Parashat Metzora

Purification of One with Tza’arat

14 Then Adonai spoke to Moses, saying: ² “This is the Torah of the one with tza’arat in the day of his cleansing. He should be brought to the kohen, ^{[a] 3} and the kohen is to go to the outside of the camp. The kohen is to examine him, and behold, if the mark of tza’arat is healed in one with tza’arat, ⁴ then the kohen is to command that two clean living birds, cedar wood, scarlet and hyssop be brought for the one being cleansed. ⁵ The kohen should command them to kill one of the birds in a clay pot over living water. ⁶ As for the living bird, he is to take it, the cedar wood, the scarlet and the hyssop, and dip them with the living bird into the blood of the bird that was killed over the living water. ⁷ He is to sprinkle on the one being cleansed from the tza’arat seven times and pronounce him clean, then release the living bird over the open field.

⁸ “The one to be cleansed must wash his clothes, shave off all his hair, and bathe himself in water. Then he should be clean. After that he may come into the camp, but is to dwell outside his tent for seven days. ⁹ Then on the seventh day, he is to shave all his hair from his head, his beard, and his eyebrows—he must shave off all his hair. He is to wash his clothes, and bathe his body in water. Then he will be clean.

¹⁰ “On the eighth day he is to take two male lambs without blemish, a one-year-old ewe lamb without blemish, three tenths of a pint of fine flour as a grain offering, mingled with oil, and a pint of oil. ¹¹ The kohen who cleanses him is to set the man who to be cleansed along with those items before Adonai, at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting. ¹² The kohen should then take one of the male lambs, and offer it for a trespass offering, with the pint of oil, and wave them as a wave offering before Adonai.