Leviticus 19:19-37

19:19 You must keep my statutes. You must not allow two different kinds of your animals to breed, ¹  you must not sow your field with two different kinds of seed, and you must not wear ²  a garment made of two different kinds of fabric. ³ 

Lying with a Slave Woman

19:20 “‘When a man has sexual intercourse with a woman, ⁴  although she is a slave woman designated for another man and she has not yet been ransomed, or freedom has not been granted to her, there will be an obligation to pay compensation. ⁵  They must not be put to death, because she was not free. 19:21 He must bring his guilt offering to the Lord at the entrance of the Meeting Tent, a guilt offering ram, ⁶  19:22 and the priest is to make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering before the Lord for his sin that he has committed, ⁷  and he will be forgiven ⁸  of his sin ⁹  that he has committed.

The Produce of Fruit Trees

19:23 “‘When you enter the land and plant any fruit tree, ¹⁰  you must consider its fruit to be forbidden. ¹¹  Three years it will be forbidden to you; ¹²  it must not be eaten. 19:24 In the fourth year all its fruit will be holy, praise offerings ¹³  to the Lord. 19:25 Then in the fifth year you may eat its fruit to add its produce to your harvest. ¹⁴  I am the Lord your God.

Blood, Hair, and Body

19:26 “‘You must not eat anything with the blood still in it. ¹⁵  You must not practice either divination or soothsaying. ¹⁶  19:27 You must not round off the corners of the hair on your head or ruin the corners of your beard. ¹⁷  19:28 You must not slash your body for a dead person ¹⁸  or incise a tattoo on yourself. ¹⁹  I am the Lord. 19:29 Do not profane your daughter by making her a prostitute, ²⁰  so that the land does not practice prostitution and become full of lewdness. ²¹ 

Purity, Honor, Respect, and Honesty

19:30 “‘You must keep my Sabbaths and fear my sanctuary. I am the Lord. 19:31 Do not turn to the spirits of the dead and do not seek familiar spirits ²²  to become unclean by them. I am the Lord your God. 19:32 You must stand up in the presence of the aged, honor the presence of an elder, and fear your God. I am the Lord. 19:33 When a foreigner resides ²³  with you in your land, you must not oppress him. 19:34 The foreigner who resides with you must be to you like a native citizen among you; so ²⁴  you must love him as yourself, because you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. 19:35 You must not do injustice in the regulation of measures, whether of length, weight, or volume. ²⁵  19:36 You must have honest balances, ²⁶  honest weights, an honest ephah, and an honest hin. ²⁷  I am the Lord your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt. 19:37 You must be sure to obey all my statutes and regulations. ²⁸  I am the Lord.’”

[19:19]  ¹ tn Heb “Your animals, you shall not cross-breed two different kinds.”

[19:19]  ² tn Heb “you shall not cause to go up on you.”

[19:19]  ³ sn Cf. Deut 22:11 where the Hebrew term translated “two different kinds” (כִּלְאַיִם, kil’ayim) refers to a mixture of linen and wool woven together in a garment.

[19:20]  ⁴ tn Heb “And a man when he lies with a woman the lying of seed.”

[19:20]  ⁵ sn That is, the woman had previously been assigned for marriage to another man but the marriage deal had not yet been consummated. In the meantime, the woman has lost her virginity and has, therefore, lost part of her value to the master in the sale to the man for whom she had been designated. Compensation was, therefore, required (see the explanation in B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 130-31).

[19:21]  ⁶ sn On the guilt offering see the note on Lev 5:15 above.

[19:22]  ⁷ tn Heb “on his sin which he has sinned.”

[19:22]  ⁸ tn Heb “there shall be forgiveness to him” or “it shall be forgiven to him.”

[19:22]  ⁹ tn Heb “from his sin.”

[19:23]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “tree of food”; KJV, ASV, NASB, NRSV “trees for food.”

[19:23]  ¹¹ tn Heb “you shall circumcise its fruit [as] its foreskin,” taking the fruit to be that which is to be removed and, therefore, forbidden. Since the fruit is uncircumcised it is forbidden (see J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 306, and esp. B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 131-32).

[19:23]  ¹² tn Heb “it shall be to you uncircumcised.”

[19:24]  ¹³ tn See B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 132, where the translation reads “set aside for jubilation”; a special celebration before the Lord.

[19:25]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “to add to you its produce.” The rendering here assumes that the point of this clause is simply that finally being allowed to eat the fruit in the fifth year adds the fruit of the tree to their harvest. Some take the verb to be from אָסַף (’asaf, “to gather”) rather than יָסַף (yasaf, “to add; to increase”), rendering the verse, “to gather to you the produce” (E. S. Gerstenberger, Leviticus [OTL], 260, and see the versions referenced in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 306). Others take it to mean that by following the regulations given previously they will honor the Lord so that the Lord will cause the trees to increase the amount of fruit they would normally produce (Hartley, 303, 306; cf. NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

[19:26]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “You shall not eat on the blood.” See the extensive remarks in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 319-20, and B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 132-33. The LXX has “on the mountains,” suggesting that this is a prohibition against illegitimate places and occasions of worship, not the eating of blood.

[19:26]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “You shall not practice divination and you shall not practice soothsaying”; cf. NRSV “practice augury or witchcraft.” For suggestions regarding the practices involved see B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 133, and J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 320.

[19:27]  ¹⁷ 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.

[19:28]  ¹⁸ 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.

[19:28]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and a writing of incision you shall not give in you.”

[19:29]  ²⁰ tn Heb “to make her practice harlotry.” Some recent English versions regard this as religious or temple prostitution (cf. TEV, CEV).

[19:29]  ²¹ tn Heb “and the land become full of lewdness.” Regarding the term “lewdness,” see the note on Lev 18:17 above.

[19:31]  ²² sn The prohibition here concerns those who would seek special knowledge through the spirits of the dead, whether the dead in general or dead relatives in particular (i.e., familiar spirits; see J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 321, and B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 134). Cf. Lev 20:6 below.

[19:33]  ²³ tn Heb “And when a sojourner sojourns.”

[19:34]  ²⁴ tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.

[19:35]  ²⁵ tn That is, liquid capacity (HALOT 640 s.v. מְשׂוּרָה). Cf. ASV, NIV, NRSV, TEV “quantity”; NAB, NASB “capacity.”

[19:36]  ²⁶ tn Heb “balances of righteousness,” and so throughout this sentence.

[19:36]  ²⁷ sn An ephah is a dry measure which measures about four gallons, or perhaps one third of a bushel, while a hin is a liquid measure of about 3.6 liters (= approximately 1 quart).

[19:37]  ²⁸ tn Heb “And you shall keep all my statutes and all my regulations and you shall do them.” This appears to be a kind of verbal hendiadys, where the first verb is a modifier of the action of the second verb (see GKC 386 §120.d, although שָׁמַר [shamar, “to keep”] is not cited there; cf. Lev 22:31).