Imamat 18:21-30

18:21 You must not give any of your children as an offering to Molech, ¹  so that you do not profane ²  the name of your God. I am the Lord! 18:22 You must not have sexual intercourse with a male as one has sexual intercourse with a woman; ³  it is a detestable act. ⁴  18:23 You must not have sexual intercourse ⁵  with any animal to become defiled with it, and a woman must not stand before an animal to have sexual intercourse with it; ⁶  it is a perversion. ⁷ 

Warning against the Abominations of the Nations

18:24 “‘Do not defile yourselves with any of these things, for the nations which I am about to drive out before you ⁸  have been defiled with all these things. 18:25 Therefore ⁹  the land has become unclean and I have brought the punishment for its iniquity upon it, ¹⁰  so that the land has vomited out its inhabitants. 18:26 You yourselves must obey ¹¹  my statutes and my regulations and must not do any of these abominations, both the native citizen and the resident foreigner in your midst, ¹²  18:27 for the people who were in the land before you have done all these abominations, ¹³  and the land has become unclean. 18:28 So do not make the land vomit you out because you defile it ¹⁴  just as it has vomited out the nations ¹⁵  that were before you. 18:29 For if anyone does any of these abominations, the persons who do them will be cut off from the midst of their people. ¹⁶  18:30 You must obey my charge to not practice any of the abominable statutes ¹⁷  that have been done before you, so that you do not ¹⁸  defile yourselves by them. I am the Lord your God.’”

Imamat 20:2-5

20:2 “You are to say to the Israelites, ‘Any man from the Israelites or from the foreigners who reside in Israel ¹⁹  who gives any of his children ²⁰  to Molech ²¹  must be put to death; the people of the land must pelt him with stones. ²²  20:3 I myself will set my face ²³  against that man and cut him off from the midst of his people, ²⁴  because he has given some of his children to Molech and thereby defiled my sanctuary and profaned my holy name. ²⁵  20:4 If, however, the people of the land shut their eyes ²⁶  to that man ²⁷  when he gives some of his children to Molech so that they do not put him to death, 20:5 I myself will set my face against that man and his clan. I will cut off from the midst of their people both him and all who follow after him in spiritual prostitution, ²⁸  to commit prostitution by worshiping Molech. ²⁹ 

[18:21]  ¹ tn Heb “And from your seed you shall not give to cause to pass over to Molech.” Smr (cf. also the LXX) has “to cause to serve” rather than “to cause to pass over.” For detailed remarks on Molech and Molech worship see N. H. Snaith, Leviticus and Numbers (NCBC), 87-88; P. J. Budd, Leviticus (NCBC), 259-60; and J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 333-37, and the literature cited there. It could refer to either human sacrifice or a devotion of children to some sort of service of Molech, perhaps of a sexual sort (cf. Lev 20:2-5; 2 Kgs 23:10, etc.). The inclusion of this prohibition against Molech worship here may be due to some sexual connection of this kind, or perhaps simply to the lexical link between זֶרַע (zera’) meaning “seed, semen” in v. 20 but “offspring” in v. 21.

[18:21]  ² tn Heb “and you shall not profane.” Regarding “profane,” see the note on Lev 10:10 above.

[18:22]  ³ tn Heb “And with a male you shall not lay [as the] lyings of a woman” (see B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 123). The specific reference here is to homosexual intercourse between males.

[18:22]  ⁴ tn The Hebrew term תּוֹעֵבָה (to’evah, rendered “detestable act”) refers to the repugnant practices of foreigners, whether from the viewpoint of other peoples toward the Hebrews (e.g., Gen 43:32; 46:34; Exod 8:26) or of the Lord toward other peoples (see esp. Lev 18:26-27, 29-30). It can also designate, as here, detestable acts that might be perpetrated by the native peoples (it is used again in reference to homosexuality in Lev 20:13; cf. also its use for unclean food, Deut 14:3; idol worship, Isa 41:24; remarriage to a former wife who has been married to someone else in between, Deut 24:4).

[18:23]  ⁵ tn See the note on v. 20 above.

[18:23]  ⁶ tn Heb “to copulate with it” (cf. Lev 20:16).

[18:23]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew term תֶּבֶל (tevel, “perversion”) derives from the verb “to mix; to confuse” and therefore refers to illegitimate mixtures of species or violation of the natural order of things.

[18:24]  ⁸ tn Heb “which I am sending away (Piel participle of שָׁלַח [shalakh, “to send”]) from your faces.” The rendering here takes the participle as anticipatory of the coming conquest events.

[18:25]  ⁹ tn Heb “And.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative or even inferential force here.

[18:25]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and I have visited its [punishment for] iniquity on it.” See the note on Lev 17:16 above.

[18:26]  ¹¹ tn Heb “And you shall keep, you.” The latter emphatic personal pronoun “you” is left out of a few medieval Hebrew mss, Smr, the LXX, Syriac, and Vulgate.

[18:26]  ¹² tn Heb “the native and the sojourner”; NIV “The native-born and the aliens”; NAB “whether natives or resident aliens.”

[18:27]  ¹³ tn Heb “for all these abominations the men of the land who were before you have done.”

[18:28]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “And the land will not vomit you out in your defiling it.”

[18:28]  ¹⁵ tc The MT reads the singular “nation” and is followed by ASV, NASB, NRSV; the LXX, Syriac, and Targum have the plural “nations” (cf. v. 24).

[18:29]  ¹⁶ sn Regarding the “cut off” penalty see the note on Lev 7:20.

[18:30]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “to not do from the statutes of the detestable acts.”

[18:30]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and you will not.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have resultative force here.

[20:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “or from the sojourner who sojourns”; NAB “an alien residing in Israel.”

[20:2]  ²⁰ tn Heb “his seed” (so KJV, ASV); likewise in vv. 3-4.

[20:2]  ²¹ tn Regarding Molech and Molech worship see the note on Lev 18:21.

[20:2]  ²² tn This is not the most frequently-used Hebrew verb for stoning (see instead סָקַל, saqal), but a word that refers to the action of throwing, slinging, or pelting someone with stones (רָגָם, ragam; see HALOT 1187 s.v. רגם qal.a, and B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 136).

[20:3]  ²³ tn Heb “And I, I shall give my faces.”

[20:3]  ²⁴ sn On the “cut off” penalty see the notes on Lev 7:20 and 17:4.

[20:3]  ²⁵ tn Heb “for the sake of defiling my sanctuary and to profane my holy name.”

[20:4]  ²⁶ tn Heb “And if shutting [infinitive absolute] they shut [finite verb].” For the infinitive absolute used to highlight contrast rather than emphasis see GKC 343 §113.p.

[20:4]  ²⁷ tn Heb “from that man” (so ASV); NASB “disregard that man.”

[20:5]  ²⁸ tn The adjective “spiritual” has been supplied in the translation to clarify that this is not a reference to literal prostitution, but figuratively compares idolatry to prostitution.

[20:5]  ²⁹ tn Heb “to commit harlotry after Molech.” The translation employs “worshiping” here for clarity (cf. NAB, NCV, TEV, CEV, NLT). On the “cut off” penalty see the note on Lev 7:20.