Numbers 19

¹ Yahweh spoke to Moses and Aaron. He said:

² ‘This is a statute of the Law which Yahweh has prescribed. Say this to the sons of Israel, They are to bring you a red heifer without fault or blemish, one that has never borne the yoke.

³ You will give it to Eleazar the priest. It must be taken outside the camp and slaughtered in his presence.

⁴ Then Eleazar the priest is to take some of the victim’s blood on his finger, and sprinkle this blood seven times towards the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.

⁵ The heifer must then be burned in his presence: hide, flesh, blood, and the dung too, must be burnt.

⁶ Then the priest is to take cedar wood, hyssop and cochineal red, and throw them on the fire where the heifer is burning.

⁷ Then he must wash his clothing and bathe his body in water; after which he may go back to the camp, though he will remain unclean until evening.

⁸ The man who has burnt the heifer must wash his clothing and bathe his body in water and will remain unclean until evening.

⁹ The man who gathers up the ashes of the heifer must be ritually clean; he will deposit them outside the camp, in a clean place. They must be kept for the ritual use of the community of the sons of Israel for making lustral water; it is a sacrifice for sin.

¹⁰ The man who has gathered up the ashes of the heifer must wash his clothing and will remain unclean until evening. For the sons of Israel as for the stranger living among them, this will be a perpetual law.

¹¹ ‘Anyone who touches a corpse, of any person whatsoever, shall be unclean for seven days.

¹² He shall purify himself with these waters on the third and the seventh day, and he will be clean; but if he does not purify himself on the third and the seventh day he will not be clean.

¹³ Anyone who touches a dead person, the body of a man that has died, and has not purified himself, defiles the tabernacle of Yahweh; such a man must be outlawed from Israel because the lustral waters have not flowed over him; he is unclean, and his uncleanness remains in him.

¹⁴ This is the law when a man dies in a tent. Anyone who goes into the tent, or anyone who is already there, shall be unclean for seven days.

¹⁵ Equally unclean also shall be every open vessel that has not been closed with a lid or fastening.

¹⁶ Anyone in the open country who touches a man who has been killed, or a man who has died, or human bones or a tomb, shall be unclean for seven days.

¹⁷ ‘For a man thus unclean, some of the ashes must be taken from the victim burnt as a sacrifice for sin. Spring water must be poured on them, in a vessel.

¹⁸ Then one who is ritually clean shall take hyssop and dip it in the water. He must then sprinkle the tent, all the vessels and everyone there, and also the man who has touched the bones, or the body of the person, whether he was killed or died of natural causes, or the tomb.

¹⁹ The man who is clean must sprinkle the unclean on the third and the seventh day, and on the seventh day he will have freed him from his sin. The man who is unclean must then wash his clothing and bathe himself in water, and by evening he will be clean.

²⁰ If an unclean man fails to purify himself in this way, he must be cut off from the community, for he would defile the sanctuary of Yahweh. The lustral waters have not flowed over him, and he is unclean.

²¹ ‘This is to be a perpetual law for them. The person who sprinkles the lustral water must wash his clothing, and the person who touches these waters shall be unclean until evening.

²² Anything that an unclean person touches shall be unclean, and anyone who touches it shall be unclean until evening.’