We here behold in striking characters the awful effects sin hath wrought in our nature: the wages of sin is, and must be, death. And when at any time in our friends, and in our houses, that sentence is executed, uncleanness is attached to all. And this must have continued forever, had not JESUS interposed and abolished death by his glorious undertaking, and brought life and immortality to light by his gospel. See, Reader! in this ceremonial uncleanness made by death, to what a miserable state out of CHRIST, our nature is universally reduced!
Numbers 19:11-16
11 He that toucheth the dead body of any mana shall be unclean seven days.
12 He shall purify himself with it on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean: but if he purify not himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean.
13 Whosoever toucheth the dead body of any man that is dead, and purifieth not himself, defileth the tabernacle of the LORD; and that soul shall be cut off from Israel: because the water of separation was not sprinkled upon him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is yet upon him.
14 This is the law, when a man dieth in a tent: all that come into the tent, and all that is in the tent, shall be unclean seven days.
15 And every open vessel, which hath no covering bound upon it, is unclean.
16 And whosoever toucheth one that is slain with a sword in the open fields, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.