Leviticus 13:9-11

A Swelling on the Skin

13:9 “When someone has a diseased infection, ¹  he must be brought to the priest. 13:10 The priest will then examine it, ²  and if ³  a white swelling is on the skin, it has turned the hair white, and there is raw flesh in the swelling, ⁴  13:11 it is a chronic ⁵  disease on the skin of his body, ⁶  so the priest is to pronounce him unclean. ⁷  The priest ⁸  must not merely quarantine him, for he is unclean. ⁹ 

[13:9]  ¹ tn Heb “When there is an infection of disease in a man.” The term for “a man; a human being” (אָדָם, ’adam; see the note on Lev 1:2 and cf. v. 2 above) refers to any person among “mankind,” male or female. For the rendering “diseased infection” see the note on v. 2 above.

[13:10]  ² tn Heb “and the priest shall see.” The pronoun “it” is unexpressed, but it should be assumed and it refers to the infection (cf. the note on v. 8 above).

[13:10]  ³ tn Heb “and behold” (so KJV, ASV).

[13:10]  ⁴ tn Heb “and rawness [i.e., something living] of living flesh is in the swelling”; KJV, NASB, NRSV “quick raw flesh.”

[13:11]  ³ tn The term rendered here “chronic” is a Niphal participle meaning “grown old” (HALOT 448 s.v. II ישׁן nif.2). The idea is that this is an old enduring skin disease that keeps on developing or recurring.

[13:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “in the skin of his flesh” as opposed to the head or the beard (v. 29; cf. v. 2 above).

[13:11]  ⁵ tn This is the declarative Piel of the verb טָמֵא (tame’, cf. the note on v. 3 above).

[13:11]  ⁶ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the priest) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[13:11]  ⁷ sn Instead of just the normal quarantine isolation, this condition calls for the more drastic and enduring response stated in Lev 13:45-46. Raw flesh, of course, sometimes oozes blood to one degree or another, and blood flows are by nature impure (see, e.g., Lev 12 and 15; cf. J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 191).