Leviticus 6:11

And he shall put off his garments, and put on other garments, and carry forth the ashes without the camp unto a clean place.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(11) And he shall put off his garments.—That is, the priest shall change the sacred robes in which he ministered at the altar; for other garments, though less holy, were not common, since the removing of the ashes was still a sacerdotal function. The holy garments were deposited in the cells within the precincts of the sanctuary, till they were required again for the altar service (Ezekiel 44:19; Ezra 2:6; Ezra 2:9; Nehemiah 7:70). Great care was taken that the place to which the ashes were removed was well sheltered, so that the wind should not blow them about. The priest was not allowed to scatter them, but had to deposit them gently. No stranger was permitted to gather them, or to make profit by the ashes.

Benson Commentary

Leviticus 6:11. Other garments — Because this was no sacred, but a common work. A clean place — Where no dung or filth was laid. The priest himself was to do all this. God’s servants must think nothing below them but sin.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

6:8-13 The daily sacrifice of a lamb is chiefly referred to. The priest must take care of the fire upon the altar. The first fire upon the altar came from heaven, ch. 9:24; by keeping that up continually, all their sacrifices might be said to be consumed with the fire from heaven, in token of God's acceptance. Thus should the fire of our holy affections, the exercise of our faith and love, of prayer and praise, be without ceasing.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Ashes ... with the burnt-offering - Rather, the ashes to which the fire hath consumed the burnt-offering.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

9. Command Aaron and his sons, saying, This … law of the burnt offering—In this passage Moses received instructions to be delivered to the priests respecting their official duties, and first the burnt offering—Hebrew, "a sacrifice, which went up in smoke." The daily service consisted of two lambs, one offered in the morning at sunrise, the other in the evening, when the day began to decline. Both of them were consumed on the altar by means of a slow fire, before which the pieces of the sacrifice were so placed that they fed it all night. At all events, the observance of this daily sacrifice on the altar of burnt offering was a daily expression of national repentance and faith. The fire that consumed these sacrifices had been kindled from heaven at the consecration of the tabernacle [Le 9:24], and to keep it from being extinguished and the sacrifices from being burned with common fire, strict injunctions are here given respecting not only the removal of the ashes [Le 6:10, 11], but the approaching near to the fireplace in garments that were not officially "holy."

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Put on other garments, because this was no sacred, but a common work.

Unto a clean place, where no dung or filth was laid. See Leviticus 4:12, and compare Leviticus 14:40,41.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And he shall put off his garments,.... Those before mentioned, he is said to put on:

and put on other garments; not common garments or lay-habits, what the priests wore when they were not on duty; for, as Ben Gersom says, these were priestly garments, though meaner than the first, or those that were put off: and so Jarchi says, they were worse than they were: it seems as if they were such that were spotted and dirty, and threadbare, almost worn out, and only fit for such sort of work as to carry out ashes: and so Maimonides (w) observes, that these other garments are not to be understood of common garments; but of such that are meaner in value and esteem, for both are holy garments; and, indeed, nothing belonging to the priestly office was to be performed but with the priestly garments, and they were only to be worn by the priests while in service:

and carry forth the ashes; when these, gathered on a heap, were become large, as Jarchi says, and there was no room for the pile of wood, they carried them out from thence; and this, he observes, was not obligatory every day, but the taking of them up, as in the preceding verse Leviticus 6:10, they were bound to every day: and these they carried

without the camp, unto a clean place; for though they were ashes, yet being ashes of holy things, were not to be laid in an unclean place, or where unclean things were: as the burnt offering was a type of Christ in his sufferings and death, enduring the fire of divine wrath in the room and stead of his people; so the carrying forth the ashes of the burnt offering, and laying them in a clean place, may denote the burial of the body of Christ without the city of Jerusalem, wrapped in a clean linen cloth and laid in a new tomb, wherein no man had been laid, Matthew 27:59.

(w) In Misn. Tamid, c. 5. sect. 3.

Geneva Study Bible

And he shall put off his garments, and put on other garments, and carry forth the ashes without the camp unto a clean place.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

11. beside the altar] on the east part (Leviticus 1:16, there called the place of the ashes).

put off his garments] Cp. Ezekiel 44:19 for the reason. For the danger to unconsecrated persons arising from what has been called ‘contagious holiness’ as a feature of early religions see Rob.-Sm. Rel. Sem.2 pp. 46 ff. See further on Leviticus 6:18.

put on other garments] The priestly garments were worn only at the altar and in the tabernacle. On going without the sacred precincts they were removed. Cp. Ezekiel 44:19.

without the camp] to the place whither parts of the Sin-Offering for ‘the anointed priest’ and for ‘the whole congregation’ were taken (Leviticus 4:12; Leviticus 4:21).

Leviticus 6:11

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

In the morning of every day the priest was to put on his linen dress (see Exodus 28:42) and the white drawers, and lift off, i.e., clear away, the ashes to which the fire had consumed the burnt-offering upon the altar (אכל is construed with a double accusative, to consume the sacrifice to ashes), and pour them down beside the altar (see Leviticus 1:16). The ו in מדּו is not to be regarded as the old form of the connecting vowel, as in Genesis 1:24 (Ewald, 211 b; see Ges. 90, 3b), but as the suffix, as in 2 Samuel 20:8, although the use of the suffix with the governing noun in the construct state can only be found in other cases in the poetical writings (cf. Ges. 121 b; Ewald, 291 b). He was then to take off his official dress, and having put on other (ordinary) clothes, to take away the ashes from the court, and carry them out of the camp to a clean place. The priest was only allowed to approach the altar in his official dress; but he could not go out of the camp with this.