And the man whose hair is fallen off his head, he is bald; yet is he clean.
Bald ... forehead bald. The falling off of the hair is another symptom which creates a suspicion of leprosy, when the baldness commences in the back part of the head. But it was not of itself a decisive sign unless when taken in connection with other tokens-a 'sore of a reddish white colour.' х nega` (H5061) laabaan (H3836) 'ªdamdaam (H125), white and somewhat reddish; Septuagint, leukee ee purrizousa, white or red. 'ªdamdaam (H125), this word, which is rendered red, comprehends in it a tinge of yellow (cf. Genesis 25:33). It expresses the colour of blood (2 Kings 3:22), and of red wine (Isaiah 63:2), but is generally used for a dark-brown red.]
The Hebrews, as well as other Orientals were accustomed to distinguish between the forehead baldness, which might be natural, and that baldness which might be the consequence of disease. The form here referred to is produced by another variety of tricophyton or hair-plant, which commits hideous ravages on the lower back part of the head. 'Its appearance is indicated by redness, tension, and irritation of the skin, followed by an erruption of tubercles of various sizes, resembling strawberries, each of which is traversed by a single hair, which has lost its colour, become brittle, and the medullary portion, or pith, of the hair being quite disorganized, can be pulled out with the utmost ease. Segments of circles of these pustules, interspersed with the parasitic growth, often extend round the front of the neck, beneath the beard from ear to ear, at the expense of permanent loss of the hair of those parts. It is very obstinate in its cure, being aggravated by injudicious applications, and lasting for years, when suitable treatment is not adopted. The means adopted for its arrestment often aggravate the ghastly deformities occasioned by the disease; and the poor creatures on whom it preys with unchecked virulence have their faces so disfigured that they scarcely look human: the eyelids and lips are sometimes quite destroyed, and the whole countenance is swollen into a frightful mass of ulcerous matter. From the rigorous measures adopted for its extirpation, as described in this passage, it appears to have been very common among the Jews, by whom it must have been regarded as a very grievous scourge, polluting their highly-cherished beards, if not consigning them to the tomb of all the Capulets' (Macmillan's Magazine,' ut supra).
The parasitic plant or fungus which occasions these sad and disgusting deformities, also infests the skin of the lower animals, particularly of the mouse, gradually destroying its hair, ears, eyes, nose, and other parts, which become very ulcerated, until the creature is a pitiable object to look at, and dies of exhaustion. The disease is very infectious, being often communicated by mice to cats and dogs, from which, in turn, children may take it on playing with them. Though not exactly the disease to which we now give the name of leprosy, this was one of several diseases which were grouped together under that title, and legislated for by Moses. In warm and tropical countries vegetation is more luxuriant than with us; and a disease which is simply troublesome and repulsive in this country becomes terrible there. Human beings in some districts of India at the present day are served much like the poor mice, having to submit to the deformity of their bodies or the loss of their limbs, owing to the uncontrolled growth of a fungus very similar in appearance to the one spoken of in this passage. (See Dr. Mason Good, 'Study of Medicine;' Michaelis, 'Commentaries on Laws of Moses;' also Dr. McCall Anderson on Parasitic Affections of Skin,' etc.)