What Does Leviticus 14:23 Mean?
And on the eighth day he shall bring them for his cleansing to the priest, to the doorway of the tent of meeting, before the face of the LORD.
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 he shall bring them on the eighth day for his cleansing unto the priest, unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, before the LORD.THE KEY
The Hebrew word for “door” means “opening,” placing cleansing at the entrance into the LORD’s presence.
THE MEANING
Your cleansing is pictured as an approach: the person being cleansed is brought to the priest at the tent’s opening, before the LORD. Purification, threshold, and presence form one movement.
THE ROOT
פֶּתַח
petaḥ
GROWS FROM
פתח
p-t-ḥ
to open
“doorway” in this verse is petaḥ. The Hebrew word for “door” is petaḥ (פֶּתַח), an opening, from pataḥ (פָּתַח), “to open”; the same root forms maphteaḥ (מַפְתֵּחַ), “key.” The verse places cleansing at an opening before the LORD, making the threshold part of how purification is pictured.
ALSO GROWS
pāṯaḥ: to open
פָּתַח
The verb shares its root with the doorway, revealing the entrance as an opening.
maphteaḥ: key
מַפְתֵּחַ
A key is that which opens; this shared root echoes the access implied by the tent’s opening.
לְטָהֳרָתוֹ
ləṭāhŏrāṯô
GROWS FROM
טהר
ṭ-h-r
to be clean or pure; to cleanse
The word for cleansing belongs to the same root family as the word for the clean state. Here, that family is set at a priestly encounter before the LORD, joining purification with approach.
ALSO GROWS
ṭāhēr: to be clean; to cleanse
טָהֵר
This verb shares the seed of “his cleansing,” holding the act of purification in the same word family.
ṭāhôr: clean, pure
טָהוֹר
This adjective names the clean state that belongs to the same root as the cleansing in the verse.
THE PATTERN
Purification and nearness meet as a person is brought to an opening and presented before God.
This is a continual rising offering throughout your generations, at the opening of the tent of meeting before the LORD, where I will meet you, to speak with you there.Who climbs the mountain of the LORD? Who stands in his set-apart place? Clean of hands and clear of heart, he who does not lift up his living soul to emptiness, nor swears in deceit.Let us draw near with a true heart in the fullness of trust, our hearts sprinkled from a burdened shared sight, and our bodies bathed in clean waters.THE THREAD
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.The phrase “he shall be clean” uses the same Hebrew root טהר (ṭ-h-r) as “his cleansing” here. The shared root holds purification and the clean state together, while this verse places the process at the altar before God.
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