'And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, 2. This shall be
the law of the leper in the day of his cleansing: He
shall be brought unto the priest: 3. And the priest
shall go forth out of the camp; and the priest shall
look, and, behold, if the plague of leprosy be healed
in the leper; 4. Then shall the priest command to take
for him that is to be cleansed two birds alive and clean,
and cedar-wood, and scarlet, and hyssop: 5. And the
priest shall command that one of the birds be killed
in an earthen vessel over running water: 6. As for the
living bird, he shall take it, and the cedar-wood, and
the scarlet, and the hyssop, and shall dip them and the
living bird in the blood of the bird that was killed over
the running water: 7. And he shall sprinkle upon him that
is to be cleansed from the leprosy seven times, and shall
pronounce him clean, and shall let the living bird loose
into the open field.'--LEV. xiv. 1-7.
The whole treatment of leprosy is parabolic. Leprosy itself is a
'parable of death.' The horrible loathsomeness, the contagiousness, the
non-curableness, etc. So the man was shut out from camp and from
sanctuary. There was a double process in the cleansing rite, restoring
to each.
I. Sketch the ceremonial. Two birds, one slain over a vessel of water
so that its blood drained in. Then the living bird was to be dipped
into this water and blood, along with cedar, scarlet, and hyssop, and
the man sprinkled seven times and the living bird set loose.
II. The significance. This elaborate symbolism was partly intelligible
even then. Two birds, like the two goats on the Atonement Day. Did both
in some sense symbolise the man? The first one was not exactly a
sacrifice. Its death points to the physical death which was the end of
the disease, but also in some sense its death symbolised the death by
which cleansing was secured.
_(a)_ The purifying water is made by blood added to it, i.e. cleansing
by sacrifice.
'By water and by blood.'
_(b)_ The sevenfold sprinkling. The cedar, symbol of incorruptibility;
the scarlet, of full vital energy; the hyssop, of purifying. So the
thought was suggested of the communication of cleansing, full health
and incorruption, undecaying strength; all physical contrasts to
leprosy sevenfold.
_(c)_ The free, glad activity. The freed bird. The restored leper.