Table of Contents
The Temple: Its Ministry and
Services
Alfred Edersheim
Chapter 18
On Purification
- The Red Heifer
Symbolical meaning of Levitical defilements and purifications
- The Offering for
the First-born --The purification of the Virgin Mary in the Temple
- Purification
for the Dead --Defilement by contact with death
- The Six Degrees of
Defilement
- Death the Greatest
Defilement
- Levitical
Defilement Traceable to Death --Sacrifice of the red heifer--Preservation of its
ashes, and use of them in purification--Symbolical meaning of this purification
- The Scape-goat, the
Red Heifer, and the Living Bird Dipped in Blood --Analogy between the red heifer, the
scape-goat, and the living bird let loose in cleansing the leper
- These Sacrifices
Defiled Those Who Took Part In Them --Why was the heifer wholly burnt?
- Significance
of the Red Heifer --Meaning of the use of the ashes of the red heifer--Rabbinical
tradition about Solomon's ignorance of the meaning of this rite
- The Sacrifice of the
Red Heifer --Selection of the red heifer--Ceremonial in its sacrifice and
burning--Selection of one so free from suspicion of defilement as to administer this
purification
- Children Used in
the Offering --Children kept in special localities for that purpose--Ceremonial
connected with the purification--How many red heifers had been offered from the time of
Moses
- Purification of the
Leper --Symbolical meaning of leprosy--Lepers admitted to special places in the
synagogue
- Examination of
the Leper --How the priests were to examine and pronounce judgment on leprosy
- Right Meaning of
Leviticus 13:12, 13
- The Mishnah
--Two-fold rites in restoring the healed leper--First, or social stage of purification
- The Second Stage
--Second stage after seven days' seclusion--The rites to be observed in it --Rabbinical
account of the service
- Purification from
Suspicion of Adultery --The meat-offering at the purification of a wife suspected of
adultery--Symbolical meaning of it--The priest warns the woman of the danger of
perjury--The words of the curse written upon the roll, washed in water from the
laver--This mixture, with dust of the sanctuary, drunk by the woman
- Regulations as
Given in the Mishnah --In what cases alone the Rabbis allowed this trial--How the
accused appeared dressed in the Temple--How she had to drink the bitter water--Divine
judgments upon the guilty--Cessation of this rite shortly after the death of our
Lord--Remarks of the Mishnah in recording this fact.