What Does Leviticus 14:57 Mean?
To point out when it is soiled, and when it is clean; this is the instruction for the striking of the skin.
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
To teach when it is unclean, and when it is clean: this is the law of leprosy.THE KEY
The “law” here shares its Hebrew root with “teach”: it is instruction that makes the distinction between unclean and clean visible.
THE MEANING
This verse gives you a way to discern when a condition is unclean and when it is clean. These are distinguishable states, not one fixed label.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that once something is called unclean, it can never be recognized as clean.
THE ROOT
תּוֹרַת
torat
GROWS FROM
ירה
To direct or instruct; the root also carries the concrete sense of throwing or shooting.
“point out” in this verse is torat. The verb translated “to teach” and the noun translated “law” belong to the same root-family, ירה (yarah). What English separates into teaching and law is instruction that directs understanding and makes the clean/unclean distinction legible.
ALSO GROWS
lehorot: To teach or instruct.
לְהוֹרוֹת
This is the verb at the start of the verse: instruction is the means by which the two states are recognized.
torah: Instruction or direction.
תּוֹרָה
The verse’s “law” is torat, an inflected form of torah, so its teaching and its instruction share one root.
moreh: A teacher or instructor.
מוֹרֶה
The teacher is one who directs understanding, echoing the verse’s purpose of teaching discernment.
THE PATTERN
Instruction makes distinctions legible, allowing a condition to be named accurately.
And God saw the light, that it was good, and God parted the light from the darkness.And they shall teach my people to separate the set-apart from the common, and cause them to perceive between the unclean and the clean.And the voice spoke to him again the second time, What God has cleansed, do not make common.THE THREAD
Guard yourself in the stroke of leprosy, and watch with great care, and you shall do according to all that the priests, the Levites, instruct you. As I commanded them, so you shall guard to do.Deuteronomy uses the same yarah root-family for what the priests teach about the affliction, joining instruction with careful observation. It shows the “law” here as guidance for learning the distinction, not a label standing alone.
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