Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament · Leviticus Chapitre 18

Intercourse with a father's wife, i.e., with a step-mother, is forbidden as uncovering the father's nakedness; since a father's wife stood in blood-relationship only to the son whose mother she was. But for the father's sake her nakedness was to be inaccessible to the son, and uncovering it was to be punished with death as incest (Leviticus 20:11; Deuteronomy 27:20). By the “father's wife” we are probably to understand not merely his full lawful wife, but his concubine also, since the father's bed was defiled in the latter case no less than in the former (Genesis 49:4), and an accursed crime was committed, the punishment of which was death. At all events, it cannot be inferred from Leviticus 19:20-22 and Exodus 21:9, as Knobel supposes, that a milder punishment was inflicted in this case.

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By the sister, the daughter of father or mother, we are to understand only the step-or half-sister, who had either the same father or the same mother as the brother had. The clause, “ whether born at home or born abroad, ” does not refer to legitimate or illegitimate birth, but is to be taken as a more precise definition of the words, daughter of thy father or of thy mother, and understood, as Lud. de Dieu supposes, as referring to the half-sister “of the first marriage, whether the father's daughter left by a deceased wife, or the mother's daughter left by a deceased husband,” so that the person marrying her would be a son by a second marriage. Sexual intercourse with a half-sister is described as חסד in Leviticus 20:17, and threatened with extermination. This word generally signifies sparing love, favour, grace; but here, as in Proverbs 14:34, it means dishonour, shame, from the Piel חסּד , to dishonour.

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The prohibition of marriage with a granddaughter, whether the daughter of a son or daughter, is explained in the words, “for they are thy nakedness,” the meaning of which is, that as they were directly descended from the grandfather, carnal intercourse with them would be equivalent to dishonouring his own flesh and blood.

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“ The daughter of thy father's wife (i.e., thy step-mother), born to thy father, ” is the half-sister by a second marriage; and the prohibition refers to the son by a first marriage, whereas Leviticus 18:9 treats of the son by a second marriage. The notion that the man's own mother is also included, and that the prohibition includes marriage with a full sister, is at variance with the usage of the expression “thy father's wife.”

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So, again, with the wife of the father's brother, because the nakedness of the uncle was thereby uncovered. The threat held out in Leviticus 20:19 and Leviticus 20:20 against the alliances prohibited in Leviticus 18:12-14, is that the persons concerned should bear their iniquity or sin, i.e., should suffer punishment in consequence (see at Leviticus 5:1); and in the last case it is stated that they should die childless. From this it is obvious that sexual connection with the sister of either father or mother was not to be punished with death by the magistrate, but would be punished with disease by God Himself.

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Sexual connection with a daughter-in-law, a son's wife, is called תּבל in Leviticus 20:12, and threatened with death to both the parties concerned. תּבל , from בּלל to mix, to confuse, signifies a sinful mixing up or confusing of the divine ordinances by unnatural unchastity, like the lying of a woman with a beast, which is the only other connection in which the word occurs (Leviticus 18:23).

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Marriage with a brother's wife was a sin against the brother's nakedness, a sexual defilement, which God would punish with barrenness. This prohibition, however, only refers to cases in which the deceased brother had left children; for if he had died childless, the brother not only might, but was required to marry his sister-in-law (Deuteronomy 25:5).

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Marriage with a woman and her daughter, whether both together or in succession, is described in Deuteronomy 27:20 as an accursed lying with the mother-in-law; whereas here it is the relation to the step-daughter which is primarily referred to, as we may see from the parallel prohibition, which is added, against taking the daughter of her son or daughter, i.e., the granddaughter-in-law. Both of these were crimes against blood-relationship which were to be punished with death in the case of both parties (Leviticus 20:14), because they were “wickedness,” זמּה , lit., invention, design, here applied to the crime of licentiousness and whoredom (Leviticus 19:29; Judges 20:6; Job 31:11).

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Lastly, it was forbidden to take a wife to her sister ( עליה upon her, as in Genesis 28:9; Genesis 31:50) in her life-time, that is to say, to marry two sisters at the same time, לצרר “to pack together, to uncover this nakedness,” i.e., to pack both together into one marriage bond, and so place the sisters in carnal union through their common husband, and disturb the sisterly relation, as the marriage with two sisters that was forced upon Jacob had evidently done. No punishment is fixed for the marriage with two sisters; and, of course, after the death of the first wife a man was at liberty to marry her sister.

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