Numbers
Chapter 19
1 God spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying,
2 This is the rule of the law that God has commanded: Tell the Israelites to bring you a red cow that is perfect, with no flaws, and that has never worn a yoke.
3 Give her to Priest Eleazar to take her outside the camp, and someone will kill her in front of him.
4 The priest Eleazar will take some of her blood with his finger, and sprinkle it seven times in front of the meeting tent.
5 Someone will burn the cow while he watches; they will burn her skin, meat, blood, and poop.
6 The priest will take cedar wood, hyssop, and red yarn and throw them into the heifer’s burning fire.
7 The priest must wash his clothes and bathe himself in water; after that, he can enter the camp, but he will be unclean until evening.
8 The person who burns her must wash their clothes in water, bathe themselves in water, and will be unclean until evening.
9 A clean person must collect the cow’s ashes and put them outside the camp in a clean area. These ashes are for the Israelite community to use in a special cleansing water. It is used for purifying from sin.
10 The person who collects the heifer’s ashes must wash their clothes and will be unclean until evening. This rule will always apply to the Israelites and any foreigners living with them.
11 Anyone who touches a dead person’s body will be unclean for seven days.
12 He must clean himself with it on the third day, and on the seventh day he will be clean. But if he does not clean himself on the third day, then he will not be clean on the seventh day.
13 Anyone who touches a dead person and does not clean themselves, makes God’s tent dirty; they will be separated from Israel. If the special water was not used on him, he is unclean; his dirtiness remains.
14 This rule applies when someone dies in a tent: anyone who enters the tent and everything inside will be not clean for seven days.
15 Every container without a lid tied on it is not clean.
16 Anyone who touches someone killed by a sword outside, or a dead body, or a human bone, or a grave, will be unclean for seven days.
17 For a person who is not clean, they must take some of the ashes from the burned cow used for sin cleaning, and mix these ashes with fresh water in a container.
18 A clean person will take hyssop, dip it in water, and sprinkle it on the tent, all the objects, the people there, and anyone who touched a bone, a dead body, or a grave.
19 A clean person must sprinkle water on the unclean person on the third and seventh days. On the seventh day, the unclean person must wash themselves, clean their clothes, and bathe in water. By evening, they will be clean.
20 If a person is unclean and does not cleanse himself, he will be removed from the community because he has made God’s sanctuary dirty; he has not had the cleansing water sprinkled on him, so he is unclean.
21 This rule will always apply: the person who uses the special water must wash their clothes; and anyone who touches the special water will be unclean until evening.
22 Whatever the unclean person touches becomes unclean, and the person who touches it will be unclean until evening.