Bible Strands
Leviticus 13:46
As long as he has the infection, he remains unclean. He must live alone in a place outside the camp.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The text addresses the Israelite community regarding a person diagnosed with a skin infection. It establishes the ongoing ritual status and required isolation for that individual.
The words — The Hebrew phrase כּל־יְמֵי (kol-yemei) translates to "all the days," conditioning the person's unclean status (יִטְמָא/טָמֵא) strictly on the duration of the affliction. The term בָּדָד (baDad) mandates living alone outside the camp rather than permanent exile.
The thread — This pattern of isolation for ritual impurity appears in Numbers 12:14 and 2 Kings 15:5, where afflicted individuals are removed from communal spaces. The practice is echoed in 2 Kings 7:3, which notes lepers dwelling outside the city gate.
Why it lands — The text requires immediate physical separation from the community for as long as the infection persists. It demands practical compliance with ritual boundaries rather than theological speculation about the cause or duration of the condition.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
All the days wherein the plague shall be in him he shall be defiled; he is unclean: he shall dwell alone; without the camp shall his habitation be.
Cross-references
- 2 Kings 7:3 Now there were four men with leprosy at the entrance of the city gate, and they said to one another, “Why just sit here until we die?
- 2 Kings 15:5 And the LORD afflicted the king with leprosy until the day he died, so that he lived in a separate house while his son Jotham had charge of the palace and governed the people of the land.
- Numbers 12:14 But the LORD answered Moses, “If her father had but spit in her face, would she not have been in disgrace for seven days? Let her be confined outside the camp for seven days; after that she may be brought back in.”
- 2 Chronicles 26:21 So King Uzziah was a leper until the day of his death. He lived in isolation, leprous and cut off from the house of the LORD, while his son Jotham had charge of the royal palace and governed the people of the land.
- Numbers 5:1 Then the LORD said to Moses,
- Proverbs 30:12 There is a generation of those who are pure in their own eyes and yet unwashed of their filth.
- Lamentations 1:1 How lonely lies the city, once so full of people! She who was great among the nations has become a widow. The princess of the provinces has become a slave.
- Lamentations 1:8 Jerusalem has sinned greatly; therefore she has become an object of scorn. All who honored her now despise her, for they have seen her nakedness; she herself groans and turns away.
- Luke 17:12 As He entered one of the villages, He was met by ten lepers. They stood at a distance
- 1 Corinthians 5:5 hand this man over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved on the Day of the Lord.