Leviticus 13:1 - Meaning and Application

I. About the disease of leprosy, we can notice several things in general.

1. It was treated more as ceremonial uncleanness than as a medical illness. At least, the law dealt with it that way, so priests, not physicians, handled it. Scripture says Christ cleansed lepers, not simply that he cured them. We do not read of anyone dying from leprosy, but it seems to have made people like the living dead, cut off from everyone except others who were infected.

There is a tradition that Pharaoh, the king who tried to kill Moses, was the first person struck with this disease, and that he died from it. It is also said to have begun in Egypt and then spread into Syria. Moses knew it well when he put his hand into his coat and took it out leprous.

2. It was seen as a plague sent directly by God, not a disease that came only from natural causes like other illnesses. Because of that, it had to be handled by a divine law. Miriam’s leprosy, Gehazi’s, and King Uzziah’s were all punishments for specific sins. If this was often the case, it is no surprise that such care was taken to distinguish it from an ordinary illness, so no one would be treated as carrying this special sign of God’s anger unless he truly did.

3. This plague is not known in the world today. What people now call leprosy is a very different disease. This seems to have been a special judgment for the sinners of those times and places. The Jews kept the idol worship they had learned in Egypt, and so God justly allowed this, along with some other Egyptian diseases, to follow them. Still, we do read of Naaman the Syrian, who was a leper (2 Kings 5:1).

4. There were other skin eruptions that looked much like leprosy, but were not leprosy. These could make a person sore and disgusting, yet still not make him ceremonially unclean. Our bodies are rightly called weak and miserable bodies, because they carry the seeds of so many diseases, and so many lives are made bitter by them.

5. The judgment of leprosy was left to the priests. Lepers were seen as marked out by God’s justice, and so it was left to his servants, the priests, who might best know his sign, to decide who was a leper and who was not. Jewish writers say that any priest, even one who could not serve at the sanctuary because of a bodily defect, could judge leprosy as long as his defect was not in his eye. They also say he could take an ordinary man to help inspect the case, but only the priest could pronounce the verdict.

6. Leprosy was a picture of the moral uncleanness of sin in the human heart. Sin is the leprosy of the soul. It defiles the conscience, and only Christ can cleanse us from it. In this, his grace is far greater than the legal priesthood. The priest could only expose the leper, for the law gives the knowledge of sin, but Christ can heal the leper, because he can take away sin. “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean” was more than the priests could do (Matthew 8:2).

Some think leprosy pictured not sin in general, but a settled state of sin that separates people from God, since their spot is not the spot of God’s children, as well as open, shameful sin that should keep people from the fellowship of the faithful. It is a very important, but very hard, work to judge our spiritual condition. We all have reason to suspect ourselves, since we know our own sores and spots, but the question is whether we are clean or unclean. A person might have a scab (Leviticus 13:6) and still be clean. The best believers still have weaknesses. But just as there were marks that showed when it really was leprosy, so there are marks of those who are in bitterness of soul because of sin. Ministers are to declare the judgment of leprosy and help those who suspect themselves test their spiritual state, either forgiving or retaining sin. That is why the keys of the kingdom of heaven are said to be given to them, because they must separate the precious from the worthless, and decide who may come as clean to the holy things and who, as unclean, must be kept away.

II. Several rules are given here to guide the priest’s judgment.

1. If the sore was only on the skin, there was hope that it was not leprosy (Leviticus 13:4). But if it went deeper than the skin, the man had to be declared unclean (Leviticus 13:3). Weaknesses that can exist with grace do not go deep into the soul. The mind still serves God’s law, and the inward person delights in it (Romans 7:22, Romans 7:25). But if the trouble is really deeper than it looks, and the inward parts are infected, the case is serious.

2. If the sore stopped and did not spread, it was not leprosy (Leviticus 13:4, Leviticus 13:5). But if it spread widely, and kept spreading after several inspections, the case was bad (Leviticus 13:7, Leviticus 13:8). If people do not keep growing worse, and their sins are checked, there is hope they will grow better. But if sin keeps gaining ground, and they get worse every day, they are going downhill.

3. If there was proud, raw flesh in the swelling, the priest did not need to wait any longer. It was certainly leprosy (Leviticus 13:10, Leviticus 13:11). Nothing shows more clearly that a person is in a bad spiritual state than a proud heart, trust in the flesh, and resistance to the rebukes of the word and the work of the Spirit.

4. If the eruption, whatever it was, covered the whole skin from head to foot, it was not leprosy (Leviticus 13:12, Leviticus 13:13). This showed that the vital parts were still sound and strong, and that nature was helping itself by pushing out what was harmful. There is hope in smallpox when it comes out well. In the same way, if people freely confess their sins and do not hide them, they are in less danger than those who cover their sins. Some take this to mean there is more hope for the openly sinful than for hypocrites. Tax collectors and prostitutes went into the kingdom of heaven before scribes and Pharisees. In one sense, sudden outbursts of passion, though very bad, are not as dangerous as hidden malice. Others take it to mean this, if we judge ourselves, we will not be judged. If we see and admit that there is no health in us, no soundness in our flesh because of sin, we will find grace in the Lord’s eyes.

5. The priest had to take time before making his judgment and not decide rashly. If the case looked doubtful, he had to shut the patient away for seven days, and then for seven more, so his judgment would be true. This teaches both ministers and people not to be quick in their condemnations, and not to judge anything before the proper time. Some people’s sins are plain before judgment, and others are only seen later, and so are their good works. Therefore, nothing should be done too quickly (1 Timothy 5:22, 1 Timothy 5:24, 1 Timothy 5:25).

6. If the suspected person was found clean, he still had to wash his clothes (Leviticus 13:6), because he had been under suspicion, and there had been something in him that gave rise to that suspicion.

Even a prisoner who is found innocent must still go down on his knees. In the same way, we all need to be washed clean in the blood of Christ from our stains, even if they are not leprosy spots. No one can say, “I am pure from sin,” though by God’s grace some are kept from the great transgression.