Imamat 19:15

Justice, Love, and Propriety

19:15 “‘You ¹  must not deal unjustly in judgment: ²  you must neither show partiality to the poor nor honor the rich. ³  You must judge your fellow citizen fairly. ⁴ 

Imamat 20:14

20:14 If a man has sexual intercourse with both a woman and her mother, ⁵  it is lewdness. ⁶  Both he and they must be burned to death, ⁷  so there is no lewdness in your midst.

Imamat 22:11

22:11 but if a priest buys a person with his own money, ⁸  that person ⁹  may eat the holy offerings, ¹⁰  and those born in the priest’s ¹¹  own house may eat his food. ¹² 

¹ tc Smr has the singular rather than the plural “you” of the MT, which brings this verb form into line with the ones surrounding it.

² tn Heb “You shall not do injustice in judgment” (NASB similar); cf. NIV “do not pervert justice.”

³ tn Heb “You shall not lift up faces of poor [people] and you shall not honor faces of great.”

⁴ tn Heb “In righteousness you shall judge your fellow citizen.”

⁵ tn Heb “And a man who takes a woman and her mother.” The Hebrew verb “to take” in this context means “to engage in sexual intercourse.”

⁶ tn Regarding “lewdness,” see the note on Lev 18:17 above.

⁷ tn Heb “in fire they shall burn him and them.” The active plural verb sometimes requires a passive translation (GKC 460 §144.f, g), esp. when no active plural subject has been expressed in the context. The present translation specifies “burned to death” because the traditional rendering “burnt with fire” (KJV, ASV; NASB “burned with fire”) could be understood to mean “branded” or otherwise burned, but not fatally.

⁸ tn Heb “and a priest, if he buys a person, the property of his silver.”

⁹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the person whom the priest has purchased) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁰ tn Heb “eat it”; the referent (the holy offerings) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹¹ tn Heb “his”; the referent (the priest) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹² tn Heb “and the [slave] born of his house, they shall eat in his food.” The LXX, Syriac, Tg. Onq., Tg. Ps.-J., and some mss of Smr have plural “ones born,” which matches the following plural “they” pronoun and the plural form of the verb.