Leviticus 13:39

Then the priest shall look: and, behold, if the bright spots in the skin of their flesh be darkish white; it is a freckled spot that groweth in the skin; he is clean.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(39) Then the priest shall look.—If the priest, upon examination, finds that these elevated spots are of a dull or palish white colour, then he is to pronounce the patient clean, that is, free of leprosy, since it is simply a white eruption or tetter, which lasts for a few months, causes no inconvenience, and by degrees disappears of itself. Hence it is called bahack, or “white scurf,” and not leprosy. This nameless disorder, which still prevails in the East, is to this day called by the Biblical name bahack.

Benson Commentary

Leviticus 13:39; Leviticus 13:42. If the spots be darkish white — When there was no other symptom but that of whiteness in the skin, the priest was to be cautious not to pronounce it a leprosy, unless the spots were perfectly bright; for if there was any cloudiness in them, it was not a leprosy. And he is informed that a man’s losing his hair by sickness or age, which made him bald, must not be taken for a sign of leprosy. But, (Leviticus 13:42,) If there were a white reddish sore — It was a sign that such baldness came not from age, nor any accident, but from the leprosy.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

13:18-44 The priest is told what judgment to make, if there were any appearance of a leprosy in old sores; and such is the danger of those who having escaped the pollutions of the world are again entangled therein. Or, in a burn by accident, ver. 24. The burning of strife and contention often occasions the rising and breaking out of that corruption, which proves that men are unclean. Human life lies exposed to many grievances. With what troops of diseases are we beset on every side; and thy all entered by sin! If the constitution be healthy, and the body lively and easy, we are bound to glorify God with our bodies. Particular note was taken of the leprosy, if in the head. If the leprosy of sin has seized the head; if the judgment be corrupted, and wicked principles, which support wicked practices, are embraced, it is utter uncleanness, from which few are cleansed. Soundness in the faith keeps leprosy from the head.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Freckled spot - If Leviticus 13:12 refers to the Lepra commonis, the Hebrew בהק bôhaq here may denote some kind of eczema, a skin disease of a somewhat similar external character.

Leviticus 13:38, Leviticus 13:39 would seem more in their natural place between Leviticus 13:17-18.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

38, 39. If a man … or a woman have in the skin of their flesh bright spots—This modification of the leprosy is distinguished by a dull white color, and it is entirely a cutaneous disorder, never injuring the constitution. It is described as not penetrating below the skin of the flesh and as not rendering necessary an exclusion from society. It is evident, then, that this common form of leprosy is not contagious; otherwise Moses would have prescribed as strict a quarantine in this as in the other cases. And hereby we see the great superiority of the Mosaic law (which so accurately distinguished the characteristics of the leprosy and preserved to society the services of those who were laboring under the uncontagious forms of the disease) over the customs and regulations of Eastern countries in the present day, where all lepers are indiscriminately proscribed and are avoided as unfit for free intercourse with their fellow men.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Darkish white, or contracted, or confined to the place where they are, and white.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Then the priest shall look,.... Upon the man or woman that has these spots, and upon the spots themselves, and examine them of what kind they are:

and, behold, if the bright spots in the skin of their flesh be darkish white; their whiteness is not strong, as Jarchi observes; but dusky and obscure, or "contracted" (w); small white spots, not large and spreading:

it is a freckled spot that grows in the skin; a kind of morphew, which the above writer describes as a sort of whiteness which appears in the flesh of a ruddy man:

he is clean; from leprosy; this is observed, lest a person that is freckled and has a morphew should be mistaken for a leprous person; as every man that has some spots, failings, and infirmities, is not to be reckoned a wicked man.

(w) "costractae", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.

Geneva Study Bible

Then the priest shall look: and, behold, if the bright spots in the skin of their flesh be darkish white; it is a freckled spot that groweth in the skin; he is clean.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Leviticus 13:39

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Harmless leprosy. - This broke out upon the skin of the body in בּהרת plaits, "white rings." If these were dull or a pale white, it was the harmless bohak, ἀλφός (lxx), which did not defile, and which even the Arabs, who still call it bahak, consider harmless. It is an eruption upon the skin, appearing in somewhat elevated spots or rings of inequal sizes and a pale white colour, which do not change the hair; it causes no inconvenience, and lasts from two months to two years.