What Does Leviticus 13:10 Mean?
And the priest shall look upon him; and behold, if the lifting is white in the skin, and it has turned the hair white, and there is living flesh in the lifting;
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And the priest shall see him: and, behold, if the rising be white in the skin, and it have turned the hair white, and there be quick raw flesh in the rising;THE KEY
The mark is read through several signs together: a raised place, hair turned white, and living flesh within it.
THE MEANING
The verse presents a body under examination, with a raised white place, changed hair, and living flesh all visible at once. “Quick” means living here, making the flesh’s aliveness part of what the priest sees and judges.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that a white mark alone settles the condition: the verse names a cluster of physical signs as the basis for discernment.
THE ROOT
חַי
chai
GROWS FROM
חיה
To live, be alive; life.
“living flesh” in this verse is chai. The Hebrew behind “quick” names the flesh as living, so the sign is not just a color change but living tissue within the raised area. The verse makes that active life part of what is seen and judged.
ALSO GROWS
chayah: To live, be alive.
חָיָה
The verb makes the life sense of “quick” explicit: the flesh is alive.
chayyim: Life.
חַיִּים
This noun carries the same root’s life sense, illuminating why the flesh’s aliveness matters in the examination.
שְׂאֵת
se’et
GROWS FROM
נשא
To lift, carry, or bear.
The word for “rising” grows from the verb for lifting or bearing, giving the raised place a sense of elevation. The same root reaches from lifting to what is borne.
ALSO GROWS
nasa: To lift, carry, or bear.
נָשָׂא
This verb shares the root and makes the raisedness of the mark concrete.
massa: A load or burden.
מַשָּׂא
This branch shows how the root’s sense of lifting extends to what is carried.
THE PATTERN
A condition is discerned through its signs read together, not by one surface impression alone.
And the priest shall look upon the stroke in the skin of the flesh; and when the hair in the stroke has turned white, and the stroke in its sight is deeper than the skin of his flesh, it is a stroke of the striking; and the priest shall look upon him, and declare him soiled.You will know them by their fruits. Do people gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?Do not judge by what the eye sees, but judge the judgment of alignment.THE THREAD
But when living flesh appears in him, he shall be soiled.The same Hebrew phrase, בָּשָׂר חַי (basar chai, “living flesh”), appears in the diagnostic continuation. It shows that the living flesh named in 13:10 carries weight in how the body is read.
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