Study Desk

The LORD said to Moses and Aaron,

"When you enter the land of Canaan, which I am giving you as your possession, and I put a spreading mildew in a house in that land,

the owner of the house must go and tell the priest, 'I have seen something that looks like mildew in my house.'

The priest is to order the house to be emptied before he goes in to examine the mildew, so that nothing in the house will be pronounced unclean. After this the priest is to go in and inspect the house.

He is to examine the mildew on the walls, and if it has greenish or reddish depressions that appear to be deeper than the surface of the wall,

the priest shall go out the doorway of the house and close it up for seven days.

On the seventh day the priest shall return to inspect the house. If the mildew has spread on the walls,

he is to order that the contaminated stones be torn out and thrown into an unclean place outside the town.

He must have all the inside walls of the house scraped and the material that is scraped off dumped into an unclean place outside the town.

Then they are to take other stones to replace these and take new clay and plaster the house.

"If the mildew reappears in the house after the stones have been torn out and the house scraped and plastered,

the priest is to go and examine it and, if the mildew has spread in the house, it is a destructive mildew; the house is unclean.

It must be torn down-its stones, timbers and all the plaster-and taken out of the town to an unclean place.

"Anyone who goes into the house while it is closed up will be unclean till evening.

Anyone who sleeps or eats in the house must wash his clothes.

"But if the priest comes to examine it and the mildew has not spread after the house has been plastered, he shall pronounce the house clean, because the mildew is gone.

To purify the house he is to take two birds and some cedar wood, scarlet yarn and hyssop.

He shall kill one of the birds over fresh water in a clay pot.

Then he is to take the cedar wood, the hyssop, the scarlet yarn and the live bird, dip them into the blood of the dead bird and the fresh water, and sprinkle the house seven times.

He shall purify the house with the bird's blood, the fresh water, the live bird, the cedar wood, the hyssop and the scarlet yarn.

Then he is to release the live bird in the open fields outside the town. In this way he will make atonement for the house, and it will be clean."

These are the regulations for any infectious skin disease, for an itch,

for mildew in clothing or in a house,

and for a swelling, a rash or a bright spot,

to determine when something is clean or unclean. These are the regulations for infectious skin diseases and mildew.