Leviticus 13:14

But when raw flesh appeareth in him,.... Between the white spots, scabs, or swellings, or in the midst of them: he shall be unclean; be pronounced unclean, and be subject to all the prescriptions of the law concerning lepers.

And the priest shall see him: and, behold, if the rising be white in the skin, and it have turned the hair white, and there be quick raw flesh in the rising; If the rising be white.

In him, or rather, in it, i.e. in the place where the sign or appearance of leprosy was, when the flesh was partly changed into a whiter colour, and partly kept its natural colour; this variety of colours was an evidence of the leprosy, as one and the same colour continuing was a sign of soundness.

Leviticus 13:14 But when raw flesh appeareth in him, he shall be unclean.Ver. 14. But when raw flesh.] Because it showed that there were still corrupt and poisoned humours in the body, not easy to be expelled till death.

(14) But when raw flesh appeareth.—Rather, but in the day when sound flesh appeareth again, that is, whenever patches of natural flesh appear intermingled with the white scurf, he forthwith becomes unclean, since this showed that the disease had not exhausted itself. Because it is here said, “But in the day when sound flesh,” &c, and not simply “but when sound flesh,” &c., the administrators of the law in the time of Christ concluded that there were days on which the examination of this distemper was not undertaken: viz., during the seven nuptial days, and the seven days of the great pilgrim festivals of Passover and Tabernacles.

9–17. The first part of this section is obscure; most modern commentators explain Leviticus 13:9-11 as referring to another form of leprosy in which the rising described in Leviticus 13:10 appears without any of the premonitory symptoms of Lev 13:2; if in addition to the white hair (already mentioned in Leviticus 13:3) there is ‘quick raw flesh’ (Leviticus 13:10) in the rising, this is a sure sign of leprosy, and the man must be declared unclean at once without waiting for any further examination. By ‘quick raw flesh’ (Heb. ‘the rawness of raw flesh,’ or lit. ‘the quickness of quick flesh’) is understood an appearance like that of raw meat. The Heb. words for ‘raw flesh’ [bâsâr ḥ ?ay] are used of raw meat in 1 Samuel 2:15; Prof. Macalister describes it as ‘red granulation tissue’ (HDB. iii. 96a). The words ‘old leprosy’ must then mean a leprosy of long standing which has not manifested itself in the preliminary stages, but, when first noticed, shews this definite indication of the disease. It is possible that these verses may include the case when the first symptoms described in Leviticus 13:2 have been either unobserved or concealed. Another explanation of Lev 13:9-11 is that they describe a fresh outbreak in one who has been pronounced clean, or who has been cured of a previous attack. The traditional interpretation of ‘quick raw flesh’ (the quickening of living flesh, A. V. mg.) is ‘sound flesh.’ The appearance of this sound flesh in a rising was, in the opinion of the rabbis, evidence that an old leprosy had developed fresh activity. The words of Lev 13:7, ‘after that he hath shewn himself to the priest for his cleansing,’ are by some considered as referring to the third of the inspections prescribed in Leviticus 13:2-6. It has been observed that the suspected person at the first and second inspection must either be pronounced unclean, or shut up for further enquiry, and he cannot be pronounced clean till the third examination. Then Leviticus 13:7-8 would refer to the reappearance of leprous symptoms after a man had been pronounced clean by the priest, and Leviticus 13:9-11 would supply further rules for such cases.

14. Raw flesh — This is the proud flesh, the appearance of which, after the universal spread of the white scurf, indicates that the disease has not yet entirely left the blood.