Heifer

A heifer is a young cow that has not yet had a calf, and several distinct ritual uses of heifers appear in the Old Testament. The red heifer ceremony of Numbers 19 was among the most important purification rites: an unblemished red cow on which no yoke had been placed was slaughtered and burned outside the camp, and its ashes were mixed with water to produce "water of purification" for cleansing those who had become ceremonially unclean through contact with a corpse. The ritual was acknowledged as a chukkat — a divine ordinance without a fully explained rationale. A heifer's neck was broken in the valley to atone for an unsolved murder under the ordinance of Deuteronomy 21:1–9, removing bloodguilt from a community. Jeremiah compares Egypt to "a very fair heifer" soon to be stung into flight (Jer. 46:20). In the New Testament, Hebrews 9:13 contrasts the ashes of the heifer with the blood of Christ, whose sacrifice accomplishes what the ritual could only foreshadow.