נִדָּה
nid.dah (H5079)
impurity
AI Word Study
# Niddah: Ritual Impurity in Biblical Hebrew The Hebrew word *niddah* (H5079) denotes a state of ritual impurity, appearing 29 times throughout the biblical text. The term carries a technical meaning within Israel's religious system, referring to a specific category of uncleanness that required prescribed purification procedures. Rather than describing moral corruption, *niddah* operates as a classificatory term within the biblical purity code—a framework that regulated access to sacred spaces and objects. The frequency of occurrence (29 instances) suggests that *niddah* represented a significant concern in biblical religious practice, warranting consistent terminology and presumably detailed legal treatment. The term's preservation across multiple biblical books indicates its importance was not isolated to a single tradition or period but was maintained across the textual layers of scripture. As a technical religious term, *niddah* would have been understood by ancient Israelites as part of their everyday vocabulary related to temple practice, domestic life, and ritual observance. Without access to the specific biblical passages using this term, the precise contexts cannot be determined from the lexical data alone. However, the existence of a dedicated lemma in the biblical vocabulary demonstrates that ancient Hebrew speakers required a specific word to categorize and communicate about this particular form of impurity, reflecting its central role in the religious and social structures of ancient Israel.
AI synthesis uses only provided lexicon data -- never training knowledge.
“Speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘If a woman conceives, and bears a male child, then she shall be unclean seven days; as in the days of her monthly period she shall be unclean.
But if she bears a female child, then she shall be unclean two weeks, as in her period; and she shall continue in the blood of purification sixty-six days.
“ ‘If a woman has a discharge, and her discharge in her flesh is blood, she shall be in her impurity seven days. Whoever touches her shall be unclean until the evening.
“ ‘Everything that she lies on in her impurity shall be unclean. Everything also that she sits on shall be unclean.
“ ‘If any man lies with her, and her monthly flow is on him, he shall be unclean seven days; and every bed he lies on shall be unclean.
“ ‘If a woman has a discharge of her blood many days not in the time of her period, or if she has a discharge beyond the time of her period, all the days of the discharge of her uncleanness shall be as in the days of her period. She is unclean.
Every bed she lies on all the days of her discharge shall be to her as the bed of her period. Everything she sits on shall be unclean, as the uncleanness of her period.
and of her who has her period, and of a man or woman who has a discharge, and of him who lies with her who is unclean.
“ ‘You shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness, as long as she is impure by her uncleanness.
“ ‘If a man takes his brother’s wife, it is an impurity. He has uncovered his brother’s nakedness. They shall be childless.
“A man who is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and lay them up outside of the camp in a clean place; and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for use in water for cleansing impurity. It is a sin offering.
Whoever touches a dead person, the body of a man who has died, and doesn’t purify himself, defiles Yahweh’s tabernacle; and that soul shall be cut off from Israel; because the water for impurity was not sprinkled on him, he shall be unclean. His uncleanness is yet on him.
But the man who shall be unclean, and shall not purify himself, that soul shall be cut off from among the assembly, because he has defiled the sanctuary of Yahweh. The water for impurity has not been sprinkled on him. He is unclean.
It shall be a perpetual statute to them. He who sprinkles the water for impurity shall wash his clothes, and he who touches the water for impurity shall be unclean until evening.
everything that may withstand the fire, you shall make to go through the fire, and it shall be clean; nevertheless it shall be purified with the water for impurity. All that doesn’t withstand the fire you shall make to go through the water.
and said to them, “Listen to me, you Levites! Now sanctify yourselves, and sanctify Yahweh, the God of your fathers’ house, and carry the filthiness out of the holy place.
which you have commanded by your servants the prophets, saying, ‘The land, to which you go to possess it, is an unclean land through the uncleanness of the peoples of the lands, through their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another with their filthiness.
Zion spreads out her hands. There is no one to comfort her. Yahweh has commanded concerning Jacob, that those who are around him should be his adversaries. Jerusalem is among them as an unclean thing.
They will cast their silver in the streets, and their gold will be as an unclean thing. Their silver and their gold won’t be able to deliver them in the day of Yahweh’s wrath. They won’t satisfy their souls or fill their bellies; because it has been the stumbling block of their iniquity.
As for the beauty of his ornament, he set it in majesty; but they made the images of their abominations and their detestable things therein. Therefore I have made it to them as an unclean thing.
and has not eaten on the mountains, hasn’t lifted up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, hasn’t defiled his neighbor’s wife, hasn’t come near a woman in her impurity,
In you have they uncovered their fathers’ nakedness. In you have they humbled her who was unclean in her impurity.
“Son of man, when the house of Israel lived in their own land, they defiled it by their ways and by their deeds. Their way before me was as the uncleanness of a woman in her impurity.
“In that day there will be a spring opened to David’s house and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness.