What Does Leviticus 13:20 Mean?
And if, when the priest sees it, behold, it is in its sight sunken below the skin, and the hair in it has turned white; the priest shall declare him soiled; it is a striking that has bloomed out of the heat-sore.
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 if, when the priest seeth it, behold, it be in sight lower than the skin, and the hair thereof be turned white; the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is a plague of leprosy broken out of the boil.THE KEY
The Hebrew for “broken out” also means “blossomed”: the affliction is pictured as an eruption growing into view.
THE MEANING
You are shown a condition becoming legible through a cluster of signs: the mark lies below the skin, its hair turns white, and it has emerged from a boil. The priest’s declaration gives that combination a definite name and status.
THE ROOT
פָּרָחָה
pāraḥāh
GROWS FROM
פרח
p-r-ḥ
To sprout, bloom, blossom, or break forth.
“bloomed out” in this verse is pāraḥāh. The word translated “broken out” carries the image of something blossoming. The lesion is described as an affliction flowering from the boil, a visible emergence rather than an isolated mark.
ALSO GROWS
peraḥ: A flower or blossom.
פֶּרַח
It makes the growth-image in “broken out” concrete: the same root names a blossom.
pōrēaḥ: Flowering, sprouting, or breaking out.
פּוֹרֵחַ
Exodus 9:9 uses this form for boils breaking out, echoing the eruption described here.
רָאָה
rāʾāh
GROWS FROM
ראה
r-ʾ-h
To see, look at, or perceive; the related noun can mean appearance or what is seen.
“seeth / sight” in this verse is rāʾāh. The priest “seeth” the mark, and the verse immediately names its “sight” or appearance. Hebrew links the act of looking with the visible evidence being judged: the declaration follows a particular appearance.
ALSO GROWS
roʾeh: A person who sees.
רֹאֶה
It shares the seeing-root that describes the priest’s examination.
marʾeh: Appearance, sight, or vision.
מַרְאֶה
It is the word-family form used for the mark’s appearance, tying what is seen to the act of seeing.
נֶגַע
negaʿ
GROWS FROM
נגע
n-g-ʿ
To touch, reach, or strike; as a noun, a stroke or affliction.
“Plague” here is a word for an afflicting mark, related to a verb meaning to touch or strike. The verse identifies that mark by its relation to the skin, hair, and boil.
ALSO GROWS
nāgaʿ: To touch, reach, or strike.
נָגַע
This verb is the seed of nega, the affliction named in the verse.
nāgūaʿ: Touched, stricken, or afflicted.
נָגוּעַ
This related form carries the root’s sense of an afflicting mark into a description of one affected.
THE PATTERN
A hidden reality becomes discernible when its outward signs are examined against a clear criterion.
When the prophet speaks in the nature of the LORD, if the word does not come to be, nor arrive, it is the word the LORD has not spoken, but the prophet has spoken it in a boiling over. You shall not cower from him.You will know them by their fruits. Do people gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?THE THREAD
And it shall become fine dust over all the land of Egypt, and shall be a boil breaking forth in blisters upon man, and upon beast, throughout all the land of Egypt.The Hebrew verb פָּרַח (pāraḥ, sprout or blossom) also describes the boils “breaking forth” here. The same root turns both eruptions into an image of affliction growing visibly out from the body.
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