Basic HTML Version
cheweth the cud, are unclean unto you: every one that toucheth them shall be unclean.”
is the opposite of
, “to be pure.”
B. Noun.
$
(
.
+
, 2932), “uncleanness.” This noun is derived from
!
$
occurs 37 times in biblical Hebrew. The word occurs in Num. 5:19: “And the priest shall
charge her by an oath, and say unto the woman, If no man have lain with thee, and if thou
hast not gone aside to uncleanliness with another instead of thine husband, be thou free
from this bitter water that causeth the curse.” Here the word refers to sexual
“uncleanness.”
$
occurs twice in Lev. 16:16 and refers to ethical and religious
“uncleanness.”
C. Adjective.
(
+
, 2931), “unclean.” This adjective occurs 89 times in the Old Testament.
The frequency of the word is high in Leviticus. Its first occurrence is also in Leviticus:
“Or if a soul touch any unclean thing, whether it be a carcase of an unclean beast, or a
carcase of unclean cattle, or the carcase of unclean creeping things, and if it be hidden
from him; he also shall be unclean, and guilty” (5:2).
The usage of
in the Old Testament resembles that of
, “pure.” First,
uncleanness is a state of being. The leper was compelled to announce his uncleanness
wherever he went (Lev. 13:45); however, even here there is a religious overtone, in that
his uncleanness was ritual. Hence, it is more appropriate to recognize that the second
usage is most basic.
in the religio-cultic sense is a technical term denoting a state
of being ceremonially unfit. Animals, carcases, unclean people, and objects conveyed the
impurity to those who touched them: “And whatsoever the unclean person toucheth shall
be unclean; and the soul that toucheth it shall lie unclean until even” (Num. 19:22). The
impurity could also be brought about by a seminal issue (Lev. 15:2) or a menstrual period
(Lev. 15:25), and whatever the unclean touched was also rendered “unclean.”
The Septuagint translations are:
(“impure; unclean”) and
(“stain;
defile”). The
KJV
gives these translations: “unclean; defiled; polluted.”
TO UNDERSTAND
A. Verbs.
(
'*
, 7919), “to be prudent, act wisely, give attention to, ponder, prosper.”
This word, which is common to both ancient and modern Hebrew, is found
approximately 75 times in the text of the Hebrew Bible. Its first use in the text, in Gen.
3:6, contributes to an interesting paradox, for while the forbidden fruit was “to be desired
to make one wise,” it was a very unwise thing to take it!
The basic meaning of
seems to be “to look at, to give attention to,” as
illustrated in this parallelism: “That they may see, and know, and consider, and
understand …” (Isa. 41:20). From this develops the connotation of insight, intellectual
comprehension: “Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom … But let him that glorieth
glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me …” (Jer. 9:23-24). As here, it is
frequently used along with and in parallelism to the Hebrew
, “to know” (primarily
experientially). As is true of
, “to be wise,”
never concerns abstract