Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Numbers 19:9
And a man [that is] clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and lay [them] up without the camp in a clean place, and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for a water of separation: it [is] a purification for sin.
9. it shall be kept ] i.e. the ashes, for which the Heb. word is singular, not plural.
a water of impurity ] i.e. a water for the removal of impurity. Cf. ‘water of sin’ (Num 8:7). The word niddh, ‘impurity,’ signifies something loathsome or abominable.
it is a sin-offering ] The cow (not the water) could be called a sin-offering because it was burnt; but, since the ashes are the object of chief importance, the word hatt’th (‘sin-offering’) must be understood in the more general sense of ‘something which removes sin.’ LXX. .
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Water of separation – In Num 8:7, the water of purification from sin is the water of purifying. So that which was to remedy a state of legal separation is here called water of separation.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 9. For a water of separation] That is, the ashes were to be kept, in order to be mixed with water, Nu 19:17, and sprinkled on those who had contracted any legal defilement.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
For the congregation of the children of Israel, i.e. for their use, and therefore in a fit place or places, whence any of them might easily procure it.
For a water, or, to the water, i.e. to be put to the water, or mixed with it.
Of separation, i.e. appointed for the cleansing of them that are in a state of separation, who for their uncleanness separated from the congregation. Either the heifer thus managed, or the water thus made and sprinkled,
is a purification for sin, Heb. a sin, i.e. a kind of an offering for sin, or rather a mean for the expiation or cleansing of sin. The name of sin is sometimes given to the punishment of sin, and sometimes to the sacrifice or offering for sin.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
And a man [that is] clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer,…. A man, a clean priest, as the Targum of Jonathan; in later times great care was taken that the priest concerned in the burning of the red cow should be pure; he was separated from his own house seven days before the time, and every day he was sprinkled with the blood of all sin offerings then offered, that it might be sure he was free from any pollution by a grave, or a dead body; and for the same reason they made a causeway on double arches from the temple to the mount of Olives, over the valley of Kidron, lest any unseen grave should be in the way; and when he came thither he was obliged to wash or dip himself, as before observed m; and so he that gathered up the ashes was to be clean from all ceremonial pollution: the Jews say n, that they pounded the ashes; if there were any black coal in them or bone, they did not leave it in them, but sifted them in stone sieves; and not the ashes of the heifer only they took, but the ashes of the cedar wood, c. mixed with them and these they put, as the Targum of Jonathan says, into an earthen vessel enclosed in a covering of clay:
and lay [them] up without the camp in a clean place; they were divided into three parts, according to the Targum of Jonathan, one part was put in the Chel (or the enclosure of the court of the tabernacle), another in the mount of Olives, and the third part was divided among all the wards of the Levites, with which the Misnah o agrees; Jarchi makes mention of the same division, and of the use of each; that the wards had was without the court, that the citizens might take of it, and all that needed to be purified; that in the mount of Olives was for the priests, to sanctify other heifers with it; and that in the Chel was for a reserve:
and it shall be kept [for a reserve] for the congregation of Israel; as ashes may be kept a long time, if well taken care of, because they are not subject to any corruption or putrefaction; and so was, as Bishop Patrick observes from Dr. Jackson, a figure of the everlasting efficacy of Christ’s blood: and, according to the Jews, these ashes of the first heifer must last more than a thousand years; for they say p the second that was burnt was in the time of Ezra, though they reckon seven more afterwards before the destruction of the second temple, in all nine; and the tenth they expect in the days of the Messiah, which are past; he, being come, has put an end to this type by fulfilling it in himself: and the use of them was
for a water of separation; being put into water, and mixed with it, was for the cleansing of such as were separated from others for their uncleanness, and was a purification of them for it, as follows:
it [is] a purification for sin: or “it [is] sin” q, not an offering for sin, properly speaking; the heifer, whose ashes they were, not being sacrificed in the tabernacle, nor on the altar, and wanted other rites; yet it answered the purposes of a sin offering, and its ashes in water were typical of the blood of Christ, which purges the conscience from dead works, when this only purified to the sanctifying of the flesh, Heb 9:13; and is the fountain set open for sin and uncleanness, Zec 13:1; where both the words are used which are here, and in the preceding clause: ashes are known to be of a cleansing nature, and so a fit emblem of spiritual purification by Christ; and the duration of them of the perpetuity of it.
m Misn. Parah, c. 3. sect. 1. 6. 7. n Ib. sect. 11. o lbid. p Ib. sect. 5. q “peccatum ipsa”, Montanus; “peccatum enim est”, Tigurine version.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
9. Ashes water of separation The chief ingredient of this water.
Purification for sin The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews strongly hints that this process did not work a real inward cleansing of the nature when he says, “How much more shall the blood of Christ purge your conscience from dead (sinful) works to serve the living God.” Heb 9:13-14.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Num 19:9. A man that is clean i.e. free from any legal defilementshall gather up the ashes; which, being taken up, were pounded and sifted, as the Jews tell us:and it shall be kept; i.e. according to some, not for the use of that generation only, but for posterity also: for ashes, being the remainder of bodies perfectly dissolved or corrupted, are not capable of a second corruption, and so, being preserved through ages for the purposes of legal purification, till the whole stock of them was exhausted, they became a proper emblem of the everlasting efficacy of Christ’s blood to purify the conscience from dead works; (Heb 9:13-14.); for the Jews tell us, that the ashes of one heifer was kept so long, that only nine in all were killed for this purpose while their state lasted: but this tradition of theirs, like most others, has little countenance from reason. St. Jerome and others, on the contrary, are of opinion, that the red heifer was slain every year; and indeed it is hardly conceivable, that fewer, at least, than one every year, should suffice to furnish ashes to expiate the ordinary defilements of the whole body of the people. These ashes were to be kept for a water of separation; i.e. as appears from Num 19:17 to be put into water, and so applied to the cleansing of those who were separated from the congregation for legal pollutions; and thus it was to be a purification for sin, or, according to the Hebrew, a sin-offering; an expiation for sin; see ch. Num 8:7.
Some of the Jews ascribed a purifying virtue to this consecrated water; but those who understood the true intention of Moses’ law considered this in no other light, than as an instituted means to absolve them from legal or ceremonial defilement, which, like the rest of their washings, purifications, and sacrifices, served to represent moral purity, and the necessity of being cleansed by repentance from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, in order to a participation of the divine favor and forgiveness. This moral purpose is much more fully enforced upon Christians, by the death of Christ: For if (says the Apostle) the blood of bulls and goats, and the ashes of an heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works, to serve the living God?
REFLECTIONS.The intention of this ceremony was, to purify from ceremonial uncleanness, and to be typical of that sprinkling of the blood of Jesus which really purges the conscience from dead works. The whole was a shadow of Him that was to come. The spotless purity of our divine Lord, when he offered himself a sacrifice for us, is here prefigured. He was red in his apparel, when he trod the wine-press alone, and when he died weltering in his blood. No yoke bound him to the dreadful service; freely he offered himself to bear the sins of many. At once the priest and sacrifice, he offered up his body on the tree, like to an unclean thing, because the Lord had laid on him the iniquity of us all; he suffered without the camp, and from the cross looked up to heaven, sprinkling his blood as it were before the door of the heavenly sanctuary. The fierceness of the fire, and the bitter hyssop, shadow forth the fierceness of the wrath of God, and the bitterness of his soul under it; whilst cedar’s sweet perfume shews how acceptable the smell of the sacrifice was to God; and the ashes referred for common use, intimates his rich salvation, obtained and offered freely to sinners of every class
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Was not this in the laying up the ashes a type of the everlasting efficacy of JESUS’S salvation? Is he not laid up in the everlasting council of peace, and for the daily, hourly, unceasing application, by the HOLY GHOST to the guilty consciences of his people. Joh 1:29 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Num 19:9 And a man [that is] clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and lay [them] up without the camp in a clean place, and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for a water of separation: it [is] a purification for sin.
Ver. 9. And a man that is clean. ] Hereby is meant the Gentile purified by faith, as one well observeth. The gathering of the ashes, is the applying of the merits of Christ, and laying hold of the mystery of his kingdom. The laying up of the ashes imports that the Christian accounts Christ’s merits his chief treasure. The clean place is the clean heart. Without the camp, notes, that the Gentiles were strangers from the commonwealth of Israel, &c. These ashes kept for the congregation, show the fulness of Christ’s merits for all his people. When he saith, it is to make a water of separation, it notes that our sins separate betwixt us and our God. But “now in Christ Jesus, we who sometimes were far off, are made nigh by his blood.” Eph 2:13
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
man. Hebrew. ‘ish. App-14. Compare the antitype, Joseph of Arimathea. Mat 27:57-60. Luk 23:50-53. Joh 19:38-42.
sin. See App-44.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
clean: Num 19:18, Num 9:13, 2Co 5:21, Heb 7:26, Heb 9:13
lay them up: Num 19:17
a water of separation: That is, water prepared by being mixed with the ashes of the heifer, and set apart for the special purpose of being sprinkled on those who had contracted any legal defilement. To this rite the apostle Paul, in his epistle to the Hebrews. – Heb 9:13, Heb 9:14, pointedly alludes: “For if,” says he, “the blood of bulls and of goats,” alluding, probably, to the sin-offerings and the scape-goat, “and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of Christ, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot unto God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God.” Num 19:13, Num 19:20, Num 19:21, Num 6:12, Num 31:23, Num 31:24, Lev 15:20, Zec 13:1, 2Co 7:1
Reciprocal: Num 8:7 – water
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Num 19:9. A man shall gather up the ashes The ashes of the heifer were separated as well as they could be from the ashes of the wood wherewith it was burned, were pounded and sifted, and laid up for the use of the congregation as there was occasion, not only for that generation, but for posterity; for the ashes of this one heifer, the Jews tell us, were sufficient to season as many vessels of water as the people of Israel would need for many ages. Nay, they say this one served till the captivity, near one thousand years, and that there never was another heifer burned fill the time of Ezra. But to this tradition of theirs, grounded probably on the silence of ancient records, there seems to be no good reason to give credit, since, in the latter ages of their church, when they had more full records, they find an account of eight burned between Ezras time and the destruction of the second temple, which was only a space of about five hundred years. In the sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ, however, offered only once for all, we have an inexhaustible fund of merit, to which, by faith, his church may have recourse from generation to generation, for the purification of their consciences from dead works.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
19:9 And a man [that is] clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and lay [them] up without the camp in a clean place, and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for a {e} water of separation: it [is] a purification for sin.
(e) Or, the water of separation because they that were separate due to their uncleanness, were sprinkled with it and made clean, Num 8:7. It is also called holy water, because it was ordained for a holy use, Num 1:17.