Chapter commentary
Leviticus Chapter 12
1
Le 12:1-8.
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2. If a woman, &c.--The mother of a boy was ceremonially unclean for a week, at the end of which the child was circumcised
(Ge 17:12; Ro 4:11-13);
the mother of a girl for two weeks
(Le 12:5)
--a stigma on the sex
(1Ti 2:14, 15)
for sin, which was removed by Christ; everyone who came near her during that time contracted a similar defilement. After these periods, visitors might approach her though she was still excluded from the public ordinances of religion
[Le 12:4].
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6-8. the days of her purifying--Though the occasion was of a festive character, yet the sacrifices appointed were not a peace offering, but a burnt offering and sin offering, in order to impress the mind of the parent with recollections of the origin of sin, and that the child inherited a fallen and sinful nature. The offerings were to be presented the day after the period of her separation had ended--that is, forty-first for a boy, eighty-first for a girl.
8
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8. bring two turtles, &c.--(See on
Le 5:6).
This was the offering made by Mary, the mother of Jesus, and it affords an incontestable proof of the poor and humble condition of the family
(Lu 2:22-24).
Le 12:1-8.
WOMAN'S UNCLEANNESS BY CHILDBIRTH.