Commento su Levitico 14:41

יקצע — rogner in old French, SCRAPE OFF, and in Mishnaic Hebrew it occurs many times.

יקציע, peels. Either as in Isaiah 44,13 “with a scraping tool,” or as suggested by the Talmud that the walls will be peeled off to the depth of a handbreadth. (Keylim 27,4).

From within. מבית does not mean “from the house,” because it is missing the ה (מהבית). Also, it would not be understandable to say that he should scrape the house from the house.

יקציע ....הקצו, “they will scrape off;” this root appears again in verse 43 and it means the same there.

‎מבית INSIDE.

אשר הקצו. The construction of this word in verse 43 where it appears as הקצות, corresponds to the verbs in which the letter combinations ה“י appear in abbreviated forms. The root קצה therefore appears as הקצו. It is also possible to understand the word as meaning קיצוע, seeing that subsequent to the expression הקצות we find the words את הבית, suggesting that it refers to the previously mentioned ואת הבית יקציע, he is to scrape or peel off part of the house.

Around the eruption. Because we cannot say all around the house, from the four walls, for if so, why does it say, “all around”? It is already written, “He shall scrape the house from the inside”!

סביב ROUND ABOUT — i. e. the place round about the plague-spot; and in Torath Cohanim (Sifra, Metzora, Chapter 4 5) it is also thus explained: that he shall peel off the plaster which is round about the area where the plague-stricken stones had been.

Wherein they scraped. Because the word הקצו is of the form (Tehillim 106:33): “המרו את רוחו (They rebelled against His spirit),” and [since] the intention here is the scraping and not the border [i.e., edge], therefore, Rashi says it refers to that which they scraped within the border of the eruption all around. If it said, “אשר קצעו (which they scraped),” we would not know where that scraping is.

הקצו is connected in meaning with the word קצה, end, — it means: which they had scraped off at the edges of the plague-spot round about it. (The words mean: the dust which they have removed from the edges. It has nothing to do with “scraping off”).