Numbers 19:11

The Holy Bible, Berean Study Bible

Contextual Overview

¹¹Whoever touches any dead body will be unclean for seven days.¹²He must purify himself with the water on the third day and the seventh day; then he will be clean. But if he does not purify himself on the third and seventh days, he will not be clean. ¹³Anyone who touches a corpse, the body of a person who has died, and does not purify himself, defiles the tabernacle of the LORD. That person must be cut off from Israel. He remains unclean, because the water of purification has not been sprinkled on him, and his uncleanness is still on him. ¹⁴This is the law when a person dies in a tent: Everyone who enters the tent and everyone already in the tent will be unclean for seven days, ¹⁵and any open container without a lid fastened on it is unclean. ¹⁶Anyone in the open field who touches someone who has been killed by the sword or has died of natural causes, or anyone who touches a human bone or a grave, will be unclean for seven days. ¹⁷For the purification of the unclean person, take some of the ashes of the burnt purification offering, put them in a jar, and pour fresh running water over them. ¹⁸Then a man who is ceremonially clean is to take some hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle the tent, all the furnishings, and the people who were there. He is also to sprinkle the one who touched a bone, grave, or person who has died or been slain. ¹⁹The man who is clean is to sprinkle the unclean person on the third day and the seventh day. After he purifies the unclean person on the seventh day, the one being cleansed must wash his clothes and bathe in water, and he will be clean by evening. ²⁰But if a person who is unclean does not purify himself, he will be cut off from the assembly, because he has defiled the sanctuary of the LORD. The water of purification has not been sprinkled on him; he is unclean.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

toucheth the dead: He who touched a dead beast was only unclean for one day - Leviticus 11:12, Leviticus 11:27, Leviticus 11:39, but he who touches a dead man is unclean for seven days. This was certainly designed to show the peculiar impurity and sinfulness of man, and the hatefulness of sin, seven times worse than the vilest animal! Numbers 19:16, Numbers 5:2, Numbers 9:6, Numbers 9:10, Numbers 31:19, Leviticus 11:31, Leviticus 21:1, Leviticus 21:11, Lamentations 4:14, Haggai 2:13, Romans 5:12, 2 Corinthians 6:17, Ephesians 2:1, Hebrews 9:14

man: Heb. soul of man

Reciprocal: Genesis 50:10 - seven days Leviticus 5:2 - touch Leviticus 5:3 - the uncleanness Leviticus 7:19 - General Leviticus 7:21 - the uncleanness Leviticus 15:13 - seven days Leviticus 22:4 - unclean Numbers 6:6 - he shall come Numbers 31:13 - without the camp 2 Chronicles 35:6 - sanctify Isaiah 65:4 - remain Ezekiel 39:14 - they shall Ezekiel 44:26 - General Hosea 9:4 - as

Cross-References

Genesis 19:28
He looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and all the land of the plain, and he saw the smoke rising from the land like smoke from a furnace.

Genesis 19:29
So when God destroyed the cities of the plain, He remembered Abraham, and He brought Lot out of the catastrophe that destroyed the cities where he had lived.

2 Kings 6:18
As the Arameans came down against him, Elisha prayed to the LORD, "Please strike these people with blindness." So He struck them with blindness, according to the word of Elisha.

Ecclesiastes 10:15
The toil of a fool wearies him, for he does not know the way to the city.

Isaiah 57:10
You are wearied by your many journeys, but you did not say, "There is no hope!" You found renewal of your strength; therefore you did not grow weak.

Jeremiah 2:36
How unstable you are, constantly changing your ways! You will be disappointed by Egypt just as you were by Assyria.

Acts 13:11
Now look, the hand of the Lord is against you, and for a time you will be blind and unable to see the light of the sun." Immediately mist and darkness came over him, and he groped about, seeking someone to lead him by the hand.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

He that toucheth the dead body of any man,.... A man and not a beast, as Aben Ezra observes; for he that touched the dead body of a beast was unclean only until evening, Leviticus 11:24; any man, Jew or Gentile, as the same writer notes: this is instanced in, as being the principal pollution, though not the only one, yet so some think, for which the water of purification made of the ashes of the burnt heifer was appointed:

shall be unclean seven days; the reason of which is, because death is the fruit of sin, which is of a defiling nature, and to show that all that are dead in sins are defiled and defiling, and are not to be touched, or to have communion and fellowship held with them but to be abstained from.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

One practical effect of attaching defilement to a dead body, and to all that touched it, etc., would be to insure early burial, and to correct a practice not uncommon in the East, of leaving the deal to be devoured by the wild beasts.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Numbers 19:11. He that toucheth the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days. — How low does this lay man! He who touched a dead beast was only unclean for one day, Leviticus 11:24; Leviticus 11:27; Leviticus 11:39; but he who touches a dead man is unclean for seven days. This was certainly designed to mark the peculiar impurity of man, and to show his sinfulness - seven times worse than the vilest animal! O thou son of the morning, how art thou fallen!