Discovery BoxLeviticus 10:10 
Context10:10 as well as 1 to distinguish between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean, 2
Leviticus 11:37
Context11:37 Now, if such a carcass falls on any sowing seed which is to be sown, 3 it is clean,
Leviticus 13:40-41
Context13:40 “When a man’s head is bare so that he is balding in back, 4 he is clean. 13:41 If his head is bare on the forehead 5 so that he is balding in front, 6 he is clean.
Leviticus 14:57
Context14:57 to teach when something is unclean and when it is clean. 7 This is the law for dealing with infectious disease.” 8
1 tn Heb “and,” but regarding the translation “as well as,” see the note at the end of v. 9.
2 sn The two pairs of categories in this verse refer to: (1) the status of a person, place, thing, or time – “holy” (קֹדֶשׁ, qodesh) versus “common” (חֹל, khol); as opposed to (2) the condition of a person, place, or thing – “unclean” (טָמֵא, tame’) versus “clean” (טָהוֹר, tahor). Someone or something could gain “holy” status by being “consecrated” (i.e., made holy; e.g., the Hebrew Piel קִדֵּשׁ (qiddesh) in Lev 8:15, 30), and to treat someone or something that was holy as if it were “common” would be to “profane” that person or thing (the Hebrew Piel הִלֵּל [hillel], e.g., in Lev 19:29 and 22:15). Similarly, on another level, someone or something could be in a “clean” condition, but one could “defile” (the Hebrew Piel טִמֵּא [timme’], e.g., in Gen 34:5 and Num 6:9) that person or thing and thereby make it “unclean.” To “purify” (the Hebrew Piel טִהֵר [tiher], e.g., in Lev 16:19 and Num 8:6, 15) that unclean person or thing would be to make it “clean” once again. With regard to the animals (Lev 11), some were by nature “unclean,” so they could never be eaten, but others were by nature “clean” and, therefore, edible (Lev 11:2, 46-47). The meat of clean animals could become inedible by too long of a delay in eating it, in which case the Hebrew term פִּגּוּל (pigul) “foul, spoiled” is used to describe it (Lev 7:18; 19:7; cf. also Ezek 4:14 and Isa 65:4), not the term for “unclean” (טָהוֹר, tahor). Strictly speaking, therefore, unclean meat never becomes clean, and clean meat never becomes unclean.
3 tn Heb “And if there falls from their carcass on any seed of sowing which shall be sown.”
4 tn Heb “And a man, when his head is rubbed bare, he is bald-headed.” The translation offered here, referring to the back of the head (i.e., the area from the top of the head sloping backwards), is based on the contrast between this condition and that of the following verse. See also B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 82.
5 tn Heb “And if from the front edge of his face, his head is rubbed bare.” See the note on v. 40 above.
6 tn The rendering “balding in front” corresponds to the location of the bareness at the beginning of the verse.
7 tn Heb “to teach in the day of the unclean and in the day of the clean.”
8 tn Heb “This is the law of the disease.” Some English versions specify this as “skin disease” (e.g., NIV, NLT), but then have to add “and (+ infectious NLT) mildew” (so NIV) because a house would not be infected with a skin disease.
sn For an explanation of the term “disease” see Lev 13:2.
