Shalom All:

In the links provided by Donna Danna (5 July 2005)
"THE MYSTERY OF THE RED HEIFER: DIVINE PROMISE OF PURITY"
.. I read this in Understanding the Concept of Biblical Purity:
An Idea that Defies Translation
http://www.templeinstitute.org/red_heifer/biblical_purity.htm
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The entire notion of ritual impurity is difficult enough to understand. But the most severe form of this state, contact with death, brings about a state of defilement so aggressively uncompromising in its spiritual hold, that it cannot be rectified except for purification through the ashes of the red heifer. This topic encompasses an entire world-view so enigmatic that an individual seeking to fathom its implications will almost inevitably encounter confusion - and possibly, grave misunderstandings as well.
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And Yeshua, "seed of the woman"/Red Heifer, called Lazarus out!!!  And Yeshua Himself rose on the thrid day!

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Yes, death is a reality, and very much a part of life. But when others must busy themselves with acts of lovingkindness for an empty body whose soul has been removed by G-d, the priests must keep their distance... for that body is now devoid of life. This is the secret of why a dead body defiles! For only life is holy. Once life has departed, it is not the stuff of death itself which renders impurity - but the absence of G-d-given life. And faced with death, the priests who serve before the eternal G-d must occupy themselves with thoughts of what life really is, and not allow themselves to succumb to the morbid illusions of despair which the vision of death invariably causes for others.
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Yeshua told the seeker to let the dead bury their dead.  In the dead there is no life!

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Thus the priests who serve in the Temple, itself the source of eternal life - for it is the place of the Shechinah, the Divine Glory of G-d - must distance themselves from the deception of death. For the impurity rendered by death is the contamination of a false vision, a lie. What men call "death" is nothing more than the bonds of transitory life breaking forth and giving way to eternal life. But in our limited vision and understanding, we view this bleakly and oppressively as death. It is a myopic outlook, but it is also a facet of the human condition that cannot be undone until the day that "death will be destroyed forever, and the Lord G-d will wipe the tears from every face... " (Isaiah 25:8).

In the meantime, the priests are exhorted to ignore this ruse. They are sanctified, and their innate holiness simply prevents them from paying any mind to such falsehood. With the exception of extending the last possible acts of love for his closest relatives, itself a duty of life, the priest's calling mandates that he ignore the morose and debilitating cycle of our misleading world, and his eyes may not look upon that vision which makes such an erroneous and damaging impression upon the soul of man. Were the priests of the Temple to pay any attention to the evanescent image of human death, they would be committing an even greater offense to the honor due life... they would be killing the truth.
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And how strong is the death-culture grip here in the USofA.

Dianne
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( Request a flow chart of Revelation Seals at  talsmawi@centurytel.net  )