House Pox - Leviticus 14:33-57

14:33-57 - The rest of chapter 14 deals with “leprosy” or “infections” within someone’s house. The interesting aspect of this is that this law was given only a year after the people left Egypt while they were still living in tents. So they would have looked at this law as only something that was going to apply to them in the future, something that demonstrated to them that they were going to, at some point, experience the fulfillment of God’s promises to them. This is pretty applicable in my own life, I need to focus more on the promises that God’s made and look forward to them being fulfilled instead of being angry or bitter than they haven’t been yet. Something I definitely needed to think about today.

There are some characteristics of this “iinfection” that were required to qualify it as that, like the color which I think was pink or green, the depth of the spots infected, it had to be seen on at least 2 bricks, and it had to be a certain size. Interestingly, according to TB the size required was about the size of a penny, which I didn’t think was very big especially considering how wide spread a mold infestation can be. The priest goes to the empty house to see if it fits the criteria, and if it does then the house is shut for 7 days, and then the priest comes back to see if it’s spread. If it has spread then the affected parts are removed, scraped, and cleaned. If it comes back a second time then the house has to be destroyed.

Once the affected parts of the house are repaired and the priest pronounces it clean, then the cleansing ritual is the same as if a person had had the infection, two birds, one is sacrificed and one is set free, etc. just like we talked about yesterday.

To me this is all a public health issue, but TB keeps bringing up the fact that these were afflictions sent from God to punish people for their secret sins and unworthiness. I don’t know if he’s saying that is fact or if he’s just explaining it from the Hebrews’ perspective, but it’s interesting to think about. I outright reject it as something that happens now but if it did happen back then, it's interesting as a thought experiement.