Leviticus 20:9

Family Life and Sexual Prohibitions ¹ 

20:9 “‘If anyone ²  curses his father and mother ³  he must be put to death. He has cursed his father and mother; his blood guilt is on himself. ⁴ 

Leviticus 24:11

24:11 The Israelite woman’s son misused the Name and cursed, ⁵  so they brought him to Moses. (Now his mother’s name was Shelomith daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan.)

[20:9]  ¹ sn Compare the regulations in Lev 18:6-23.

[20:9]  ² tn Heb “If a man a man who.”

[20:9]  ³ tn Heb “makes light of his father and his mother.” Almost all English versions render this as some variation of “curses his father or mother.”

[20:9]  ⁴ tn Heb “his blood [plural] is in him.” Cf. NAB “he has forfeited his life”; TEV “is responsible for his own death.”

[24:11]  ⁵ tn The verb rendered “misused” means literally “to bore through, to pierce” (HALOT 719 s.v. נקב qal); it is from נָקַב (naqav), not קָבַב (qavav; see the participial form in v. 16a). Its exact meaning here is uncertain. The two verbs together may form a hendiadys, “he pronounced by cursing blasphemously” (B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 166), the idea being one of the following: (1) he pronounced the name “Yahweh” in a way or with words that amounted to “some sort of verbal aggression against Yahweh himself” (E. S. Gerstenberger, Leviticus [OTL], 362), (2) he pronounced a curse against the man using the name “Yahweh” (N. H. Snaith, Leviticus and Numbers [NCBC], 110; G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 311), or (3) he pronounced the name “Yahweh” and thereby blasphemed, since the “Name” was never to be pronounced (a standard Jewish explanation). In one way or another, the offense surely violated Exod 20:7, one of the ten commandments, and the same verb for cursing is used explicitly in Exod 22:28 (27 HT) prohibition against “cursing” God. For a full discussion of these and related options for interpreting this verse see P. J. Budd, Leviticus (NCBC), 335-36; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 408-9; and Levine, 166.