in certain relations; that in Leviticus xviii. chiefly this law is found; and that this law is of permanent obligation, binding on Christians." There can indeed be little doubt of this. Violations of the law are spoken of as sins of the Egyptians and Canaanites. It is not, therefore, a mere Jewish law. The following is the language by which it is introduced and followed:—"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" (verse 3). "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 (for all these abominations have the men of the land done, which were before you, and the land is defiled)," (verses 26 and 27). In the New Testament we find the Apostle Paul saying (1 Cor. v. 1.)—"It is commonly reported that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife." Plainly the Apostle assumes that there was some code different from that known among the heathen, which Christians were bound to acknowledge, and which prohibited a man's marriage with a stepmother. No law on this subject is found in the New Testament, but only in the Books of Moses, to which therefore Christians must look for guidance in respect to the prohibited degrees.
Let us now examine the Divine Law which is laid down in Leviticus. Leaving out of view, for the present, Law. xviii. 18, (which, according as we adopt the rendering in the text, or in the margin, forbids the marriage of two sisters, while both are alive, or simply, of any two women, while both are alive), we find the following are the only relatives whom a man is expressly forbidden to marry.[1]
| 1. | His mother (Lev. xviii., 7) | a relative by blood. |
| 2. | His father's wife (i. e. stepmother) Lev. xviii. 8, and xx. 11), | a relative by marriage. |
| 3. | His sister (Lev. xviii. 9, and xx. 17) | a relative by blood. |
| 4. | His half-sister (Lev. xviii. 9, and xx. 17) | a relative by blood. |
| 5. | His son's daughter (Lev. xviii. 10) | a relative by blood. |
| 6. | His daughter's daughter (Lev. xviii. 10) | a relative by blood. |
| 7. | His father's sister (Lev. xviii. 12, and xx, 19), | a relative by blood. |
- ↑ It seems sufficiently evident that the prohibitions in Lev. 18th include prohibitions of Marriage. They were so understood by the Jews, and are so understood by Christians generally. The terms used are not, in themselves, applicable merely to unlawful intercourse between persons not married to each other—they are elsewhere used with reference to marriages. Besides, if there be here no prohibition of incestuous marriages, such marriages are nowhere else forbidden, and thus a Jew might marry his nearest relatives without being guilty of incest. Although intercourse with them was punished by death, if there was no marriage, yet if the parties were married no punishment was inflicted! It need scarcely be added that the "wife" whom a man is forbidden to marry means "widow." Two men, father and son, or nephew and uncle, cannot be supposed to have been married at the same time to the same "wife." It is, obviously, the "widow" of the father and uncle whom the son and nephew are forbidden to marry. This is a common use of the word "wife" in other parts of Scripture.
