🔢WEB · Numbers 5:3
What does Numbers 5:3 mean?
"Both you shall put male and female outside of the camp; that they not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell.”"
— Numbers 5:3 (World English Bible)
Surrounding context
Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
“Command the children of Israel that they put out of the camp every leper, and everyone who has an issue, and whoever is unclean by the dead.
Both you shall put male and female outside of the camp; that they not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell.”
The children of Israel did so, and put them outside of the camp; as Yahweh spoke to Moses, so did the children of Israel.
Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
“Speak to the children of Israel: ‘When a man or woman commits any sin that men commit, so as to trespass against Yahweh, and that soul is guilty;
Explanation
Numbers 5:3 comes in the middle of a short instruction (Numbers 5:1-4) in which God tells Moses to remove three categories of people from the Israelite camp: those with a serious skin disease, those with a bodily discharge, and anyone who had become ceremonially unclean through contact with a dead body. The verse itself simply states the principle behind that instruction—both men and women who fall into these categories are to be sent outside the camp so that the camp itself is not defiled, because God himself dwells there among his people.
The book of Numbers records Israel's experiences during the wilderness wandering, after they left Mount Sinai and before entering the Promised Land. Moses is the human author, writing under God's direction, and the immediate audience is the community of Israel organized in tribal camps around the tabernacle. This structure was carefully ordered, with the tabernacle—the tent where God's presence dwelt—at the very center. Purity regulations like this one were not arbitrary; they reflected the seriousness of having a holy God physically present among an ordinary, sinful, mortal people. Skin diseases, bodily discharges, and death were all associated with decay, sickness, and mortality in a fallen world, and Israel's ritual law used these physical realities to teach spiritual lessons about holiness and imp
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