Leviticus 20:11

20:10-27 These verses repeat what had been said before, but it was needful there should be line upon line. What praises we owe to God that he has taught the evil of sin, and the sure way of deliverance from it! May we have grace to adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things; may we have no fellowship with unfruitful works of darkness, but reprove them.

And the man that lieth with his father's wife,.... Whether she be his mother, or another woman, as the Targum of Jonathan; that is, whether she is his own mother, or a stepmother, or whether he did this in the lifetime of his father, or after his death, or whether she was betrothed or married, it mattered not; according to the Jewish tradition (d), this is a breach of the law, Leviticus 18:8 ; and a man guilty of this hath uncovered his father's nakedness; and which is a foul and shameful piece of wickedness; the penalty follows: both of them shall be put to death; by casting stones on them, as the Targum of Jonathan adds; for, as before observed, wherever the following phrase: their blood shall be upon them, is used, stoning is meant; and so, according to the Misnah (e), all those were to be stoned, after mentioned, of whom this phrase is used. (d) Misn. ut supra, (Sanhedrin, c. 7.) sect. 4. (e) lbid.

7-19. Sanctify yourselves therefore, and be ye holy—The minute specification of the incestuous and unnatural crimes here enumerated shows their sad prevalence amongst the idolatrous nations around, and the extreme proneness of the Israelites to follow the customs of their neighbors. It is to be understood, that, whenever mention is made that the offender was "to be put to death" without describing the mode, stoning is meant. The only instance of another form of capital punishment occurs in Le 20:14, that of being burnt with fire; and yet it is probable that even here death was first inflicted by stoning, and the body of the criminal afterwards consumed by fire (Jos 7:15).

Whoever cursed father or mother was to be punished with death ( Leviticus 19:3 ); "His blood would be upon him." The cursing of parents was a capital crime (see at Leviticus 17:4 , and for the plural דּמיו Exodus 22:1 and Genesis 4:10 ), which was to return upon the doer of it, according to Genesis 9:6 . The same punishment was to be inflicted upon adultery ( Leviticus 20:10 , cf. Leviticus 18:20 ), carnal intercourse with a father's wife ( Leviticus 20:11 , cf. Leviticus 18:7-8 ) or with a daughter-in-law ( Leviticus 20:12 , cf. Leviticus 18:17 ), sodomy ( Leviticus 20:13 , cf. Leviticus 18:22 ), sexual intercourse with a mother and her daughter, in which case the punishment was to be heightened by the burning of the criminals when put to death ( Leviticus 20:14 , cf. Leviticus 18:17 ), lying with a beast ( Leviticus 20:15 , Leviticus 20:16 , cf. Leviticus 18:23 ), sexual intercourse with a half-sister ( Leviticus 20:17 , cf. Leviticus 18:9 and Leviticus 18:11 ), and lying with a menstruous woman ( Leviticus 20:18 , cf. Leviticus 18:19 ).

The punishment of death, which was to be inflicted in all these cases upon both the criminals, and also upon the beast that had been abused ( Leviticus 20:15 , Leviticus 20:16 ), was to be by stoning, according to Leviticus 20:2 , Leviticus 20:27 , and Deuteronomy 22:21 .; and by the burning ( Leviticus 20:14 ) we are not to understand death by fire, or burning alive, but, as we may clearly see from Joshua 7:15 and Joshua 7:25 , burning the corpse after death. This was also the case in Leviticus 21:9 and Genesis 38:24 .

(17) Their abominations. —This word occurs here for the first time, but the verb appears in Deuteronomy 7:26 (“utterly detest “), and in Leviticus 11:11 ; Leviticus 11:13 ; Leviticus 11:43 ; Leviticus 20:25 . In the later scriptures of the Old Testament this word “abomination” is frequently used to denote an idol. Their idols.—Either “great blocks,” or as in the margin, a term of extreme contempt. (See Leviticus 26:30, where the word first occurs. ) It is a favourite term with the prophet Ezekiel, who uses it four times as often as other writers in the Old Testament.