1 And the LORD {YHWH, Divine Speaker} spoke to Moses and to Aaron {Aharon: priestly brother}, saying,
2 This is the statute of the instruction which the LORD {YHWH, Divine Lawgiver} has commanded, saying, Speak to the sons of Israel, that they may take for you a red heifer {parah adumah: sacrificial heifer}, perfect, in which there is no blemish and upon which no yoke has ever come.
3 And you shall give her to Eleazar the priest {hak-kohen: anointed minister}, and he shall bring her outside the camp, and he shall slaughter her before him {lefanav: in his presence}.
4 Then Eleazar {Elazar: Sanctuary Servant} the priest shall take some of its blood on his finger and sprinkle {hizzah: ritual purification} the blood seven times toward the front of the tent of meeting.
5 And he shall burn the cow {parah: red heifer} before his eyes; its skin, its flesh, and its blood he shall burn upon its dung {pirshah: refuse}.
6 And the priest {hakohein: sanctuary official} shall take cedar wood and hyssop and scarlet yarn {tolaʻat: worm-derived crimson} and throw them into the midst of the heifer’s burning.
7 And the priest {kohen: ritual mediator} shall wash his garments {beged: outer clothing}, and he shall bathe his flesh in water; afterward, he may come into the camp, but the priest shall remain unclean until the evening.
8 And the one who burns it must wash his clothes {beged: outer garment} in water and bathe his body {basar: flesh} in water, and he will be unclean until the evening.
9 And a man who is clean shall gather the ashes of the heifer {happarah: red heifer} and deposit them outside the camp in a clean place; and they shall be kept for the congregation of the sons of Israel as a reserve for water of impurity, a sin-offering {chatat: purification offering}.
10 And the one who gathers the ashes of the cow shall wash his garments, and he shall be unclean {tame: ritually impure} until the evening. It shall be for the sons of Israel and for the sojourner who sojourns among them as an everlasting statute {olam: perpetual, unending}.
11 Whoever touches a corpse {met: dead body} of any person shall be unclean {tame: ritually impure} for seven days.
12 He shall purify himself with it {bo: cleansing water} on the third day and on the seventh day, and he shall be clean {yithar: ritually acceptable}; but if he does not purify himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he shall not be clean.
13 Every person who touches a corpse without purifying himself defiles the tabernacle of the LORD {YHWH, Holy Presence}; and that soul {nefesh: essential life} shall be cut off from Israel because the water of impurity was not sprinkled on him. He will remain unclean, for his uncleanness is still upon him.
14 This is the law {torah: divine instruction} when a person dies in a tent: Everyone who enters the tent, and everyone already in the tent, will be unclean {yitma: ceremonially impure} for seven days.
15 And every open vessel which has no covering {tsamid: protective seal} fastened upon it is unclean {tame: ritually impure}.
16 And anyone who touches, on the surface of the field, one slain{chalal: violently slain} by the sword, or a dead body, or a bone, or a grave{kaver: burial site}, shall be unclean for seven days.
17 And they shall take for the unclean person {latame: one made ritually impure} from the ashes of the burned sin-offering, and they shall put living water {mayim chayyim: flowing water} into a vessel.
18 And a man who is clean {tahor: ritually pure} shall take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle it on the tent and on all the vessels {keilim: implements}, on the persons who were there, and on the one who touched the bone or the slain or the dead or the grave.
19 And the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean {tame: ritually defiled} on the third day and on the seventh day, and on the seventh day he shall cleanse him. Then the unclean person shall wash his garments {beged: outer clothing} and bathe in water, and he shall be clean at evening.
20 And any man who becomes unclean and does not purify himself shall be cut off from the midst of the assembly, because he has defiled the sanctuary of the LORD {YHWH, Holy One}; the water of impurity {mei-niddah: ritual cleansing} was not sprinkled upon him; he is unclean.
21 And it shall be for them a statute forever, and the one who sprinkles the water of impurity {mei haniddah: ritual cleansing water} shall wash his clothes, and the one who touches the water of impurity will be unclean until evening {erev: sunset period}.
22 And everything that the unclean {tame: ritually impure} person touches shall become unclean, and the soul {nefesh: life as whole being} who touches it shall be unclean until the evening.