Commentaria in Numeros
“One of the sailors was ordered to climb the mast to observe what region they were holding; and when he said that a ruined sepulchre faced the prow, he took it as an ill omen,” namely Hannibal. From the same rite it came about that the “god Viduus” was worshipped by them outside the city, as St. Cyprian testifies, in his book On the Vanity of Idols: “So far,” he says, “are the names of gods invented among the Romans, that among them there is even a god Viduus, who widows the body of its soul, who, as being deadly and funereal, is not kept within the walls but is placed outside.” Theodoret touches upon this superstition of the ancients, book VIII, On the Cure of Greek Maladies.
It is otherwise among Christians, who have their sepulchres near the churches, that they may pray for the dead, and that they may keep perpetually before their eyes the image and hope of death and resurrection.
Tropologically, corpses are sins. Hence St. Paul, Hebrews 9:14, calls sins “dead works.” Whence Chrysostom, homily 15 on John: “If anyone in old times touched a dead man, he was defiled; and here, if anyone touches a dead work, that is, sin—he is defiled through the conscience.” Likewise: “If he who touched a dead body might not enter the temple, how much less he who has dead works? for the contamination is the worst”; let him therefore wash himself at once by confession, and not touch the dead again, that is, not return to sin. And again: “It is said,” he says, “that a plague, when it is bred, corrupts bodies; such is sin: it differs in nothing from a plague, not because it first corrupts the air and then bodies, but because it leaps at once into the soul,” etc. What can be imagined more foul than vomit, or more loathsome and horrible to eat? Such is he who returns to sin. Whence Proverbs 26: “As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is the fool that repeats his folly.”
OF SIN (that is, of the heifer burnt to expiate legal sins: hence the heifer is here called sin, by metonymy), AND THEY SHALL PUT LIVING WATERS UPON THEM (the ashes).—Living waters are those which move and flow, as fountains and rivers; dead waters are those which stand and stagnate.
20. IF ANY MAN BE NOT EXPIATED BY THIS RITE, HIS SOUL SHALL PERISH.—Note: the uncleanness of him who touched a corpse lasted only seven days, after which it of itself expired and ceased, says Abulensis. For this is what is said in verse 16: “He shall be unclean seven days.” But the contrary is truer, namely that this uncleanness did not cease except by the expiation of the water of ashes. For verse 13 says: “He that is not sprinkled with the water of expiation shall be unclean, and his uncleanness shall remain upon him.” He who was unclean ought therefore to purify himself with this water of ashes; and if he despised it, he was punished with death for the violated law of God, either by the judges, if the matter was established, or by God himself, if it was hidden. But if through forgetfulness he had omitted this expiation of himself, and afterwards remembered it, he was bound to offer the sacrifice for his offence prescribed in Leviticus 5:3 and 5; if he did not remember, it was not imputed to him for punishment. So Abulensis.
Abulensis notes, Question 21, that the Jews no longer keep any expiations, nor are they bound by them, even though they persist in Judaism and in their erroneous conscience, by which they suppose themselves still held by the ancient laws. For these expiations were prescribed in relation to the Sanctuary, namely that they should not approach it except clean or expiated; but now they have no Sanctuary. Secondly, because this red heifer, from which the water of purification was made, had to be sacrificed by a priest in the place where the temple was, and its blood sprinkled toward the temple; but now they have neither priests nor temple: wherefore they cannot sacrifice this red heifer. For the same cause the Jews did not keep these purifications in the Babylonian captivity; for in it the temple was overthrown.
21. EVERY ONE THAT TOUCHES THE WATERS OF EXPIATION SHALL BE UNCLEAN UNTIL EVENING.—“Every one”; therefore the sprinkler also was unclean, and even he himself who was sprinkled with this water was indeed cleansed from the former uncleanness, for example of a corpse, but contracted another from the touch of this water, by which he was reckoned unclean until the evening, as is plain from verse 17. So Abulensis. This water was therefore at once expiatory and unclean; just as lye, though it is unclean, yet cleanses cloths.
22. WHATSOEVER THE UNCLEAN PERSON TOUCHES, HE SHALL MAKE IT UNCLEAN.—“Unclean,” not legally; for so this uncleanness would at once have pervaded all the Jews; but naturally, as only lepers, those with an issue of seed, and women in their courses were. For whatever these touched they made unclean; but if anyone touched these unclean things further, he did not thereby become unclean, as I said in Leviticus. So Abulensis. But because lepers, those with an issue and women in their courses are not treated of here, nor is any mention made of them in this chapter, Lyranus more truly refers this to him who is unclean from the touch of the waters of ashes, or of expiation. For these words are to be referred to what immediately precedes, where it is said: “Every one that touches the waters of expiation shall be unclean until evening.” Then it is added: “Whatsoever the unclean person (namely the one just mentioned, that is, from the touch of the water of expiation) touches, he shall make unclean,” so that he breathes upon and communicates his uncleanness to another who touches him; for this is what is added.
AND THE PERSON THAT TOUCHES ANY OF THESE THINGS SHALL BE UNCLEAN UNTIL EVENING.—“Of these,” namely those mentioned in this chapter, that is, the red heifer, its blood, the ashes, the water of purification. For whoever touched these were unclean until evening, as was said in verses 7, 10 and 21. So Abulensis. But because this verse depends on the preceding and as it were answers to it in like manner, therefore, secondly, Lyranus rightly says: He who touches anything of these, namely which the unclean person has touched (who is unclean from the touch of the waters of purification), shall by the touch of them be unclean until evening. For these waters, being of ashes and made from the burning of the dung and skin of the heifer, though they were expiatory, were nevertheless reckoned unclean, so that whoever touched them was not only unclean himself, but also spread his uncleanness to all things which he touched, so that he who in turn touched what had been touched by him and thus polluted, was polluted, and became unclean until evening. That this is the sense is plain both from the connection of the sentences and from the Hebrew and Chaldee text, which admit no other sense. Note: this uncleanness ceased of itself at evening, without any other expiation; otherwise there would have been an endless progress in expiations. So Lyranus.
Finally, the Hebrews hand down, and the Burgensis among them, that only six red heifers were sacrificed through the whole duration of both temples: namely the first, in the time of Moses by Eleazar, of which mention is made here, and its ashes lasted through the whole first temple; the second, in the time of Esdras, at the beginning of the second temple; and that Simeon the Just sacrificed two others at different times (for he was high priest for eighty years); and finally that two more were sacrificed by John the high priest, who was the father of Mathathias, from whom the Machabees descended. But it is hard to believe that the ashes of one heifer, to be scattered through so many, should have sufficed for so great, that is, so countless a multitude of Jews; for the ashes of a single heifer were distributed through all Judea. For single Jews frequently used them for their expiation. Wherefore it is more probable, as Lyranus says, that one red heifer was sacrificed every year.