1 The LORD said to Moses and Aaron,
2 "This is the statute of the law the LORD has commanded: Tell the children of Israel to bring you a red heifer, sound, without any defect, that has never been under a yoke.
3 Give it to Eleazar the priest; it is to be taken outside the camp and slaughtered in his presence.
4 Eleazar the priest is to take some of its blood on his finger and sprinkle it seven times toward the front of the tent of meeting.
5 The heifer is to be burned before his eyes—its hide, its flesh, and its blood, together with its dung.
6 The priest is to take cedar wood, hyssop, and scarlet yarn and throw them onto the burning heifer.
7 Then the priest must wash his clothes and bathe his body in water; after that he may come into the camp, but he remains unclean until evening.
8 The man who burns the heifer must also wash his clothes in water and bathe his body in water, and he remains unclean until evening.
9 A man who is clean is to gather up the ashes of the heifer and put them in a clean place outside the camp. They are to be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for the water for impurity; it is a sin offering.
10 The one who gathers the ashes of the heifer must wash his clothes, and he remains unclean until evening. This is a lasting statute for the children of Israel and for the foreigner living among them.
11 "Anyone who touches the dead body of any human being will be unclean for seven days.
12 He must purify himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and then he will be clean. If he does not purify himself on the third day and the seventh day, he will not be clean.
13 Anyone who touches a corpse, the body of a person who has died, and does not purify himself, defiles the LORD's tabernacle; that person shall be cut off from Israel. Because the water for impurity was not sprinkled on him, he is unclean; his uncleanness stays on him.
14 "This is the law when someone dies in a tent: anyone who enters the tent and anyone who is in it will be unclean for seven days,
15 and every open container without a lid tied on it is unclean.
16 In the open country, anyone who touches someone killed by the sword, or someone who has died, or a human bone, or a grave, will be unclean for seven days.
17 "For the unclean person, some of the ashes from the burned sin offering are to be taken and put in a vessel, and fresh running water added to them.
18 Then a man who is clean is to take hyssop, dip it in the water, and sprinkle the tent, all its furnishings, and the people who were there, as well as anyone who touched the bone, the one who was killed, the one who died, or the grave.
19 The clean man is to sprinkle the unclean person on the third day and on the seventh day. On the seventh day he will have purified him; then the person must wash his clothes and bathe in water, and in the evening he will be clean.
20 But anyone who becomes unclean and does not purify himself, that person shall be cut off from the assembly, because he has defiled the LORD's sanctuary. The water for impurity has not been sprinkled on him; he is unclean.
21 This is to be a lasting statute for them. The one who sprinkles the water for impurity must wash his clothes, and anyone who touches the water for impurity will be unclean until evening.
22 Anything the unclean person touches becomes unclean, and anyone who touches it will be unclean until evening."