sifted clean: someone or something so refined of all that does not belong that it stands out as pure, sincere, choice, or shining
This is a rare, poetic word, found only seven times and only in the songs and wisdom books, never in the law, the prophets, or in plain narrative. It is not the usual term for being ritually clean (that role belongs to a different word טהור). Instead it lives in lyric and reflective writing, and it draws all of its color from one underlying picture: grain being sifted and winnowed until only the good kernels are left.
That single picture throws off several related shades of meaning.
- A heart that has been sifted clean of pretense is sincere and wholly devoted (Psalm 24:4; 73:1).
- A person sifted of guilt is morally innocent (Job 11:4).
- A daughter singled out from all the rest is the choice, favored one (Song of Songs 6:9).
- Something polished or refined gleams, so the same word can mean "bright" and "radiant," like the sun or like God's clear commands (Song of Songs 6:10; Psalm 19:8).
- Even the one concrete use, a feeding trough that is clean because it is empty (Proverbs 14:4), comes back to the same idea of having nothing left in it but what belongs.
These are not separate, unrelated meanings but facets of a single act: to be sifted out is at once to be made pure, to be set apart, and to be shown off as the best. Song of Songs 6 even plays on two of these shades two verses apart, calling the beloved both the chosen one and the radiant one. So while a translator must reach for different English words depending on the verse, the word itself keeps one steady center.