The one who burns the heifer shall wash his clothes in water and bathe his body in water and shall be unclean until evening.
We have here the divine appointment concerning the solemn burning of a red heifer to ashes, and the preserving of the ashes, that of them might be made, not a beautifying, but a purifying, water, for that was the utmost the law reached to; it offered not to adorn as the gospel does, but to cleanse only.
Commenting on Numbers 19:1-10
And he that burneth her shall wash his clothes in water,.... In forty seahs of water, as the Targum of Jonathan: this shows that one different from this is designed in Num 19:7; and that this is one distinct from him that sprinkled the blood, Num 19:4, and bathe his flesh in water: in a like quantity, as the above Targum: and shall be unclean...
And he that burneth her shall wash his clothes in water, and bathe his flesh in water, and shall be unclean until the even. (d) The inferior priest who killed her, and burned her.