Imamat 13:40

Baldness on the Head

13:40 “When a man’s head is bare so that he is balding in back, ¹  he is clean.

Yeremia 7:29

7:29 So, mourn, ²  you people of this nation. ³  Cut off your hair and throw it away. Sing a song of mourning on the hilltops. For the Lord has decided to reject ⁴  and forsake this generation that has provoked his wrath!’” ⁵ 

[13:40]  ¹ tn Heb “And a man, when his head is rubbed bare, he is bald-headed.” The translation offered here, referring to the back of the head (i.e., the area from the top of the head sloping backwards), is based on the contrast between this condition and that of the following verse. See also B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 82.

[7:29]  ² tn The word “mourn” is not in the text. It is supplied in the translation for clarity to explain the significance of the words “Cut your hair and throw it away.”

[7:29]  sn Cf. Mic 1:16; Job 1:20 for other examples of this practice which was involved in mourning.

[7:29]  ³ tn The words, “you people of this nation” are not in the text. Many English versions supply, “Jerusalem.” The address shifts from second masculine singular addressing Jeremiah (vv. 27-28a) to second feminine singular. It causes less disruption in the flow of the context to see the nation as a whole addressed here as a feminine singular entity (as, e.g., in 2:19, 23; 3:2, 3; 6:26) than to introduce a new entity, Jerusalem.

[7:29]  ⁴ tn The verbs here are the Hebrew scheduling perfects. For this use of the perfect see GKC 312 §106.m.

[7:29]  ⁵ tn Heb “the generation of his wrath.”