The Third Book of Moses, called Leviticus
Leviticus 20
Chapter XX · Vol. I, pp. 396–398
2 Of him that giveth of his seed to Molech. 4 Of him that favoureth such an one. 6 Of going to wizards. 7 Of sanctification. 9 Of him that curseth his parents. 10 Of adultery. 11, 14, 17, 19 Of incest. 13 Of sodomy. 15 Of bestiality. 18 Of uncleanness. 22 Obedience is required with holiness. 27 Wizards must be put to death.
1 AND the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
2 Again, thou shalt say to the children of Israel, Whosoever he be of a the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn in Israel, that b giveth any of his seed unto Molech,1 he shall surely be put to death; the people of the land shall stone him with stones.
A.M. 2514. B.C. 1490.
a ch. 17.10, 13, 15.
b ch. 18.21. De. 18.10; xiii.; 17.2-7. 2 Ki. 17.17; 23.10. Je. 32.35.
1 Molech was an idol of the Ammonites to whom children were burned in sacrifice, or caused to pass through the fire, in order that the rest of the family might prosper.—[Molech, or Moloch, or Malcham, appears to have been one of the most ancient deities of Western Asia. It was especially honoured by the Ammonites and Phœnicians; the latter seem to have identified it with Baal. Human sacrifices were offered up to it; and the mode in which these were offered, at least in later times, was as follows:—A brazen statue of the deity with stretched-out arms was heated by means of an internal furnace. The child was then placed in the outstretched arms, and was thus roasted alive. In the days of Solomon a statue of Molech was erected in the valley of the Kidron, at the southern base of Mount Moriah. The cruelties there enacted, and the curse entailed by them, are mentioned in Je. 7.31-34.—P.]
3 And I will c set my face against that man, and will cut him off from among his people; because he hath given of his seed unto Molech, to defile my sanctuary, and to profane my holy name.
c ver. 27; ch. 24.14, 16, 23. Nu. 15.35, 36. De. 13.10; 17.5; 21.21; 22.21, 24.
4 And if d the people of the land e do any ways hide their eyes from the man, when he giveth of his seed unto Molech, and kill him not;
5 Then I will f set my face against that man, and against his family, and will cut him off, and all that go a g whoring after him, to commit whoredom with Molech, from among their people.
f Eze. 7.8, 9. Ex. 20.5; 34.14-16. Je. 32.28-36. ch. 17.7.
g Ju. 2.12, 17, 19. Je. 3. Eze. xvi. xx. xxiii. 2 Ki. 17.7-23.
6 And the h soul that turneth after such as have familiar spirits, and after wizards, to go a whoring after them, I will even set my face against that soul, and will cut him off from among his people.
h ver. 27; ch. 19.26, 31. 1 Sa. 28.3, 7. 1 Ch. 10.13. Is. 8.19. Ex. 22.18. De. 18.10, 11.
7 Sanctify i yourselves therefore, and be ye holy: for I am the LORD your God.
i ch. 11.44; 19.2. 1 Pe. 1.15, 16. Mat. 5.48. He. 12.14. Phi. 2.15, 16.
8 And ye k shall keep my statutes, and do them: I am the LORD which l sanctify you.
k De. 4.2; 5.32; 11.32; 12.32.
l ch. 21.8. Eze. 20.12. Ex. 19.5, 6. 1 Th. 5.23. Jude 1. 1 Co. 1.30.
9 For m every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his n blood shall be upon him.
m Ex. 21.17. De. 27.16. Pr. 20.20. Mat. 15.4.
n Jos. 2.19. Ju. 9.24. 2 Sa. 1.16. Mat. 27.25. ver. 11-13, 16, 27.
10 And o the man that committeth adultery with another man's wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.
o De. 22.21, 24. Jn. 8.4, 5. ch. 18.20. Job 31.9-11. Pr. 6.26, 29, 32-35. Je. 29.22, 23.
11 And p the man that lieth with his father's wife hath uncovered his father's nakedness: both of them shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
12 And q if a man lie with his daughter-in-law, both of them shall surely be put to death: they have wrought confusion;2 their blood shall be upon them.
q Ge. 38.16, 18. ch. 18.15. De. 27.23.
2 Or, a horrible crime.
13 If r a man also lie with mankind as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
14 And s if a man take a wife and her mother, it is wickedness: they shall be burnt with fire, both he and they; that there be no wickedness among you.
s ch. 18.17. De. 27.23. Eze. 22.11.
16 And if a woman approach unto any beast, and lie down thereto, thou shalt kill the woman and the beast: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
17 And u if a man shall take his sister, his father's daughter, or his mother's daughter, and see her nakedness, and she see his nakedness, it is a wicked thing; and they shall be cut off in the sight of their people: he hath uncovered his sister's nakedness; x he shall bear his iniquity.
u ch. 18.9. 2 Sa. 13.12. Eze. 22.11. De. 27.22.
x ch. 5.1; ver. 19. Be charged with and punished for their sin.
18 And y if a man shall lie with a woman having her sickness, and shall uncover her nakedness; he hath discovered3 her fountain, and she hath uncovered the fountain of her blood; and both of them shall be z cut off from among their people.4
y ch. 18.19; 15.19, 24, 25. Eze. 22.10.
3 Heb. made naked.
z ch. 17.4, 9, 10, 14; 19.8.
4 The enormities forbidden in ch. xviii. are here declared punishable with death. This punishment, it is supposed, was in many cases inflicted by strangling; in other cases, stoning is appointed; and where the death is declared to be by burning, it is supposed, not burning alive, but consuming the body by fire, after death by stoning. In the case of Achan, he was first stoned to death, though the punishment ordered was that of burning, Jos. 7.25, 26. The punishment of adultery by death was not peculiar in eastern countries to the law of Moses. On the contrary, it seems to have been universal among them. Besides the greatness of the crime itself, it led, in the jealous and revengeful passions which it excited, to assassinations and bloody quarrels.—I.
19 And a thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy mother's sister, nor of thy father's sister; for he uncovereth his near kin: they shall bear their iniquity.
a ch. 18.12, 13. Ex. 6.20.
20 And if b a man shall lie with his uncle's wife, he hath uncovered his uncle's nakedness: they shall bear their sin; they shall c die childless.
b ch. 18.14.
c ver. 21.
21 And d if a man shall take his brother's wife, it is an unclean thing;5 he hath uncovered his brother's nakedness: they shall be 6 childless.
d ch. 18.16. Mat. 14.4.
5 Heb. a separation.
6 The law (De. 25.5) required a brother either publicly to refuse, or else to marry the wife of his deceased brother, if childless. The prohibition in the text must therefore be confined to taking the wife of a brother who had left a family to inherit his property.—C.
22 Ye e shall therefore keep all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do them; that the land, whither I bring you to dwell therein, f spue you not out.
e ch. 18.4, 5, 26; 19.37. De. 4.1, 2; 5.32; 12.32; 30.15, 16.
f ch. 18.25-28; 26.33. De. 8.19, 20; 28.25, 36, 63, 64; 31.29.
23 And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nations which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and g therefore I abhorred them.
g De. 9.5. ch. 18.27.
24 But I have said unto you, h Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey: I am the LORD your God, which have i separated you from other people.
25 Ye k shall therefore put difference between clean beasts and unclean, and between unclean fowls and clean: and ye shall not make your souls abominable by beast, or by fowl, or by any manner of living thing that creepeth7 on the ground, which I have separated from you as unclean.
26 And l ye shall be holy unto me: for I the LORD am holy, and have severed you from other people, m that ye should be mine.
l ver. 7; ch. 19.2. 1 Pe. 1.16. Tit. 2.14; 3.8, 14.
m ver. 24. Ps. 135.4. De. 32.9; 7.6; 26.18; 14.2. Ex. 19.5, 6. 1 Pe. 2.9.
27 A n man also or woman, that hath a familiar spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put to death: they shall stone o them with stones; their blood shall be upon them.
n De. 18.10, 11. 1 Sa. 28.7, 8. Ex. 22.18. ch. 19.26, 31.
o See ver. 2.
Notes
[Ver. 2. Molech, worshipped either by children passing between two fires, or being placed in the hands, or in the body, of the brazen statue intensely heated, by which means they were instantly destroyed. C.]
Ver. 4. [But should not charity cover, rather than publish or punish, 'the multitude of sins?' 1 Pe. 4.8. Yes; charity (fervent charity among yourselves) shall cover the multitude of sins against one another, but may not interfere with the offences of idolatrous murder, which is an offence against God. Such was the judicial law of the Jewish state; the church of Christ has the same law in principle, but with spiritual penalties, because she is spiritual, 1 Co. 5.5; 10.20; 2 Co. 6.14; Ep. 5.11. C.]
Ver. 20. [Childless has, by some, been supposed to signify, that the guilty parties should suffer death, and so have no children, but this is inconsistent with possible circumstances, as, for example, the crime might be committed in a strange land, where the Jewish law, were it even death, could not be enforced; or the crime might be concealed, so that the infliction of the penalty would not be attempted. By comparing the passage with Je. 22.30, where Coniah is written childless, with 1 Ch. 3.16, 17, where we find he had a large family (there called Jeconiah); and then returning to Jeremiah, where he defines childless to mean expulsion for ever from the throne he had disgraced by his wickedness, we will be enabled to conclude that childless necessarily means no more than disinherited descendants are not reckoned to their guilty parents in the public genealogies. C.]
Reflections.—At what a terrible expense do Satan's votaries readily serve him!—and shall I count anything too dear for the Lord! Miserable is the state of a nation when the vilest idolatries, inhumanities, and abominations break out; and especially when they pass unpunished: but corrupt nature is prone to evil; the commands of God are therefore enforced with the most awful penalties and threatenings of death; and filthy pleasures infallibly issue in fearful punishments: nor are any more exposed to the severe indignation of God than those professors who wilfully imitate the profane world. But honourable, pleasant, and profitable is a course of universal holiness; especially amidst a multitude of temptations and examples to the contrary: and delightful is the study of it, when God, as our own God, sanctifies us wholly, soul, body, and spirit; and thus forms us for himself, that we may dwell alone, and show forth his praise.