Leviticus 18

The LORD spoke to Moses. He said:

1And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,

2Speak to the people of Israel and tell them: I am the LORD your God.

2Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, I am the LORD your God.

Note"The LORD" printed in capitals stands in for the personal name of God in Hebrew, four consonants usually written YHWH. Jewish readers of the Hebrew traditionally did not pronounce it, saying instead the ordinary word for "Lord," and English Bibles since the sixteenth century have followed that practice by using capitals.

3Do not do the things that are done in the land of Egypt, where you used to live. Do not do the things that are done in the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. Do not live by their customs.

3After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do: and after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall ye not do: neither shall ye walk in their ordinances.

NoteEgypt is where the Israelites are described as having lived as slaves; Canaan is the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean coast that the book presents them as about to enter. "Doings" in the King James is not a vague word: it means established practices and habitual conduct, and the following list is what the chapter has in mind.

4You are to follow my rulings and keep my laws and live by them. I am the LORD your God.

4Ye shall do my judgments, and keep mine ordinances, to walk therein: I am the LORD your God.

NoteThe King James uses two different words that are two different Hebrew terms. "Judgments" (mishpatim) are rulings of the kind a judge hands down in particular cases. "Ordinances" or "statutes" (huqqim) are standing decrees, from a root connected with engraving or inscribing. The pairing is a way of saying "the whole body of what I lay down."

5So keep my laws and my rulings. The person who does them will live by them. I am the LORD.

5Ye shall therefore keep my statutes, and my judgments: which if a man do, he shall live in them: I am the LORD.

Note"Live in them" reads oddly in modern English. The Hebrew means the person who keeps these will live by them, or stay alive because of them. How far that reaches (a long and secure life in the land, or something more) is not spelled out here, and readers have taken it in more than one direction.

6None of you may come near to any close relative to have sexual relations with that person. I am the LORD.

6None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover their nakedness: I am the LORD.

Note"Uncover the nakedness" is a fixed Hebrew idiom for having sexual relations, not a reference to seeing someone undressed. The King James translates it word for word, which is why the phrase repeats throughout the chapter. "Near of kin" translates a Hebrew expression meaning literally "flesh of his flesh."

7Do not shame your father by having sexual relations with your mother. She is your mother; do not have sexual relations with her.

7The nakedness of thy father, or the nakedness of thy mother, shalt thou not uncover: she is thy mother; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness.

NoteThe doubled wording reflects a way of thinking in which a wife's sexuality was spoken of as belonging to her husband, so that a violation involving the mother is described first as an offense against the father. The second half of the verse makes clear that the mother is the person meant.

8Do not have sexual relations with your father's wife. That would shame your father.

8The nakedness of thy father’s wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy father’s nakedness.

Note"Thy father's wife" rather than "thy mother" points to another wife of the father, a stepmother. The laws assume a household in which a man might have more than one wife, and might remarry after a wife's death.

9Do not have sexual relations with your sister, whether she is your father's daughter or your mother's daughter, and whether she was born in your home or somewhere else.

9The nakedness of thy sister, the daughter of thy father, or daughter of thy mother, whether she be born at home, or born abroad, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover.

Note"Born at home, or born abroad" is disputed. It most likely distinguishes a sister born within the father's household from one born outside it, that is, to the mother in an earlier marriage, the point being that the rule covers both. Some read it instead as legitimate versus illegitimate birth.

10Do not have sexual relations with your son's daughter or your daughter's daughter. That would shame your own family line.

10The nakedness of thy son’s daughter, or of thy daughter’s daughter, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover: for theirs is thine own nakedness.

Note"Theirs is thine own nakedness" means these granddaughters are your own descendants; the shame would fall on your own line.

11Do not have sexual relations with the daughter of your father's wife, born to your father. She is your sister.

11The nakedness of thy father’s wife’s daughter, begotten of thy father, she is thy sister, thou shalt not uncover her nakedness.

NoteThis verse is hard to place beside verse 9, which has already covered a father's daughter. It is usually read as the daughter of the father's other wife, born to the father, so a half-sister by a different mother within the same household; some read it as a stepdaughter of the father with no blood tie.

12Do not have sexual relations with your father's sister. She is a close relative of your father.

12Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s sister: she is thy father’s near kinswoman.

13Do not have sexual relations with your mother's sister, because she is a close relative of your mother.

13Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy mother’s sister: for she is thy mother’s near kinswoman.

14Do not shame your father's brother by going near his wife to have sexual relations with her. She is your aunt.

14Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s brother, thou shalt not approach to his wife: she is thine aunt.

NoteThe prohibition is stated as an offense against the uncle, then made explicit: the woman meant is his wife, the reader's aunt by marriage.

15Do not have sexual relations with your daughter-in-law. She is your son's wife; do not have sexual relations with her.

15Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy daughter in law: she is thy son’s wife; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness.

16Do not have sexual relations with your brother's wife. That would shame your brother.

16Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother’s wife: it is thy brother’s nakedness.

NoteElsewhere the law makes one exception to this: if a man died childless, his brother was expected to marry the widow so that a son could be counted as the dead man's heir (the arrangement modern writers call levirate marriage, from the Latin for brother-in-law). This verse concerns a brother's wife while the brother is alive.

17Do not have sexual relations with both a woman and her daughter. Do not take her son's daughter or her daughter's daughter and have sexual relations with her. They are her close relatives. It is wicked.

17Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter, neither shalt thou take her son’s daughter, or her daughter’s daughter, to uncover her nakedness; for they are her near kinswomen: it is wickedness.

Note"Take" here means take in marriage. The King James "wickedness" translates a specific Hebrew legal term (zimmah) used for deliberate, planned depravity, not for wrongdoing in general.

18Do not take your wife's sister as a rival wife, to cause your wife pain by having sexual relations with the sister while your wife is still alive.

18Neither shalt thou take a wife to her sister, to vex her, to uncover her nakedness, beside the other in her life time.

NoteThe Hebrew phrase translated "a wife to her sister" can also be an idiom meaning "one woman in addition to another," and a few readers have taken the verse as a restriction on having two wives at all. The usual reading is the literal one: a man's wife and her actual sister. "To vex her" means to set the two up as rivals; the same Hebrew root supplies the ordinary word for a co-wife.

19Also, do not come near a woman to have sexual relations with her while she is set apart during her monthly period.

19Also thou shalt not approach unto a woman to uncover her nakedness, as long as she is put apart for her uncleanness.

NoteUnder these laws a menstruating woman was in a state of ritual impurity for a set period, during which she was kept apart from certain contacts. "Uncleanness" here is a ritual category, not a statement about hygiene or moral fault; men incurred similar temporary impurity from other bodily discharges.

20Do not have sexual relations with your neighbor's wife and make yourself unclean with her.

20Moreover thou shalt not lie carnally with thy neighbour’s wife, to defile thyself with her.

Note"Lie carnally" translates a Hebrew phrase that refers literally to the emission of semen. "Defile" again means to fall into a state of ritual impurity.

21Do not hand over any of your children to be passed through the fire to Molech, and do not treat the name of your God as common. I am the LORD.

21And thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Molech, neither shalt thou profane the name of thy God: I am the LORD.

NoteMolech is the name attached in the Hebrew Bible to a deity, or to a type of offering, associated with the burning of children. Ancient and modern readers have disagreed over whether "pass through the fire" means the children were killed and burned or subjected to some rite of dedication involving fire; the biblical texts elsewhere describe it as killing. "Profane the name" means to treat as ordinary and common something set apart, the opposite of holding it holy.

22Do not lie with a man the way you lie with a woman. It is detestable.

22Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.

Note"Abomination" translates to'evah, a word for something regarded as taboo or repellent within a community; it is used in the Hebrew Bible of ritual offenses and of things foreigners find disgusting as well as of moral ones. The Hebrew of the first clause is unusual and reads roughly "you shall not lie with a male the lyings of a woman."

23Do not have sexual relations with any animal and make yourself unclean with it. A woman must not present herself to an animal to mate with it. It is a perversion.

23Neither shalt thou lie with any beast to defile thyself therewith: neither shall any woman stand before a beast to lie down thereto: it is confusion.

Note"Confusion" is not the modern sense of being puzzled. The Hebrew word (tebel) appears only here and in one other place and seems to mean an improper mixing of things belonging to separate categories, the same concern that lies behind other laws against crossbreeding animals or sowing a field with two kinds of seed.

24Do not make yourselves unclean in any of these ways. The nations I am driving out ahead of you have made themselves unclean by all of these things.

24Defile not ye yourselves in any of these things: for in all these the nations are defiled which I cast out before you:

25The land is unclean too. So I am punishing it for its sin, and the land itself vomits out the people living in it.

25And the land is defiled: therefore I do visit the iniquity thereof upon it, and the land itself vomiteth out her inhabitants.

NoteIn the King James, to "visit" a sin upon someone means to come and deal with it, that is, to punish. The picture of the land vomiting out its inhabitants treats the land itself as able to be made sick by what happens on it.

26So you are to keep my laws and my rulings, and you must not do any of these detestable things. This applies to those born in your nation and to any foreigner living among you.

26Ye shall therefore keep my statutes and my judgments, and shall not commit any of these abominations; neither any of your own nation, nor any stranger that sojourneth among you:

Note"Stranger that sojourneth" translates ger, a resident foreigner who has settled among the Israelites long term, not a passing traveler. Such a person had a recognized legal standing and was bound by some, though not all, of these laws.

27(The people who lived in the land before you did all these detestable things, and the land became unclean.)

27(For all these abominations have the men of the land done, which were before you, and the land is defiled;)

28Then the land will not vomit you out too, when you make it unclean, the way it vomited out the nations that were there before you.

28That the land spue not you out also, when ye defile it, as it spued out the nations that were before you.

29Anyone who does any of these detestable things will be cut off from his people.

29For whosoever shall commit any of these abominations, even the souls that commit them shall be cut off from among their people.

Note"Cut off from among their people" translates a Hebrew penalty (karet) whose exact force is debated. It has been understood as execution by the community, as expulsion, and as a punishment carried out by God rather than by human courts, possibly meaning the person's line would end. The text does not specify.

30So you are to keep what I have charged you to do. Do not follow any of these detestable customs that were followed before you came, and do not make yourselves unclean by them. I am the LORD your God.

30Therefore shall ye keep mine ordinance, that ye commit not any one of these abominable customs, which were committed before you, and that ye defile not yourselves therein: I am the LORD your God.

Note"Keep mine ordinance" translates a phrase meaning roughly "keep my keeping", the noun is used elsewhere of a guard duty or an assigned charge that someone is responsible for maintaining.