Leviticus 19:27-28

19:27 You must not round off the corners of the hair on your head or ruin the corners of your beard. ¹  19:28 You must not slash your body for a dead person ²  or incise a tattoo on yourself. ³  I am the Lord.

¹ tc Heb “and you [singular] shall not ruin the corner of your [singular] beard.” Smr, LXX, Syriac, and Tg. Ps.-J. have the plural pronouns (i.e., “you” and “your” plural) rather than the singular of the MT.

² tn Heb “And slash for the soul you shall not give.” The Hebrew term נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, “soul, person, life”) can sometimes refer to a “dead person” (cf. Lev 21:1, 5; 22:5). See J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 306, 320-21.

³ tn Heb “and a writing of incision you shall not give in you.”