1 The Lord told Moses and Aaron, 2 “This is a legal regulation the Lord has ordered, saying, Tell the Israelites to bring you a red cow without defects which has never been yoked. 3 Hand it over to Eleazar the priest, and he will take it outside the camp and have it slaughtered before him. 4 Eleazar the priest will put some of its blood on his finger and sprinkle it seven times towards the entrance of the Tent of Meeting. 5 Then the cow must be burned as he watches. All of it is to be burned—its skin, meat, and blood, as well as its excrement. 6 The priest shall throw cedar wood, hyssop, and crimson thread on the burning cow. 7 Then the priest shall wash his clothes and his body in water, and after that he may enter the camp, but he will remain unclean until the evening. 8 The person who burned the cow shall also wash his clothes and his body in water, and he too will remain unclean until the evening. 9 Then a man who is clean shall collect the ashes of the cow and keep them in a clean place outside the camp. They are to be kept by the Israelites to prepare the water of purification which is for purifying from sin. 10 The man who collected the ashes of the cow shall also wash his clothes, and he will remain unclean until the evening. This is a permanent rule for the Israelites and for the foreigner that lives with them. 11 If you touch a dead body you will be unclean for seven days. 12 You must purify yourself with the water of purification on the third day and on the seventh day, and then you will be clean. But if you don't purify yourself on the third and seventh days, you won't be clean. 13 If you touch a dead body and don't purify yourself, you make the Tabernacle of the Lord unclean and must be expelled from Israel. You are still unclean because the water of purification hasn't been sprinkled on you, and your uncleanness remains. 14 The following regulation applies when a person dies in a tent. Everyone who comes into the tent and everyone who is already in the tent will be unclean for seven days. 15 Any open container there that doesn't have a closed lid is unclean. 16 If you're out in the open and you touch someone who has been killed by the sword or who has died naturally, or if you touch a human bone or a grave, then you'll be unclean for seven days. 17 This is the process for the purification if you are unclean. Take some of the ashes of the burnt offering for purification, and put them in a jar with fresh water. 18 A man who is clean shall take some hyssop and dip it in the water. Then sprinkle the tent and everything inside it, and everybody who was there. He would also need to sprinkle you if you touched a bone, or a grave, or someone who has died or has been killed. 19 The man who is clean is to sprinkle you both on the third day and on the seventh day. After you are purified on the seventh day, you must wash your clothes and yourself in water, and that evening you'll be clean. 20 But if you don't purify yourself, you will be expelled from the Israelites, because you have made the Tabernacle of the Lord unclean. The water of purification hasn't been sprinkled on you, and you remain unclean. 21 This is a permanent rule for everyone. The man who sprinkles the water of purification must wash his clothes, and anyone who touches the water of purification will be unclean until the evening. 22 Anything the unclean person touches will be unclean, and anyone who touches it will be unclean until the evening.”
Numbers 19 Free Bible Version
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
People & places in this chapter
From this site's family tree and Bible maps, only where those guides cite this chapter.
People
Moses
Drawn from the Nile, he led Israel out of Egypt and received God's Law.
Cited in the guide: Exodus 2–Deuteronomy 34
Cross references (19)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 2 Deuteronomy 21:3; Leviticus 22:20–25; 1 Samuel 6:7; 1 Peter 1:19; Philippians 2:6–8
- 3 Leviticus 4:12; Leviticus 4:21; Hebrews 13:11–13; Leviticus 16:27; Leviticus 24:14
- 4 Leviticus 16:14; Leviticus 4:17; Leviticus 4:6; Leviticus 16:19; Hebrews 9:13–14
- 5 Exodus 29:14; Leviticus 4:11–12; Isaiah 53:10; Psalm 22:14; Leviticus 4:21
- 6 Leviticus 14:4; Leviticus 14:49; Leviticus 14:6; Psalm 51:7; Hebrews 9:19–23
- 7 Leviticus 11:25; Leviticus 15:5; Leviticus 16:26–28; Numbers 19:19; Numbers 19:8
- 9 Hebrews 9:13; Numbers 19:13; Numbers 19:20–21; Numbers 9:13; Hebrews 7:26
- 10 Exodus 12:49; Numbers 15:15–16; Numbers 19:19; Romans 3:29–30; Numbers 19:7–8
- 11 Numbers 5:2; Numbers 31:19; Leviticus 21:1; Numbers 9:6; Numbers 19:16
- 12 Numbers 31:19; Psalm 51:7; Hosea 6:2; 1 Corinthians 15:3–4; Acts 15:9
- 13 Leviticus 15:31; Leviticus 22:3; Leviticus 7:20; Numbers 8:7; Numbers 19:9
- 15 Leviticus 11:32; Leviticus 14:36; Numbers 31:20
- 16 Numbers 19:11; Numbers 31:19; Matthew 23:27; Luke 11:44; Ezekiel 39:11–16
- 17 Numbers 19:9; John 7:38; Genesis 26:19; Song of Songs 4:15; John 4:10–11
- 18 Ezekiel 36:25–27; Hebrews 9:14; Numbers 19:9; Psalm 51:7; John 17:17
- 19 1 John 1:7; Hebrews 10:22; Ezekiel 36:25; Ephesians 5:25–27; Leviticus 14:9
- 20 Numbers 19:13; Genesis 17:14; Mark 16:16; Romans 2:4–5; 2 Peter 3:14
- 21 Hebrews 9:13–14; Hebrews 10:4; Leviticus 16:26–28; Hebrews 9:10; Leviticus 11:40
- 22 Haggai 2:13; Leviticus 15:5; Leviticus 7:19; Leviticus 5:2; Mark 7:21–23
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
In the law every one who toucheth a dead body was considered impure, but these are not dead.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 9 (1899)