John Gill Commentary Leviticus 15:16

"And if any man`s seed of copulation go out from him, then he shall bathe all his flesh in water, and be unclean until the even." — Leviticus 15:16 (ASV)

And if any man's seed of copulation go out from him Not in lawful cohabitation, nor voluntarily, but involuntarily, as Aben Ezra observes; not through any disorder, which came by an accident, or in any criminal way, but through a dream, or any lustful imagination; what is commonly called nocturnal pollution ^F3 ; then he shall wash all his flesh in water, and be unclean until the even ; and so the Egyptian priests, when it happened that they were defiled by a dream, they immediately purified themselves in a laver ^F4 so the Jewish priests did when the like happened to them asleep in the temple ^F5 ; see (Deuteronomy 23:10Deuteronomy 23:11) .

---

FOOTNOTES:

• F3: "----& noctem flumine purgas." Pers. Satyr. 2.
• F4: Chaeremon. apud Porphyr. de Abstinentia, l. 4. c. 7.
• F5: Misn. Tamid. c. 1. sect. 1.