before he could come into the immediate presence of
God, an adumbration of the fact that between the sinner's acceptance
and the appointed time of his appearing, finally and fully cleansed,
before the Lord, on the resurrection morning, there intervenes a
period of delay, even the whole lifetime of the believer here in the
flesh and in the disembodied state. For only thereafter does he at
last, wholly perfected, appear before God in the heavenly Zion. But
before thus appearing, the accepted man once and again had to cleanse
his garments and his person, that so he might remove everything in
which by any chance uncleanness might still lurk. Which, translated
into New Testament language, gives us the charge of the Apostle Paul
(2 Cor. vii. 1) addressed to those who had indeed received the new
life, but were still in the flesh: "Let us cleanse ourselves from all
defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of
God."
But, at last, the week of delay is ended. After its seventh day
follows an eighth, the first-day morning of a new week, the morning
typical of resurrection and therewith completed redemption, and the
leper now, completely restored, appears before God in the holy
tabernacle. Even so shall an eighth-day morning dawn for all who by
the cleansing blood have been received into the number of God's
people. And when that day comes, then, even as when the cleansed man
appeared at the tent of meeting, he presented guilt-offering,
sin-offering, and burnt-offering, as the warrant for his presence
there, and the ground of his acceptance, so shall it be in that day of
resurrection, when every one of God's once leprous but now washed and
accepted children shall appear in Zion before Him. They will all
appear there as pleading the blood, the precious blood of Christ;
Christ, at last apprehended and received by them in all His fulness,
as expiation, satisfaction, and righteousness. For so John represents
it in the apocalyptic vision of the blood-washed multitude in the
heavenly glory (Rev. vii. 14, 15): "These are they which come out of
the great tribulation, and they washed their robes, and made them
white in the blood of the Lamb. _Therefore_ are they before the throne
of God; and they serve Him day and night in His temple."
And as it is written (Rom. viii. 11) that the final quickening of our
mortal bodies shall be accomplished by the Spirit of God, so the
leper, now in God's presence, receives a special anointing; a type of
the unction of the Holy Ghost in resurrection power, consecrating the
once leprous ear, hand, and foot, and therewith the whole body, now
cleansed from all defilement, to the glad service of Jehovah our God
and our Redeemer.
Such, in outline at least, appears to be the typical significance of
this ceremonial of the cleansing of the leper. Some details are
indeed still left unexplained, but, probably, the whole reason for
some of the regulations is to be found in the immediate practical
necessities of the leper's condition.
OF LEPROSY IN A GARMENT OR HOUSE.
xiii. 47-59; xiv. 33-53.
"The garment also that the plague of leprosy is in, whether it be
a woollen garment, or a linen garment; whether it be in warp, or
woof; of linen, or of woollen; whether in a skin, or in any thing
made of skin; if the plague be greenish or reddish in the
garment, or in the skin, or in the warp, or in the woof, or in
any thing of skin; it is the plague of leprosy, and shall be
shewed unto the priest: and the priest shall look upon the
plague, and shut up that which hath the plague seven days: and he
shall look on the plague on the seventh day: if the plague be
spread in the garment, either in the warp, or in the woof, or in
the skin, whatever service skin is used for; the plague is a
fretting leprosy; it is unclean. And he shall burn the garment,
whether the warp or the woof, in woollen or in linen, or any
thing of skin, wherein the plague is: for it is a fretting
leprosy; it shall be burnt in the fire. And if the priest shall
look, and, behold, the plague be not spread in the garment,
either in the warp, or in the woof, or in any thing of skin; then
the priest shall command that they wash the thing wherein the
plague is, and he shall shut it up seven days more: and the
priest shall look, after that the plague is washed: and, behold,
if the plague have not changed its colour, and the plague be not
spread, it is unclean; thou shalt burn it in the fire: it is a
fret, whether the bareness be within or without. And if the
priest look, and, behold, the plague be dim after the washing
thereof, then he shall rend it out of the garment, or out of the
skin, or out of the warp, or out of the woof: and if it appear
still in the garment, either in the warp, or in the woof, or in
any thing of skin, it is breaking out: thou shalt burn that
wherein the plague is with fire. And the garment, either the
warp, or the woof, or whatsoever thing of skin it be, which thou
shalt wash, if the plague be departed from them, then it shall be
washed the second time, and shall be clean. This is the law of
the plague of leprosy in a garment of woollen or linen, either in
the warp, or the woof, or any thing of skin, to pronounce it
clean, or to pronounce it unclean.... And the Lord spake unto
Moses and unto Aaron, saying, When ye be come into the land of
Canaan, which I give to you for a possession, and I put the
plague of leprosy in a house of the land of your possession; then
he that owneth the house shall come and tell the priest, saying,
There seemeth to me to be as it were a plague in the house: and
the priest shall command that they empty the house, before the
priest go in to see the plague, that all that is in the house be
not made unclean: and afterward the priest shall go in to see the
house: and he shall look on the plague, and, behold, if the
plague be in the walls of the house with hollow strakes, greenish
or reddish, and the appearance thereof be lower than the wall;
then the priest shall go out of the house to the door of the
house, and shut up the house seven days: and the priest shall
come again the seventh day, and shall look: and, behold, if the
plague be spread in the walls of the house; then the priest shall
command that they take out the stones in which the plague is, and
cast them into an unclean place without the city: and he shall
cause the house to be scraped within round about, and they shall
pour out the mortar that they scrape off without the city into an
unclean place: and they shall take other stones, and put them in
the place of those stones; and he shall take other mortar, and
shall plaister the house. And if the plague come again, and break
out in the house, after that he hath taken out the stones, and
after he hath scraped the house, and after it is plaistered; then
the priest shall come in and look, and, behold, if the plague be
spread in the house, it is a fretting leprosy in the house: it is
unclean. And he shall break down the house, the stones of it, and
the timber thereof, and all the mortar of the house; and he shall
carry them forth out of the city into an unclean place. Moreover
he that goeth into the house all the while that it is shut up
shall be unclean until the even. And he that lieth in the house
shall wash his clothes; and he that eateth in the house shall
wash his clothes. And if the priest shall come in, and look, and,
behold, the plague hath not spread in the house, after the house
was plaistered; then the priest shall pronounce the house clean,
because the plague is healed. And he shall take to cleanse the
house two birds, and cedar wood, and scarlet, and hyssop: and he
shall kill one of the birds in an earthen vessel over running
water: and he shall take the cedar wood, and the hyssop, and the
scarlet, and the living bird, and dip them in the blood of the
slain bird, and in the running water, and sprinkle the house
seven times: and he shall cleanse the house with the blood of the
bird, and with the running water, and with the living bird, and
with the cedar wood, and with the hyssop, and with the scarlet:
but he shall let go the living bird out of the city into the open
field: so shall he make atonement for the house: and it shall be
clean."
There has been much debate as to what we are to understand by the
leprosy in the garment or in a house. Was it an affection identical in
nature with the leprosy of the body? or was it merely so called from a
certain external similarity to that plague?
However extraordinary the former supposition might once have seemed,
in the present state of medical science we are at least able to say
that there is nothing inconceivable in it. We have abundant
experimental evidence that a large number of diseases, and, not
improbably, leprosy among them, are caused by minute parasitic forms
of vegetable life; and, also, that in many cases these forms of life
may, and do, exist and multiply in various other suitable media
besides the fluids and tissues of the human body. If, as is quite
likely, leprosy be caused by some such parasitic life in the human
body, it is then evidently possible that such parasites, under
favourable conditions of heat, moisture, etc., should exist and
propagate themselves, as in other analogous cases, outside the body;
as, for instance, in cloth, or leather, or in the plaster of a house;
in which case it is plain that such garments or household implements,
or such dwellings, as might be thus infected, would be certainly
unwholesome, and presumably capable of communicating the leprosy to
the human subject. But we have not yet sufficient scientific
observation to settle the question whether this is really so; we can,
however, safely say that, in any case, the description which is here
given indicates a growth in the affected garment or house of some kind
of mould or mildew; which, as we know, is a form of life produced
under conditions which always imply an unwholesome state of the
article or house in which it appears. We also know that if such
growths be allowed to go on unchecked, they involve more or less
rapid processes of decomposition in that which is affected. Thus, even
from a merely natural point of view, one can see the high wisdom of
the Divine King of Israel in ordering that, in all such cases, the man
whose garment or house was thus affected should at once notify the
priest, who was to come and decide whether the appearance was of a
noxious and unclean kind or not, and then take action accordingly.
Whether the suspicious spot were in a house or in some article it
contained, the article or house (the latter having been previously
emptied) was first shut up for seven days (xiii. 50; xiv. 38). If in
the garment or other article affected it was found then to have
spread, it was without any further ceremony to be burnt (xiii. 51,
52). If it had not spread, it was to be washed and shut up seven days
more, at the end of which time, even though it had not spread, if the
greenish or reddish colour remained unchanged, it was still to be
adjudged unclean, and to be burned (xiii. 55). If, on the other hand,
the colour had somewhat "dimmed," the part affected was to be cut out;
when, if it spread no further, it was to be washed a second time, and
be pronounced clean (xiii. 58). If, however, after the excision of the
affected part, the spot appeared again, the article, without further
delay, was to be burned (xiii. 57).
The law, in the case of the appearing of a leprosy in a house (xiv.
33-53), was much more elaborate. As in the former case, when the
occupant of the house suspects, "as it were a plague in the house," he
is to go and tell the priest; who is, first of all, to order the
emptying of the house before he goes in, lest that which is in the
house, should it prove to be the plague, be made unclean (ver. 36).
The diagnosis reminds us of that of the leprosy in the body; greenish
or reddish streaks, in appearance "lower than the wall," _i.e._,
deep-seated (ver. 37). Where this is observed, the empty house is to
be shut up for seven days (ver. 38); and at the end of that time, if
the spot has spread, "the stones in which the plague is" are to be
taken out, the plaster scraped off the walls of the house, and all
carried out into an unclean place outside of the city, and new stones
and new plaster put in the place of the old (vv. 40-42). If, after
this, the plague yet reappear, the house is to be adjudged unclean,
and is to be wholly torn down, and all the material carried into an
unclean place without the city (vv. 44, 45). If, on the other hand,
after this renewal of the interior of the house, the spots do not
reappear, the priest "shall pronounce the house clean, because the
plague is healed" (ver. 48). But, unlike the case of the leprous
garment, this does not end the ceremonial. It is ordered that the
priest shall take to cleanse (_lit._ "to purge the house from sin")
(ver. 49) two birds, scarlet, cedar, and hyssop, which are then used
precisely as in the case of the purgation of the leprous man; and at
the end, "he shall let go the living bird out of the city into the
open field: so shall he make atonement for the house: and it shall be
clean" (vv. 50-53).
For the time then present, one can hardly fail to see in this
ceremonial, first, a merciful sanitary intent. By the observance of
these regulations not only was Israel to be saved from many sicknesses
and various evils, but was to be constantly reminded that Israel's
God, like a wise and kind Father, had a care for everything that
pertained to their welfare; not only for their persons, but also for
their dwellings, and even all the various articles of daily use. The
lesson is always in force, for God has not changed. He is not a God
who cares for the souls of men only, but for their bodies also, and
everything around them. His servants do well to remember this, and in
this imitate Him, as happily many are doing more and more. Bibles and
tracts are good, and religious exhortation; but we have here left us a
Divine warrant not to content ourselves with these things alone, but
to have a care for the clothing and the homes of those we would reach
with the Gospel. In all the large cities of Christendom it must be
confessed that the principle which underlies these laws concerning
houses and garments, is often terribly neglected. Whether the
veritable plague of leprosy be in the walls of many of our tenement
houses or not, there can be no doubt that it could not be much worse
if it were; and Christian philanthropy and legislation could scarcely
do better in many cases than vigorously to enforce the Levitical law,
tear down, re-plaster, or, in many cases, destroy from the foundation,
tenement houses, which could, with little exaggeration, be justly
described as leprous throughout.
But all which is in this law cannot be thus explained. Even the
Israelite must have looked beyond this for the meaning of the
ordinance of the two birds, the cedar, scarlet, and hyssop, and the
"atonement" for the house. He would have easily perceived that not
only leprosy in the body, but this leprosy in the garment and the
house, was a sign that both the man himself, and his whole environment
as well, was subject to death and decay; that, as already he would
have learned from the Book of Genesis, even nature was under a curse
because of man's sin; and that, as in the Divine plan, sacrificial
cleansing was required for the deliverance of man, so also it was
somehow mysteriously required for the cleansing of his earthly abode
and surroundings, in default of which purgation they must be
destroyed.
And from this to the antitypical truth prefigured by these laws it is
but a step; and a step which we take with full New Testament light to
guide us. For if the leprosy in the body visibly typified the working
of sin and death in the soul of man, then, as clearly, the leprosy in
the house must in this law be intended to symbolise the working of sin
in the material earthly creation, which is man's abode. The type thus
brings before us the truth which is set forth by the Apostle Paul in
Rom. viii. 20-22, where we are taught in express words that, not man
alone, but the whole creation also, because of sin, has come under a
"bondage of corruption." "The creation was subjected to vanity, not of
its own will, but by reason of him who subjected it.... For we know
that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until
now." This is one truth which is shadowed forth in this type.
But the type also shows us how, as Scripture elsewhere clearly
teaches, if after such partial purgation as was effected by means of
the deluge the bondage of corruption still persist, then the abode of
man must itself be destroyed; "the earth and the works that are
therein shall be burned up" (2 Peter iii. 10). Nothing less than fire
will suffice to put an end to the working in material nature of this
mysterious curse. And yet beyond the fire is redemption. For the
atonement shall avail not only for the leprous man, but for the
purifying of the leprous abode. The sprinkling of sacrificial blood
and water by means of the cedar, and hyssop, and scarlet, and the
living bird, which effected the deliverance of the leper, are used
also in the same way and for the same end, for the leprous house. And
so "according to his promise, we look for new heavens and a new
earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness" (2 Peter iii. 13); and it shall
be brought in through the virtue of atonement made by a Saviour slain,
and applied by a Saviour alive from the dead; so that, as the free
bird flies away in token of the full completion of deliverance from
the curse, so "the creation itself also shall be delivered from the
bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of
God" (Rom. viii. 21).
But there was also a leprosy of the garment. If the leprosy in the
body typified the effect of sin in the soul, and the leprosy in the
house, the effect of sin in the earthly creation, which is man's home;
the leprosy of the garment can scarcely typify anything else than the
presence and effects of sin in those various relations in life which
constitute our present environment. Whenever, in any of these, we
suspect the working of sin, first of all we are to lay the case before
the heavenly Priest. And then, if He with the "eyes like a flame of
fire" (Rev. i. 14; ii. 18) declare anything unclean, then that in
which the stain is found must be without hesitation cut out and thrown
away. And if still, after this, we find the evil reappearing, then the
whole garment must go, fair and good though the most of it may still
appear. In other words, those relations and engagements in which,
despite all possible care and precaution, we find manifest sin
persistently reappearing, as if there were in them, however
inexplicably, an ineradicable tendency to evil,--these we must
resolutely put away, "hating even the garment spotted by the flesh."
The leprous garment must be burnt. For its restoration or purification
the law made no provision. For here, in the antitype, we are dealing
with earthly relationships, which have only to do with the present
life and order. "The fashion of this world passeth away" (1 Cor. vii.
31). There shall be "new heavens and a new earth," but in that new
creation the old environment shall be found no longer. The old
garments, even such as were best, shall be no longer used. The
redeemed shall walk with the King and Redeemer, clothed in the white
robes which He shall give. No more leprosy then in person, house, or
garment! For we shall be set before the presence of the Father's
glory, without blemish, in exceeding joy, "not having spot, or
wrinkle, or any such thing." Wherefore "to the only God our Saviour,
through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and power,
before all time, and now, and for evermore. Amen."