4 And she shall continue thirty-three days in the blood of her cleansing; no holy thing shall she touch, nor come into the sanctuary, until the days of her cleansing are fulfilled.
And if a woman have her flux of blood many days out of the time of her separation, or if she have the flux beyond the time of her separation, all the days of the flux of her uncleanness shall she be as [in] the days of her separation: she is unclean. Every bed whereon she lieth all the days of her flux shall be unto her as the bed of her separation; and every object on which she sitteth shall be unclean, according to the uncleanness of her separation. And whoever toucheth them shall be unclean, and shall wash his clothes, and bathe in water, and be unclean until the even. And if she be cleansed of her flux then she shall count seven days, and after that she shall be clean.
And Haggai said, If one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, is it become unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean.
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Commentary on Leviticus 12 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 12
Le 12:1-8. Woman's Uncleanness by Childbirth.
2. If a woman, &c.—The mother of a boy was ceremonially unclean for a week, at the end of which the child was circumcised (Ge 17:12; Ro 4:11-13); the mother of a girl for two weeks (Le 12:5)—a stigma on the sex (1Ti 2:14, 15) for sin, which was removed by Christ; everyone who came near her during that time contracted a similar defilement. After these periods, visitors might approach her though she was still excluded from the public ordinances of religion [Le 12:4].
6-8. the days of her purifying—Though the occasion was of a festive character, yet the sacrifices appointed were not a peace offering, but a burnt offering and sin offering, in order to impress the mind of the parent with recollections of the origin of sin, and that the child inherited a fallen and sinful nature. The offerings were to be presented the day after the period of her separation had ended—that is, forty-first for a boy, eighty-first for a girl.
8. bring two turtles, &c.—(See on Le 5:6). This was the offering made by Mary, the mother of Jesus, and it affords an incontestable proof of the poor and humble condition of the family (Lu 2:22-24).