The rite that brings a healed person back. Two live birds, cedar wood, scarlet and hyssop: one bird is killed over fresh water in a clay pot, the other is dipped in its blood and released into the open field. It is the scapegoat in miniature — one dying, one leaving alive with something on it. Then the chapter turns to houses, and this is where the translations openly come apart. KJV, ASV and YLT say the plague of leprosy in a house; WEB says a spreading mildew. The remedy is removing stones, scraping plaster, and if it returns, demolishing the building. A word that covers skin, cloth and masonry is a ritual classification, not a diagnosis, and this passage is the clearest proof of it.