Numbers 19

19 ¹ Our Father spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying:

² This is the statute of the law that our Father has commanded: Tell the children of Israel to bring you a red heifer without blemish, in which there is no defect, and on which no yoke has ever been laid. ³ You shall give it to Eleazar the priest, and it shall be brought outside the camp and slaughtered in his presence.

⁴ Then Eleazar the priest shall take some of its blood on his finger and sprinkle it seven times toward the front of the tent of meeting. ⁵ And the heifer shall be burned while he watches — its hide, its flesh, and its blood, together with its dung. ⁶ The priest shall take cedar wood, hyssop, and scarlet yarn, and throw them into the fire where the heifer is burning.

⁷ Then the priest shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water, and afterward he may come into the camp; but the priest shall be unclean until evening. ⁸ The one who burns it shall also wash his clothes in water and bathe himself in water, and he shall be unclean until evening.

⁹ A man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer and deposit them outside the camp in a clean place, and they shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel as the water of purification; it is for cleansing from sin. ¹⁰ The one who gathers the ashes of the heifer shall wash his clothes, and he shall be unclean until evening. This shall be a lasting statute for the children of Israel and for the foreigner who lives among them.

Cleansing from the Unclean

¹¹ Whoever touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean for seven days. ¹² He shall purify himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and then he will be clean; but if he does not purify himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he will not be clean. ¹³ Anyone who touches a dead body — the corpse of a person who has died — and does not purify himself defiles the tabernacle of our Father, and that person shall be cut off from Israel. Because the water of purification was not sprinkled on him, he remains unclean; his uncleanness is still on him.

¹⁴ This is the law when a person dies in a tent: everyone who enters the tent and everyone who is in the tent shall be unclean for seven days. ¹⁵ And every open vessel that has no lid fastened on it shall be unclean.

¹⁶ Whoever in the open field touches someone killed by the sword, or one who has died naturally, or a human bone, or a grave, shall be unclean for seven days.

¹⁷ For the unclean person, they shall take some of the ashes of the burned purification offering, put them in a vessel, and add fresh running water. ¹⁸ Then a clean person shall take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle it on the tent, on all the vessels, on the people who were there, and on the one who touched the bone, or the slain, or the dead, or the grave.

¹⁹ The clean person shall sprinkle the unclean one on the third day and on the seventh day, and on the seventh day he shall purify him. Then he shall wash his clothes and bathe in water, and by evening he will be clean. ²⁰ But the person who is unclean and does not purify himself shall be cut off from the assembly, because he has defiled the sanctuary of our Father. The water of purification was not sprinkled on him; he is unclean.

²¹ This shall be a lasting statute for them. The one who sprinkles the water of purification shall wash his clothes, and whoever touches the water of purification shall be unclean until evening.

²² Whatever the unclean person touches shall become unclean, and anyone who touches that shall be unclean until evening.