Leviticus 14:11 - On the noun אִישׁ

(The above rendering comes from the RJPS translation—an adaptation of the NJPS translation—as per a correction in April 2024. Before accounting for this rendering, I will analyze the plain sense of the Hebrew term containing אִישׁ, by employing a situation-oriented construal as outlined in this document, pp. 11–16.)

This verse introduces a long procedure that takes place on the 8th day of the purification rituals after a diagnosis of “leprosy” on skin.

The party in question is referred to more than 20 times in this chapter, with 11 of them being simply in terms of the Hitpael-stem participle alone, as הַמִּטַּהֵר (plus 6 finite verb inflections). We should be asking: What is so special about this instance that warrants the fuller label הָאִישׁ הַמִּטַּהֵר only here? And what does אִישׁ contribute to the overall meaning?

Is it a matter of gender? No, gender is not at issue. Women as well as men are in view, as being susceptible to “leprosy” (as exemplified by Miriam in Num 12:10–15) and thus in need of purification. At any rate, in Hebrew הָאִישׁ (or almost any other personal noun phrase) cannot specify gender when it is used to refer to a class of persons, as here.

Rather, as usual, אִישׁ marks its referent as being essential for grasping the depicted situation, in contrast to that person’s presence being taken as a given (as elsewhere in this passage). The label הָאִישׁ, as usual, profiles its referent in terms of the discourse-active situation, while signaling a distinct stage in the ritual procedure. Yet here the overencoding of the referring expressions (as הָאִישׁ הַמִּטַּהֵר rather than one component label or the other—and likewise the expanded labeling of the other participant as הַכֹּהֵן הַמְטַהֵר “the priest who performs the purification” rather than the usual הַכֹּהֵן “the priest,” as in prior verses) appears to also provide thematic highlighting of what follows, namely the procedure’s elaborate climax. As if to say: Drum roll, please!

On the discourse functions involved, see Steven Runge, “Pragmatic Effects of Semantically Redundant Anchoring Expressions in Biblical Hebrew Narrative,” Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages 32.2 (2006]): 87–104.)

As for rendering into English, the NJPS rendering ‘the man to be cleansed’ nowadays is overly gendered, implying that women are not in view. Replacing “man” with “person” (or “one”) lacks the situating function of man. In order to put more weight on the presence of the party in question as being constitutive, the adverb along is added to the preposition with.