and refers to one of the same class, species, or sex. So that the rendering of this verse in most commentaries of the day is a wife to her sister, whether she be sister by her blood, or nation, or by common sisterhood. Indeed it would be doubly wrong to commit bigamy with one's wife's own sister.
The law of God is, that man may marry after his wife's death another woman. The question is, Can that woman be your wife's own sister? What is God's law about marriage? He distinctly points out to us in His code that His law is that a man cannot marry his wife's own sister, as we have seen. His law cannot be dispensed with, unless God Himself dispenses with it. But we see not the slightest sign of a dispensation given by God, and there is no natural or physiological reason for it. He simply forbids marriages near of kin and polygamy. It is absurd to think that God in the same breath, as it were, would both forbid and then allow the marriage. Besides in this case, according to the showing of nature, or true physiology, or God's law, there is no physiological or natural reason why a woman should marry her brother-in-law, because he can marry any one else (but not her by the law of God). Naturally speaking, I say, there is no necessity for a man to marry his deceased wife's own sister to perpetuate his name. He can marry any other not near of kin without breaking God's law.
