L
E V I T I C U S
CHAP. XVIII.
Here
is, I. A general law against all conformity to the corrupt usages of the
heathen, ver. 1-5. II. Particular laws, 1. Against incest, ver. 6-18. 2.
Against beastly lusts, and barbarous idolatries, ver. 19-23. III. The
enforcement of these laws from the ruin of the Canaanites, ver. 24-30.
|
Cautions
against Idolatrous Practices.
B. C.
1490.
|
|
|
|
1 And the LORD
spake unto Moses, saying, 2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and
say unto them, I am the LORD
your God. 3 After 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.
4 Ye shall do my judgments, and keep mine ordinances, to walk therein: I am
the LORD
your God. 5 Ye shall therefore keep my statutes, and my judgments:
which if a man do, he shall live in them: I am the LORD.
After divers ceremonial institutions, God here returns to the enforcement of
moral precepts. The former are still of use to us as types, the latter still
binding as laws. We have here, 1. The sacred authority by which these laws are
enacted: I am the Lord your God (v. 1, 4, 30), and I am the
Lord, v. 5, 6, 21. "The Lord, who has a right to rule all;
your God, who has a peculiar right to rule you." Jehovah is the fountain
of being, and therefore the fountain of power, whose we are, whom we are bound
to serve, and who is able to punish all disobedience. "Your God to whom
you have consented, in whom you are happy, to whom you lie under the highest
obligations imaginable, and to whom you are accountable." 2. A strict
caution to take heed of retaining the relics of the idolatries of Egypt, where
they had dwelt, and of receiving the infection of the idolatries of Canaan,
whither they were now going, v. 3. Now that God was by Moses teaching
them his ordinances there was aliquid dediscendum--something to be
unlearned, which they had sucked in with their milk in Egypt, a country
noted for idolatry: You shall not do after the doings of the land of Egypt.
It would be the greatest absurdity in itself to retain such an affection for
their house of bondage as to be governed in their devotions by the usages of
it, and the greatest ingratitude to God, who had so wonderfully and graciously
delivered them. Nay, as if governed by a spirit of contradiction, they would
be in danger, even after they had received these ordinances of God, of
admitting the wicked usages of the Canaanites and of inheriting their vices
with their land. Of this danger they are here warned, You shall not walk in
their ordinances. Such a tyrant is custom that their practices are called ordinances,
and they became rivals even with God's ordinances, and God's professing people
were in danger of receiving law from them. 3. A solemn charge to them to keep
God's judgments, statutes, and ordinances, v. 4, 5. To this charge,
and many similar ones, David seems to refer in the many prayers and
professions he makes relating to God's laws in the 119th Psalm. Observe here,
(1.) The great rule of our obedience--God's statutes and judgments. These we
must keep to walk therein. We must keep them in our books, and keep
them in our hands, that we may practise them in our hearts and lives. Remember
God's commandments to do them, Ps. ciii. 18. We must keep in them as our
way to travel in, keep to them as our rule to work by, keep them as our
treasure, as the apple of our eye, with the utmost care and value. (2.) The
great advantage of our obedience: Which if a man do, he shall live in them,
that is, "he shall be happy here and hereafter." We have reason to
thank God, [1.] That this is still in force as a promise, with a very
favourable construction of the condition. If we keep God's commandments in
sincerity, though we come short of sinless perfection, we shall find that the
way of duty is the way of comfort, and will be the way to happiness. Godliness
has the promise of life, 1 Tim. iv. 8. Wisdom has said, Keep my
commandments and live: and if through the Spirit we mortify the deeds
of the body (which are to us as the usages of Egypt were to Israel) we
shall live. [2.] That it is not so in force in the nature of a covenant as
that the least transgression shall for ever exclude us from this life. The
apostle quotes this twice as opposite to the faith which the gospel reveals.
It is the description of the righteousness which is by the law, the man
that doeth them shall live en autoiV--in
them (Rom. x. 5), and is urged to prove that the law is not of faith,
Gal. iii. 12. The alteration which the gospel has made is in the last word:
still the man that does them shall live, but not live in them;
for the law could not give life, because we could not perfectly keep it; it
was weak through the flesh, not in itself; but now the man that does
them shall live by the faith of the Son of God. He shall owe his
life to the grace of Christ, and not to the merit of his own works; see Gal.
iii. 21, 22. The just shall live, but they shall live by faith,
by virtue of their union with Christ, who is their life.
|
Incest
Defined and Forbidden; Against Marrying Near Relations.
B. C.
1490.
|
|
|
|
6 None of you shall
approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover their nakedness:
I am the LORD.
7 The nakedness of thy father, or the nakedness of thy mother, shalt thou not
uncover: she is thy mother; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness.
8 The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy
father's nakedness. 9 The 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.
10 The 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. 11 The nakedness of thy father's wife's daughter,
begotten of thy father, she is thy sister, thou shalt not uncover her
nakedness. 12 Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father's
sister: she is thy father's near kinswoman. 13 Thou shalt
not uncover the nakedness of thy mother's sister: for she is thy
mother's near kinswoman. 14 Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness
of thy father's brother, thou shalt not approach to his wife: she is
thine aunt. 15 Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy
daughter in law: she is thy son's wife; thou shalt not uncover her
nakedness. 16 Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy
brother's wife: it is thy brother's nakedness. 17 Thou
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. 18 Neither shalt thou take a wife to her sister, to
vex her, to uncover her nakedness, beside the other in her life time.
These laws relate to the seventh commandment, and, no doubt, are obligatory on
us under the gospel, for they are consonant to the very light and law of
nature: one of the articles, that of a man's having his father's wife, the
apostle speaks of as a sin not so much as named among the Gentiles, 1
Cor. v. 1. Though some of the incests here forbidden were practised by some
particular persons among the heathen, yet they were disallowed and detested,
unless among those nations who had become barbarous, and were quite given up
to vile affections. Observe,
I. That which is forbidden as to the relations here specified is approaching
to them to uncover their nakedness, v. 6.
1. It is chiefly intended to forbid the marrying of any of these relations.
Marriage is a divine institution; this and the sabbath, the eldest of all, of
equal standing with man upon the earth: it is intended for the comfort of
human life, and the decent and honourable propagation of the human race, such
as became the dignity of man's nature above that of the beasts. It is honourable
in all, and these laws are for the support of the honour of it. It was
requisite that a divine ordinance should be subject to divine rules and
restraints, especially because it concerns a thing wherein the corrupt nature
of man is as apt as in any thing to be wilful and impetuous in its desires,
and impatient of check. Yet these prohibitions, besides their being enacted by
an incontestable authority, are in themselves highly reasonable and equitable.
(1.) By marriage two were to become one flesh, therefore those that before
were in a sense one flesh by nature could not, without the greatest absurdity,
become one flesh by institution; for the institution was designed to unite
those who before were not united. (2.) Marriage puts an equality between
husband and wife. "Is she not thy companion taken out of thy side?"
Therefore, if those who before were superior and inferior should intermarry
(which is the case in most of the instances here laid down), the order of
nature would be taken away by a positive institution, which must by no means
be allowed. The inequality between master and servant, noble and ignoble, is
founded in consent and custom, and there is no harm done if that be taken away
by the equality of marriage; but the inequality between parents and children,
uncles and nieces, aunts and nephews, either by blood or marriage, is founded
in nature, and is therefore perpetual, and cannot without confusion be taken
away by the equality of marriage, the institution of which, though ancient, is
subsequent to the order of nature. (3.) No relations that are equals are
forbidden, except brothers and sisters, by the whole blood or half blood, or
by marriage; and in this there is not the same natural absurdity as in the
former, for Adam's sons must of necessity have married their own sisters; but
it was requisite that it should be made by a positive law unlawful and
detestable, for the preventing of sinful familiarities between those that in
the days of their youth are supposed to live in a house together, and yet
cannot intermarry without defeating one of the intentions of marriage, which
is the enlargement of friendship and interest. If every man married his own
sister (as they would be apt to do from generation to generation if it were
lawful), each family would be a world to itself, and it would be forgotten
that we are members one of another. It is certain that this has always
been looked upon by the more sober heathen as a most infamous and abominable
thing; and those who had not this law yet were herein a law to themselves. The
making use of the ordinance of marriage for the patronizing of incestuous
mixtures is so far from justifying them, or extenuating their guilt, that it
adds the guilt of profaning an ordinance of God, and prostituting that to the
vilest of purposes which was instituted for the noblest ends. But,
2. Uncleanness, committed with any of these relations out of marriage, is
likewise, without doubt, forbidden here, and no less intended than the former:
as also all lascivious carriage, wanton dalliance, and every thing that has
the appearance of this evil. Relations must love one another, and are to have
free and familiar converse with each other, but it must be with all purity;
and the less it is suspected of evil by others the more care ought the persons
themselves to take that Satan do not get advantage against them, for he
is a very subtle enemy, and seeks all occasions against us.
II. The relations forbidden are most of them plainly described; and it is
generally laid down as a rule that what relations of a man's own he is bound
up from marrying the same relations of his wife he is likewise forbidden to
marry, for they two are one. That law which forbids marrying a brother's wife
(v. 16) had an exception peculiar to the Jewish state, that, if a man
died without issue, his brother or next of kin should marry the widow, and
raise up seed to the deceased (Deut. xxv. 5), for reasons which held good only
in that commonwealth; and therefore now that those reasons have ceased the
exception ceases, and the law is in force, that a man must in no case marry
his brother's widow. That article (v. 18) which forbids a man to take
a wife to her sister supposes a connivance at polygamy, as some other laws
then did (Exod. xxi. 10; Deut. xxi. 15), but forbids a man's marrying two
sisters, as Jacob did, because between those who had before been equal there
would be apt to arise greater jealousies and animosities than between wives
that were not so nearly related. If the sister of the wife be taken for the
concubine, or secondary wife, nothing can be more vexing in her life, or as
long as she lives.
|
Laws
against Iniquity.
|
B.
C. 1490.
|
|
|
19 Also thou shalt not
approach unto a woman to uncover her nakedness, as long as she is put apart
for her uncleanness. 20 Moreover thou shalt not lie carnally with
thy neighbour's wife, to defile thyself with her. 21 And 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.
22 Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is
abomination. 23 Neither 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. 24 Defile not ye yourselves in
any of these things: for in all these the nations are defiled which I cast out
before you: 25 And the land is defiled: therefore I do visit the
iniquity thereof upon it, and the land itself vomiteth out her
inhabitants. 26 Ye 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:
27 (For all these abominations have the men of the land done, which were
before you, and the land is defiled;) 28 That the land spue not
you out also, when ye defile it, as it spued out the nations that were
before you. 29 For whosoever shall commit any of these
abominations, even the souls that commit them shall be cut off from
among their people. 30 Therefore 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.
Here is, I. A law to preserve the honour of the marriage-bed, that it should
not be unseasonably used (v. 19), nor invaded by an adulterer, v.
20.
II. A law against that which was the most unnatural idolatry, causing their
children to pass through the fire to Moloch, v. 21. Moloch (as
some think) was the idol in and by which they worshipped the sun, that great
fire of the world; and therefore in the worship of it they made their own
children either sacrifices to this idol, burning them to death before it, or
devotees to it, causing them to pass between two fires, as some think, or to
be thrown through one, to the honour of this pretended deity, imagining that
the consecrating of but one of their children in this manner to Moloch would
procure good fortune for all the rest of their children. Did idolaters thus
give their own children to false gods, and shall we think any thing too dear
to be dedicated to, or to be parted with for, the true God? See how this sin
of Israel (which they were afterwards guilty of, notwithstanding this law) is
aggravated by the relation which they and their children stood in to God.
Ezek. xvi. 20, Thou hast taken thy sons and thy daughters, whom thou hast
borne unto me, and these thou hast sacrificed. Therefore it is here called
profaning the name of their God; for it looked as if they thought they
were under greater obligations to Moloch than to Jehovah; for to him they
offered their cattle only, but to Moloch their children.
III. A law against unnatural lusts, sodomy and bestiality, sins not to be
named nor thought of without the utmost abhorrence imaginable, v. 22,
23. Other sins level men with the beasts, but these sink them much lower. That
ever there should have been occasion for the making of these laws, and that
since they are published they should ever have been broken, is the perpetual
reproach and scandal of human nature; and the giving of men up to these vile
affections was frequently the punishment of their idolatries; so the apostle
shows, Rom. i. 24.
IV. Arguments against these and the like abominable wickednesses. He that has
an indisputable right to command us, yet because he will deal with us as men,
and draw with the cords of a man, condescends to reason with us. 1.
Sinners defile themselves with these abominations: Defile not yourselves in
any of these things, v. 24. All sin is defiling to the conscience,
but these are sins that have a peculiar turpitude in them. Our heavenly
Father, in kindness to us, requires of us that we keep ourselves clean, and do
not wallow in the dirt. 2. The souls that commit them shall be cut off,
v. 29. And justly; for, if any man defile the temple of God, him
shall God destroy, 1 Cor. iii. 17. Fleshly lusts war against the soul, and
will certainly be the ruin of it if God's mercy and grace prevent not. 3. The
land is defiled, v. 25. If such wickednesses as these be practised
and connived at, the land is thereby made unfit to have God's tabernacle in
it, and the pure and holy God will withdraw the tokens of his gracious
presence from it. It is also rendered unwholesome to the inhabitants, who are
hereby infected with sin and exposed to plagues and it is really nauseous and
loathsome to all good men in it, as the wickedness of Sodom was to the soul of
righteous Lot. 4. These have been the abominations of the former inhabitants, v.
24, 27. Therefore it was necessary that these laws should be made, as
antidotes and preservatives from the plague are necessary when we go into an
infected place. And therefore they should not practise any such things,
because the nations that had practised them now lay under the curse of God,
and were shortly to fall by the sword of Israel. They could not but be
sensible how odious those people had made themselves who wallowed in this
mire, and how they stank in the nostrils of all good men; and shall a people
sanctified and dignified as Israel was make themselves thus vile? When we
observe how ill sin looks in others we should use this as an argument with
ourselves with the utmost care and caution to preserve our purity. 5. For
these and the like sins the Canaanites were to be destroyed; these filled the
measure of the Amorites' iniquity (Gen. xv. 16), and brought down that
destruction of so many populous kingdoms which the Israelites were now shortly
to be not only the spectators, but the instruments of: Therefore I do visit
the iniquity thereof upon it, v. 25. Note, The tremendous judgments
of God, executed on those that are daringly profane and atheistical, are
intended as warnings to those who profess religion to take heed of every thing
that has the least appearance of, or tendency towards, profaneness or atheism.
Even the ruin of the Canaanites is an admonition to the Israelites not to do
like them. Nay, to show that not only the Creator is provoked, but the
creation burdened, by such abominations as these, it is added (v. 25), The
land itself vomiteth out her inhabitants. The very ground they went upon
did, as it were, groan under them, and was sick of them, and not easy till it
had discharged itself of these enemies of the Lord, Isa. i. 24. This
bespeaks the extreme loathsomeness of sin; sinful man indeed drinks in
iniquity like water, but the harmless part of the creation even heaves at
it, and rises against it. Many a house and many a town have spued out the
wicked inhabitants, as it were, with abhorrence, Rev. iii. 16. Therefore take
heed, saith God, that the land spue not you out also, v. 28. It
was secured to them, and entailed upon them, and yet they must expect that, if
they made the vices of the Canaanites their own, with their land their fate
would be the same. Note, Wicked Israelites are as abominable to God as wicked
Canaanites, and more so, and will be as soon spued out, or sooner. Such a
warning as was here given to the Israelites is given by the apostle to the
Gentile converts, with reference to the rejected Jews, in whose room they were
substituted (Rom. xi. 19, &c.); they must take heed of falling after
the same example of unbelief, Heb. iv. 11. Apply it more generally; and
let it deter us effectually from all sinful courses to consider how many they
have been the ruin of. Lay the ear of faith to the gates of the bottomless
pit, and hear the doleful shrieks and outcries of damned sinners, whom earth
has spued out and hell has swallowed, that find themselves undone, for ever
undone, by sin; and tremble lest this be your portion at last. God's
threatenings and judgments should frighten us from sin.
V. The chapter concludes with a sovereign antidote against this infection: Therefore
you shall keep my ordinance that you commit not any one of these abominable
customs, v. 30. This is the remedy prescribed. Note, 1. Sinful
customs are abominable customs, and their being common and fashionable does
not make them at all the less abominable nor should we the less abominate
them, but the more; because the more customary they are the more dangerous
they are. 2. It is of pernicious consequence to admit and allow of any one
sinful custom, because one will make way for many, Uno absurdo dato, mille
sequuntur--Admit but a single absurdity, you invite a thousand. The way of
sin is downhill. 3. A close and constant adherence to God's ordinances is the
most effectual preservative from the infection of gross sin. The more we taste
of the sweetness and feel of the power of holy ordinances the less inclination
we shall have to the forbidden pleasures of sinners' abominable customs. It is
the grace of God only that will secure us, and that grace is to be expected
only in the use of the means of grace. Nor does God ever leave any to their
own hearts' lusts till they have first left him and his institutions.
Contents
|
Next
Section
