What Does Leviticus 14:20 Mean?
And the priest shall offer the rising offering and the gift upon the altar. And the priest shall make a covering for him, and he shall be clean.
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 offer the burnt offering and the meat offering upon the altar: and the priest shall make an atonement for him, and he shall be clean.THE KEY
The verse’s hidden hinge is a covering that ends with a person being named clean.
THE MEANING
A condition of uncleanness is not the final word over you: a covering is made for you, and you are clean. The verse holds the act and its result together, an offering is presented, a covering is made, and cleanness follows.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that uncleanness has to remain your identity: the verse names cleanness as the state that follows the covering.
THE ROOT
וְכִפֶּר
ve-khipper kaphar
GROWS FROM
כפר
Cover; make a covering.
The Hebrew verb carries the image of covering within what English calls atonement. Here that covering is made for a person, and the verse names its result as cleanness.
ALSO GROWS
kappōret: Cover or covering; the cover of the ark, traditionally called the mercy seat.
כַּפֹּרֶת
The same root names a physical cover, making the covering in this verse more than an abstract idea.
kippurim: Coverings or acts of atonement.
כִּפּוּרִים
This related form keeps the covering image present in the language of atonement.
וְטָהֵר
ve-taher taher
GROWS FROM
טהר
Be clean or pure.
The verse gives the covering a named result: the person is taher, clean. The action and the changed state belong to one movement.
ALSO GROWS
tahor: Clean or pure.
טָהוֹר
This adjective names the state the verse says the person enters.
tohorah: Cleanness or purity.
טָהֳרָה
This noun shows the same root naming cleanness as a state.
עֹלָה
ʿolah
GROWS FROM
עלה
Rise or go up; the offering is that which ascends.
“rising offering” in this verse is ʿolah. The offering carries a motion of ascent: what is presented on the altar is pictured as rising. That movement stands beside the covering and the resulting cleanness.
ALSO GROWS
ʿālāh: Rise or go up.
עָלָה
The verb gives the burnt offering its sense of upward movement.
maʿalah: Ascent or upward step.
מַעֲלָה
This related form keeps ascent visible within the same root family.
THE PATTERN
A cleansing act moves a person from an unclean condition into a named state of cleanness.
For on that day the priest makes a covering for you, to cleanse you, so that you may be clean from all your shortcomings before the LORD.Remove my falling short with hyssop, and I am clean; tread me, and I am whiter than snow.How much more will the blood of the Anointed One, who through the breath of the ages brought himself near without blemish to God, cleanse our shared sight from dead works to serve the living God.THE THREAD
For on that day the priest makes a covering for you, to cleanse you, so that you may be clean from all your shortcomings before the LORD.This verse uses the same כפר (kaphar, cover) root for the priest’s atonement and links that covering directly to cleansing and cleanness. The repeated sequence makes the connection visible: covering, then clean.
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