But  when  it  prevailed  to  a  hitherto  unheard-of  extent,  in  consequence  of  the
sentence  pronounced  by  God,  the  defilements  would  necessarily  be  so  crowded
together  that  the  whole  congregation  would  te  in  clanger  of  being  infected  with
the  defilement  of  death,  and  of  forfeiting  its  vocation  to  Ije  the  holy  nation  of
Jehovah,  unless  God  provided  it  the  means  of  cleansing  itself  from  this  defile-
ment, without  losing  the  fellowship  of  His  covenant  of  grace.  The  law  which
follows  furnished  the  means.'"  So  Keil;  but  if  truly  such  a  mere  temporary
expedient,  the  ordinance  of  the  red  heifer  only  shows  the  more  how  "all  these
things  happened  unto  them  for  types,  and  are  written  for  our  admonition."
Defilement  with  death  is  evidently  a  special  feature  of  this  wilderness-book,  and
we  have  thus  met  with  it  in  the  law  of  the  Na/arite,  and  in  the  provision  of  a
second  passover.  Death  is,  in  fact,  what  characterizes  the  world  as  a  wilderness,
not  a  permanent  abode,  nor  able  to  sustain  life  ;  and  it  defiles  l)ecause  it  is  the
penalty  of  sin.  In  all  over  which  deiith  rules,  therefore,  it  is  the  lesson  here,
there  is  defilement  for  the  living — typiadly,  lor  those  that  have  what  is  really
life  before  God;  and  this  is  what  decline,  in  whatever  form  or  degree,  in  the  child
of  God  bears  witness  of,  that  he  has  slipped  away  from  the  joy  of  his  own
heavenly  portion,  and  that,  as  the  apostle  puts  it  (Phil.  iii.  19),  he  "minds"


3.  1.  6.
NUMBERS.
455


k  cf.  Heb.
13.  12.
I  Lev.17. 11.
1  Jno.  1.  7.
in  cf.  Heb.
12.29.
n  Lev.  14. 4.
cf.  Gal.  6.
14.
p  Cf.  Hab.l.
13.
<?  c/.  Rev.  1.
18.
Rom.  6.
