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Selected Verse: Leviticus 12:5 - King James
Verse |
Translation |
Text |
Le 12:5 |
King James |
But if she bear a maid child, then she shall be unclean two weeks, as in her separation: and she shall continue in the blood of her purifying threescore and six days. |
Summary Of Commentaries Associated With The Selected Verse
Notes on the Bible, by Albert Barnes, [1834] |
Some have thought that this doubling of each of the two periods was intended to remind the people of the fact that woman represents the lower side of human nature, and was the first to fall into temptation. Ti1 2:13-15; Pe1 3:7. The ancients had a notion that the mother suffers for a longer time after the birth of a girl than after the birth of a boy. The period required for the restoration of her health in the one case was thirty days, and in the other, it was 40 or 42 days. This notion may have been connected with a general custom of observing the distinction as early as the time of Moses. |
Commentary on the Old Testament, by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch [1857-78] |
But if she had given birth to a girl, she was to be unclean two weeks (14 days), as in her menstruation, and then after that to remain at home 66 days. The distinction between the seven (or fourteen) days of the "separation for her infirmity," and the thirty-three (or sixty-six) days of the "blood of her purifying," had a natural ground in the bodily secretions connected with child-birth, which are stronger and have more blood in them in the first week (lochia rubra) than the more watery discharge of the lochia alba, which may last as much as five weeks, so that the normal state may not be restored till about six weeks after the birth of the child. The prolongation of the period, in connection with the birth of a girl, was also founded upon the notion, which was very common in antiquity, that the bleeding and watery discharge continued longer after the birth of a girl than after that of a boy (Hippocr. Opp. ed. Khn. i. p. 393; Aristot. h. an. 6, 22; 7, 3, cf. Burdach, Physiologie iii. p. 34). But the extension of the period to 40 and 80 days can only be accounted for from the significance of the numbers, which we meet with repeatedly, more especially the number forty (see at Exo 24:18). |
Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible, by John Wesley [1754-65] |
Threescore and six days - The time in both particulars is double to the former, not so much from natural causes, as to put an honour upon the sacrament of circumcision, which being administered to the males, did put an end to that pollution sooner than otherwise had been. |
7 Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.
13 For Adam was first formed, then Eve.
14 And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.
15 Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety.
18 And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat him up into the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights.