וּמִפֶּתַח֩ אֹ֨הֶל מוֹעֵ֜ד לֹ֤א תֵֽצְאוּ֙ שִׁבְעַ֣ת יָמִ֔ים עַ֚ד י֣וֹם מְלֹ֔את יְמֵ֖י מִלֻּאֵיכֶ֑ם כִּ֚י שִׁבְעַ֣ת יָמִ֔ים יְמַלֵּ֖א אֶת־יֶדְכֶֽם׃
И вы не должны выходить из дверей скинии собрания семь дней, пока не исполнятся дни вашего посвящения; ибо Он освятит вас семь дней.
Ibn Ezra
you shall be installed the clause omits “at the end of”. Scripture means to say that at the end of seven days, they shall be installed. Some people say that they did not leave for seven days , but that during the night they used to leave to tend to their personal necessities. My personal belief is that they could leave when they needed to, day or night. A great scholar said that they dug a latrine in the courtyard of the Tent of Assembly, but this is far-fetched. Scripture says, “The children of Israel wept for Moshe…thirty days.” [Deuteronomy 34:8] — was there never a moment when they were not crying? By saying that they should stay in the entrance to the Tent of Assembly day and night [:35] Scripture means only to say that they should not concern themselves with other business, and that they should not take walks to any other places. (Compare to, “he will not leave the Sanctuary” [21:12] as I will explain later.)
Rabbeinu Bahya
כי שבעת ימים ימלא את ידכם, “for you shall be inaugurated for a period of seven days.” G’d had said something similar in Exodus 29,35 where the Torah wrote: ”for seven days you shall inaugurate them.”
A kabbalistic approach: the days of inauguration were seven as the people already realised the significance of the seven garments of the High Priest (the trousers not being a specific garment of the High Priest). We read in Isaiah 63,12: מוליך לימין משה זרוע תפארתו, “who made His glorious arm march at the right side of Moses.” This is a reference to Moses who trained Aaron and gave him some of his prophetic powers. According to the Zohar Tzav 34,2, this is why Moses had to anoint Aaron. During these seven days Moses performed the High Priest’s duties (dressed only in a white tunic) in order to confer all this sanctity upon Aaron. Rabbi Abba said that seeing that Moses was firmly rooted in the holy place whence all this power stemmed, he was able to transfer this sanctity to Aaron. This is why the Torah wrote earlier (30,12): “he poured from the oil of anointment on Aaron’s head, and he anointed him and sanctified him.” This is also the reason that these days of inauguration were described (in the Zohar) as “days of שלמות, “days of perfection, or perfecting.”
A kabbalistic approach: the days of inauguration were seven as the people already realised the significance of the seven garments of the High Priest (the trousers not being a specific garment of the High Priest). We read in Isaiah 63,12: מוליך לימין משה זרוע תפארתו, “who made His glorious arm march at the right side of Moses.” This is a reference to Moses who trained Aaron and gave him some of his prophetic powers. According to the Zohar Tzav 34,2, this is why Moses had to anoint Aaron. During these seven days Moses performed the High Priest’s duties (dressed only in a white tunic) in order to confer all this sanctity upon Aaron. Rabbi Abba said that seeing that Moses was firmly rooted in the holy place whence all this power stemmed, he was able to transfer this sanctity to Aaron. This is why the Torah wrote earlier (30,12): “he poured from the oil of anointment on Aaron’s head, and he anointed him and sanctified him.” This is also the reason that these days of inauguration were described (in the Zohar) as “days of שלמות, “days of perfection, or perfecting.”
Chizkuni
לא תצא שבעת ימים, “do not leave (the door) of the tent for seven days;” this is not to be understood as a house arrest, but means that Aaron and his sons are not to undertake any other activities and not go to another tent even. However, at night they were at liberty to perform what any normal person needs to do. We have another example of a similar construction in Deuteronomy 34,8 where the whole people of Israel is described as mourning Moses and weeping over his death for thirty days, and the meaning surely is not that they did not move from their tents during all this time even to use the sanitary facilities. The same construction is used in connection with the commandment to dwell in the huts on Sukkot for seven days, (Leviticus 23,42) as well as in Leviticus 21,12: “he (the High Priest when mourning his father or mother) must not leave the Tabernacle.” (Compare Ibn Ezra on our verse).