Biblion Bible Commentary
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The Two Birds
Leviticus 14:1-32
1 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, · WEB
The priest goes outside the camp to examine a healed man, and one bird is killed while the other is released alive.
The chapter opens with a movement nobody has to make: the priest shall go out of the camp Leviticus 14:3.
The excluded man cannot come in to be examined, so the priest goes to him. The system that put him outside also sends somebody out to check whether he can return, and the visit is a standing requirement rather than a favor.
The rite for his cleansing uses two birds, and its shape is the most vivid in the book.
One is killed in an earthen vessel over running water Leviticus 14:5. The other is dipped, alive, together with cedar wood, scarlet and hyssop, in the blood of the first. The man is sprinkled seven times and pronounced clean — and then shall let the living bird go into the open field Leviticus 14:7.
A bird carrying the blood of its dead counterpart is released into open country, and nobody sees where it goes. The same two-part figure appears at the center of the book with two goats Leviticus 16:8, and it says the same thing both times: something dies, and something else carries the effect of that death away and out of sight.
The re-entry is then staged over eight days. He washes, shaves all his hair, and bathes; he may come into the camp but shall dwell outside his tent seven days Leviticus 14:8. On the seventh day he shaves everything again — head, beard, eyebrows Leviticus 14:9.
The stages are gradual, and the middle one is the humane detail. A man who has lived alone outside the camp is not returned straight to his household; he sleeps in the camp among people for a week first.
And on the eighth day, the offerings — with blood put on the tip of his right ear, the thumb of his right hand and the great toe of his right foot Leviticus 14:14, and then oil on the same three points Leviticus 14:17.
Those are the marks put on Aaron and his sons at their ordination Leviticus 8:23. A man returning from exclusion receives the ritual given to priests being installed, which is a striking way to describe a restoration.
And then, as always: if he is poor, and can't afford so much Leviticus 14:21, the rate drops to one lamb and two birds. A man who has spent months unable to work is not asked for the full price of coming home.
settled What this mark means