a blow (figuratively · noun, common masculine singular construct
leprosy
צָרַ֔עַתtza.Ra.'at
H6883
leprosy · noun, common feminine singular absolute
man
בְּאָדָ֑םbe.'a.Dam
H120
ruddy i.e. a human being (an individual or the species · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
brought
וְהוּבָ֖אve.hu.Va'
H935
to go or come (in a wide variety of applications) · conjunction + verb, hophal sequential perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
priest
הַכֹּהֵֽןha.ko.Hen
H3548
literally one officiating · definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Leviticus 13:1-17
I. Concerning the plague of leprosy we may observe in general, 1. That it was rather an uncleanness than a disease; or, at least, so the law considered it, and therefore employed not the physicians but the priests about it. Christ is said to cleanse lepers, not to cure them. We do not read of any that died of the leprosy, but it rather buried them alive, by rendering them unfit for conversation with any but such as were infected like themselves. Yet there is a tradition that Pharaoh, who sought to kill Moses, was the first that ever was struck with this disease, and that he died of it. It is said to have begun first in Egypt, whence it spread into Syria. It was very well known to Moses, when…
if the rising be white--This BRIGHT WHITE leprosy is the most malignant and inveterate of all the varieties the disease exhibits, and it was marked by the following distinctive signs: A glossy white and spreading scale, upon an elevated base, the elevation depressed in the middle, but without a change of color; the black hair on the patches participating in the whiteness, and the scaly patches themselves perpetually enlarging their boundary. Several of these characteristics, taken separately, belong to other blemishes of the skin as well; so that none of them was to be taken alone, and it was only when the whole of them concurred that the Jewish priest, in his capacity of physician, was to p…
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 Lev 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 Mat 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 the doctrine, of the kingdom of heaven, should, from particular evidences, be at all times able to distinguish…
The Church Fathers
Then he continues: If a man had a leprosy, he will come to the priest, and the priest will examine him, and if there was a white scar on the skin, and this changed the hair making it white and from the healthyness of the living flesh there would be changed in the scar. If we remove the "and" (from the last sentence) of the previous text, put there according to the way of expressing oneself in the Scriptures, we have the following meaning: The priest will examine it, and if there is a white scar on the skin and this changed the hair making it white from the healthiness of the living flesh in the scar. The order is: He changed the white hair in the scar from the health of the living flesh, that is, as the living and healthy flesh has dark and black hair, so this scar has white. And it continues: A rooted leprosy is in the skin of its color; and the priest shall stain him-he shall pronounce him stained-he will not separate him, since he is unclean. The text seems to mean that when hair is changed in white with the same color as white hair due to skin disease, it is no longer necessary to separate the patient to examine him, nor do we have to wait until the place of the skin is more sunken. Due to the fact that the skin is white, of a different color than the rest and that it has white hair, of a different color than the rest of the living and healthy flesh, it is declared that there is a rooted leprosy. It is rooted leprosy, because you no longer have to examine it during those fourteen days. And it continues: But if the healthy color were restored and it became white. This is said because it had been said that all the white color spread all over the skin was already pure for this same reason, since there would have been no change there. And he continues: But at any time when he sees a bright color in him, he will be stained (Lv 13,11). Here it is clear that the change is disapproved. And therefore, in relation to what has just been said: But if the healthy color were restored and turned white, and it will come to the priest, and the priest will examine it and if the touch has turned white, and the priest will purify the affected: it is pure (Lv 13,16.4), we should not believe that the healthy color was restored so that healthy color would result; because it was already the color by which it became impure because of the change. Thus, he says that his healthy…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Leprosy — (Heb. tsara’ath, a “smiting,” a “stroke,” because the disease was regarded as a direct providential infliction). This name is from the Greek lepra, by which the Greek physicians designated the…
Purification — The process by which a person unclean, according to the Levitical law, and thereby cut off from the sanctuary and the festivals, was restored to the enjoyment of all these privileges. The great…
Leprosy · The priests: Examined persons suspected of — The priests: Examined persons suspected of
Priests · Services of: Deciding in cases of leprosy — Services of: Deciding in cases of leprosy
Sanitation · CONTAGION — CONTAGION
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
When the plague of leprosy is in a man,.... He has all the signs of it, and it is pretty manifest both to himself and others that it is upon him:
then he shall be brought unto the priest; by his friends and neighbours, if he is not willing to come of himself: a sinner insensible of the leprosy of sin, and of his unclean and miserable state through it, has no will to come to Christ the great High Priest for cleansing; but one that is sensible of it, and of Christ's ability to help and cleanse him, will come freely and gladly, and importunately seek to him for it; though indeed such an one is brought by powerful and efficacious grace to him, yet not against, but with his full will; see John 5…
When a man shall have in the skin. Since every eruption was not the leprosy, and did not render a man unclean, when God appoints the priests to be the judges, He distinguishes by certain marks a common eruption from the leprosy; and then subjoins the difference between the various kinds of leprosy. For the disease was not always incurable; but, only when the blood was altogether corrupted, so that the skin itself had become hardened by its corrosion, or swollen by its diseased state. This, then, must be observed in the first place, that the Greek and Latin word lepra, and the Hebrew tsrt tzaragmath, extend further than to the incurable disease, which medical men call elephantiasis [4] both o…
The symptoms of leprosy, whether proceeding directly from eruptions in the skin, or caused by a boil or burn. - Lev 13:2-8. The first case: "When a man shall have in the skin of his flesh (body) a raised spot or scab, or a bright spot." שׂאת, a lifting up (Gen 4:7, etc.), signifies here an elevation of the skin in some part of the body, a raised spot like a pimple. ספּחת, an eruption, scurf, or scab, from ספח to pour out, "a pouring out as it were from the flesh or skin" (Knobel). בּהרת .)le, from בּהר, in the Arabic and Chaldee to shine, is a bright swollen spot in the skin. If ether of these signs became "a spot of leprosy," the person affected was to be brought to the priest, that he migh…
If the rash had spread, then the priest declared the person unclean and the isolation became long-term.
Rashi on Leviticus 13:8
וטמאו הכהן AND THE PRIEST SHALL PRONOUNCE HIM UNCLEAN — and as soon as he has pronounced him unclean he is a decided leper and he is obliged when he recovers from his leprosy to bring two birds (as a means of his purification) and to shave his flesh and to bring the offering which is mentioned in the section beginning זאת תהיה — Leviticus ch. 14 (cf. Megillah 8b).
צרעת הוא IT IS A LEPROSY — this מספחת is a leprosy (while the מספחת mentioned in v. 6 is a clean scab)
The word צרעת is feminine; נגע is masculine.
