Forbidden sexual relationships
18
And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 📚“Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them, I am the LORD your God. 3 📚You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt 📖 where you lived, and you shall not do what is done in the land of Canaan 📖 where I am taking you, and you shall not behave according to their rules. 4 📚You shall obey my laws and observe my regulations to walk in them; I am the LORD your God. 5 📚You shall therefore keep my regulations, and my laws; if a man obeys them he will live through them; I am the LORD.18:5Neh 9:29; Ezek 18:9; 20:11; Luke 10:28; Rom 10:5; Gal 3:12. This was the basis of the law and the old covenant. The problem was that because of the sinfulness of man’s nature no one ever kept perfectly the law of God (except the Lord Jesus Who had no sinful nature). See Rom 3:9-12, 23, and the note at Ex 19:8. But it was certainly possible for the Israelites to avoid the detestable sins and idolatries of the Egyptians and Canaanites.🪶
6 📚“None of you shall approach any of his blood relatives to uncover his nakedness; I am the LORD.
7 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father, or the nakedness of your mother; she is your mother; you shall not uncover her nakedness.
8 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s wife; it is your father’s nakedness.
9 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of your sister, the daughter of your father, or daughter of your mother, whether she be born at home, or born outside; do not uncover their nakedness.
10 “You shall not uncover the nakedness of your son’s daughter, or of your daughter’s daughter; do not uncover their nakedness; for their nakedness is your own nakedness.
11 “You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s wife’s daughter, begotten of your father; she is your sister; you shall not uncover her nakedness.
12 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s sister; she is your father’s close relative.
13 “You shall not uncover the nakedness of your mother’s sister, for she is your mother’s close relative.
14 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s brother; you shall not approach his wife; she is your aunt.
15 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of your daughter-in-law; she is your son’s wife; you shall not uncover her nakedness.
16 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of your brother’s wife; it is your brother’s nakedness.
17 📚“You shall not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter, neither shall you take her son’s daughter, or her daughter’s daughter, to uncover her nakedness; for they are her close relatives; it is wickedness.
18 📚“And you shall not marry a woman and her sister as a rival, while the other woman is still living, to uncover her nakedness.
18:6-18 All sexual contact and marriage between members of the same family were forbidden.🪶
19 📚“Also you shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness during her period of impurity.
20 📚“And you shall not have intercourse with your neighbour’s wife, to defile yourself with her.
21 📚“And you shall not let any of your offspring pass through the fire 📖 to Molech 📖, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the LORD.
22 📚“You shall not lie with a man as with a woman; it is an abomination.
23 📚“And you shall not have intercourse with any animal to defile yourself with it; nor shall any woman stand before an animal to have intercourse with it; it is perversion.
24 📚“Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, for the nations which I will drive out before you were defiled by all these things. 25 📚And the land is defiled; therefore I will punish it for its wickedness, and the land itself vomits out its inhabitants.
18:24-25 Lev 20:23; Deut 9:5; 18:11; Rom 1:18; Col 3:6. At last the practices of the nations in Canaan had become so detestable that God’s wrath fell on them. Note at Gen 6:7. God determined to drive them out and give their land to His people Israel. In all this we may be absolutely sure of this truth – there is no punishment which God sends on any individual or any group or people or nation which is undeserved. Only when the sins of men reach such a stage that God must judge and punish them does He do so.🪶
26 📚You shall therefore keep my regulations and my laws, and shall not commit any of these abominations; not any of your own nation, or any foreigner who lives among you 27 📚(for the men of the land who were there before you have done all these abominations, and the land is defiled), 28 📚so that the land does not also vomit you out for defiling it, as it vomited out the nations that were before you.
29 📚“For anyone who commits any of these abominations, those persons who commit them shall be cut off from among their people. 30 📚Therefore you shall keep my charge so that you do not follow any of these abominable customs which were followed before you, and so that you do not defile yourselves with them. I am the LORD your God”.