lepros

BDAG (s.v. λεπρός) glosses the adjective "leprous" and notes that it stands substantivally in the NT for the afflicted person, while cautioning at λέπρα that the condition so named in this literature is not necessarily Hansen's disease; Louw-Nida §23.163 states the point directly. Michaelis (TDNT 4:233-234) roots the whole λεπ- group in the sense of peeling and scaling, and LSJ records the non-medical use of λεπρός for rough or scaly ground and for hide, with Theophrastus applying it to a diseased plant, so the medical use is a specialization of a wider sense. Greek medical writers class λέπρα among superficial complaints and reserve ἐλέφας / ἐλεφαντίασις, described in detail by Aretaeus of Cappadocia, for what is now called leprosy. The Septuagint had used the word group to render Hebrew tsaraat in Leviticus 13-14, a priestly impurity classification that the same chapters extend to fabric and house walls (HALOT 3:1057; Milgrom, Leviticus 1-16). In the Gospels the governing verb is consistently καθαρίζω rather than θεραπεύω or ἰάομαι, taken from Leviticus 14 LXX, and Matthew 10:8 sets λεπροὺς καθαρίζετε deliberately alongside ἀσθενοῦντας θεραπεύετε; Marcus, Yarbro Collins, Davies and Allison, France and Bovon all treat the purity frame as basic to the pericopes, and Thiessen reads the touch of Mark 1:41 as removing the source of impurity rather than annulling the purity system. Davies and Allison further note that the cleansing of λεπροί in the messianic-sign saying of Matthew 11:5 // Luke 7:22 appears in no Isaianic catalogue and is absent from 4Q521, so it reflects the concrete shape of Jesus' ministry. Second-order debates continue over how often actual Hansen's disease lay behind the term, the aDNA-confirmed Akeldama burial showing it was present in first-century Jerusalem while Hulse, Browne and the Anchor Bible Dictionary article hold that the great majority of cases were other dermatoses.