Leviticuschapter 12
8 verses · Moses, by tradition · 15th to 13th century BC · The Law
Key verse
When the days of her purification are complete, whether for a son or for a daughter, she is to bring to the priest at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting a year-old lamb for a burnt offering and a young pigeon or a turtledove for a sin offering.
It stands in A lamb: or two birds if she is poor, verses 6 to 8.
The chapter
Chapter summary
Purification after childbirth. A woman who bears a man-child is unclean seven days, her separation thirty-three days; a maid-child, fourteen and sixty-six days. At the end, she brings a lamb of the first year for a burnt offering and a young pigeon or turtledove for a sin offering; if she cannot afford a lamb, two turtledoves or two young pigeons. Atonement is made and she is clean. Luke 2:22–24 records Mary's offering of the two birds. The poor woman's offering. At Jesus' presentation. The chapter normalises the ordinary events of human life into the regime of holiness.
Context
Law · Moses · Leviticus overview
The world of this chapter
- Who
- Women bearing children in a camp, and the households that had to know when the mother could handle sacred things again
- Where
- An ordinary household in the camp, and then the entrance to the Tent of Meeting on the day the waiting ends
- When
- Israel encamped at Sinai, within the purity instructions given after the priesthood was installed. c. 1445 BC, in the second year after the Exodus, on the traditional dating that follows the book's own setting
Historical context
The speech is given to Moses alone, unlike chapter 11 before it and chapter 13 after it, both of which are addressed to Moses and Aaron together.
Childbirth in this world happened at home, attended by women, with no physician involved. The forty or eighty days the chapter counts are therefore a household matter, and the only public act in it is the offering at the end.
A first hearer knew that verse 2 was measuring by a rule he already had, the seven days of a woman's period, which Leviticus 15:19 states. The chapter takes that measure as known and does not repeat it.
He also knew what the restriction at verse 4 cost. Not touching anything sacred and not entering the sanctuary meant that for more than a month a mother stood outside the one place where the nation met God, at exactly the moment she had most reason to give thanks.
The offering at verse 6 names a real price. A year-old lamb was a substantial animal for a household, and verse 8 exists because the law was written with families who could not produce one in view.
Circumcision on the eighth day at verse 3 was already the household's practice, set for Abraham at Genesis 17:12, and this is the only place in Leviticus that commands it.
Significance
The chapter told a family exactly when ordinary life resumed and when the mother could come back to the sanctuary, which in a camp organised around a tent was a practical question rather than a ceremonial one.
The sin offering at verse 6 was required and no sin was named, which taught a first hearer that uncleanness and guilt were separate categories. Nothing in bearing a child was treated as a fault.
Verse 8 made the end of the waiting reachable for everyone. A woman who could bring two birds was cleansed on the same terms as a woman who could bring a lamb.
Where the chapter sits
Leviticus 12 falls in Laws of clean and unclean (chapters 11–15). Diet, childbirth, skin disease, mildew in garments and houses, bodily discharges, holiness traced through ordinary life.
Before it: Consecration of the priesthood, chapters 8–10. After it: Day of Atonement, chapters 16.
The whole shape of Leviticus→The structure of this chapter
People1
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
Days of purifying after a birth
Chapter 11 was spoken to Moses and Aaron together, and this one is spoken to Moses alone. The mother's seven days of uncleanness and her three and thirty days of purifying make forty in total. The one instruction here addressed to anyone but her is the circumcision of her son at verse 3, and John Gill ties that eighth day to the morning after her first seven end. Luke 2:21 records the eighth day kept for Jesus.
Leviticus 12:1
“And the Lord spake unto Moses,.... The laws in the preceding chapter were delivered both to Moses and Aaron, but what follows in this only to Moses; but inasmuch as the priest had a concern in it, it being his business to offer the sacrifices required by the following law, it was no doubt given to Moses, to be delivered to Aaron, as well as to the people. R.”
1 more voice on this verseWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Leviticus 12:1
“This chapter would more naturally follow the 15th chapter of Leviticus. See the note to Lev 15:1.”
Leviticus 12:2
“Seven days - Not for any filthiness which was either in the conception, or in bringing forth, but to signify the universal and deep pollution of man's nature, even from the birth, and from the conception. Seven days or thereabouts, nature is employed in the purgation of most women.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Leviticus 12:3
“And in the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised. Or the foreskin of his flesh, that is, of the man child born according to the law, Gen 17:12 and this seems to furnish out a reason why a male child was not circumcised before the eighth day, and why it was then, because before that its mother was in her separation and uncleanness, and then was freed from it; and so the Targum of Jonathan.”
Leviticus 12:4
“In the blood of her purifying - In her polluted and separated estate; for the word blood or bloods signifies both guilt, and uncleanness, as here and elsewhere. And it is called the blood of her purifying, because by the expulsion or purgation of that blood, which is done by degrees, she is purified.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Leviticus 12:4
“Why the time of both those was double for a female to what it was for a male I can assign no reason but the will of the Law-maker; in Christ Jesus no difference is made of male and female, Gal. iii. But this ceremonial uncleanness which the law laid women in child-bed under was to signify the pollution of sin which we are all conceived and born in, Ps. li.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Leviticus 12:5-7
Every number doubles for a daughter, two weeks against one and threescore and six days against three and thirty, and the text gives no reason for it. Matthew Henry wrote that he could assign no reason but the will of the Law-maker, and Adam Clarke called the difference difficult to account for. What is asked at verse 6 is the same either way, a lamb for a burnt offering and a bird for a sin offering, so the doubling falls on the waiting rather than on the sacrifice. A sin offering is required and no sin is named anywhere in the chapter, which is why Henry offers two readings of it and settles on neither.
Leviticus 12:5
“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. 1Ti 2:13-15; 1Pe 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.”
1 more voice on this verse
Leviticus 12:5
“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.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
A lamb: or two birds if she is poor
Leviticus 12:6
“For a son or a daughter - For the birth of a son, or of a daughter: but the purification was for herself, as appears from the following verses. A sin-offering - Because of her ceremonial uncleanness, which required a ceremonial expiation.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
The last verse lowers the price. A woman who cannot afford a lamb brings two turtledoves or two young pigeons, and one bird then does the work the lamb would have done. Luke 2:22-24 has Mary and Joseph at the temple bringing exactly that pair, which places the household Jesus was born into on the lower line of this verse. Adam Clarke said it plainly, that the heir to the throne of David was not able to bring a lamb.
Leviticus 12:8
“And if she be not able to bring a lamb, then she shall bring two turtles, or two young pigeons - As the Virgin Mary brought only the latter, hence it is evident that she was not able, i. e., she was not rich enough to provide the former; for such a holy woman would not have brought the less offering had she been capable of bringing the greater. How astonishing is this! The only heir to the throne of David was not able to bring a lamb to offer in sacrifice to God!”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Cross references
Leviticus 12:8
- Quoted inLuke 2:24and to offer the sacrifice specified in the Law of the Lord: “A pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.”
'A pair of turtledoves', purification offering
Keep studying
On this page
Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: The Pentateuch and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.