21:15 Suppose a man has two wives, one whom he loves more than the other, 11 and they both 12 bear him sons, with the firstborn being the child of the less loved wife.
25:11 If two men 13 get into a hand-to-hand fight, and the wife of one of them gets involved to help her husband against his attacker, and she reaches out her hand and grabs his genitals, 14
1 tn Heb “every city of men.” This apparently identifies the cities as inhabited.
2 tn Heb “under the ban” (נַחֲרֵם, nakharem). The verb employed is חָרַם (kharam, usually in the Hiphil) and the associated noun is חֵרֶם (kherem). See J. Naudé, NIDOTTE, 2:276-77, and, for a more thorough discussion, Susan Niditch, War in the Hebrew Bible, 28-77.
3 tn Heb “we put them under the ban” (נַחֲרֵם, nakharem). See note at 2:34.
4 tn Heb “city of men.”
5 tn The Hebrew verb used here (חָמַד, khamad) is different from the one translated “crave” (אָוַה, ’avah) in the next line. The former has sexual overtones (“lust” or the like; cf. Song of Sol 2:3) whereas the latter has more the idea of a desire or craving for material things.
6 tn Heb “your neighbor’s.” See note on the term “fellow man” in v. 19.
7 tn Heb “your neighbor’s.” The pronoun is used in the translation for stylistic reasons.
8 tn Heb “or anything that is your neighbor’s.”
7 tn Heb “must not multiply” (cf. KJV, NASB); NLT “must not take many.”
9 tn Heb “Who [is] the man.”
11 tn Heb “one whom he loves and one whom he hates.” For the idea of שָׂנֵא (sane’, “hate”) meaning to be rejected or loved less (cf. NRSV “disliked”), see Gen 29:31, 33; Mal 1:2-3. Cf. A. Konkel, NIDOTTE 3:1256-60.
12 tn Heb “both the one whom he loves and the one whom he hates.” On the meaning of the phrase “one whom he loves and one whom he hates” see the note on the word “other” earlier in this verse. The translation has been simplified for stylistic reasons, to avoid redundancy.
13 tn Heb “a man and his brother.”
14 tn Heb “shameful parts.” Besides the inherent indelicacy of what she has done, the woman has also threatened the progenitive capacity of the injured man. The level of specificity given this term in modern translations varies: “private parts” (NAB, NIV, CEV); “genitals” (NASB, NRSV, TEV); “sex organs” (NCV); “testicles” (NLT).
15 tn Heb “who lies with” (so NASB, NRSV); also in vv. 22, 23. This is a Hebrew idiom for having sexual relations (cf. NIV “who sleeps with”; NLT “who has sexual intercourse with”).
16 tn See note at Deut 22:30.
17 tn Heb “he uncovers his father’s skirt” (NASB similar). See note at Deut 22:30.
17 tc For MT reading שָׁגַל (shagal, “ravish; violate”), the Syriac, Targum, and Vulgate presume the less violent שָׁכַב (shakhav, “lie with”). The unexpected counterpart to betrothal here favors the originality of the MT.