Leviticus 18 :: English Standard Version (ESV)

Unlawful Sexual Relations

Lev 18:1And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying,

Lev 18:2“Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, I am the LORD your God.

Lev 18:3You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt, where you lived, and you shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, to which I am bringing you. You shall not walk in their statutes.

Lev 18:4

Lev 18:4You shall follow my rules[fn] and keep my statutes and walk in them. I am the LORD your God.

Lev 18:5

Lev 18:5You shall therefore keep my statutes and my rules; if a person does them, he shall live by them: I am the LORD.

Lev 18:6

Lev 18:6“None of you shall approach any one of his close relatives to uncover nakedness. I am the LORD.

Lev 18:7

Lev 18:7You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father, which is the nakedness of your mother; she is your mother, you shall not uncover her nakedness.

Lev 18:8

Lev 18:8You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s wife; it is your father’s nakedness.

Lev 18:9

Lev 18:9You shall not uncover the nakedness of your sister, your father’s daughter or your mother’s daughter, whether brought up in the family or in another home.

Lev 18:10

Lev 18:10You shall not uncover the nakedness of your son’s daughter or of your daughter’s daughter, for their nakedness is your own nakedness.

Lev 18:11

Lev 18:11You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s wife’s daughter, brought up in your father’s family, since she is your sister.

Lev 18:12

Lev 18:12You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s sister; she is your father’s relative.

Lev 18:13

Lev 18:13You shall not uncover the nakedness of your mother’s sister, for she is your mother’s relative.

Lev 18:14

Lev 18:14You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s brother, that is, you shall not approach his wife; she is your aunt.

Lev 18:15

Lev 18:15You shall not uncover the nakedness of your daughter-in-law; she is your son’s wife, you shall not uncover her nakedness.

Lev 18:16

Lev 18:16You shall not uncover the nakedness of your brother’s wife; it is your brother’s nakedness.

Lev 18:17

Lev 18:17You shall not uncover the nakedness of a woman and of her daughter, and you shall not take her son’s daughter or her daughter’s daughter to uncover her nakedness; they are relatives; it is depravity.

Lev 18:18

Lev 18:18And you shall not take a woman as a rival wife to her sister, uncovering her nakedness while her sister is still alive.

Lev 18:19

Lev 18:19“You shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness while she is in her menstrual uncleanness.

Lev 18:20

Lev 18:20And you shall not lie sexually with your neighbor’s wife and so make yourself unclean with her.

Lev 18:21

Lev 18:21You shall not give any of your children to offer them[fn] to Molech, and so profane the name of your God: I am the LORD.

Lev 18:22

Lev 18:22You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.

Lev 18:23

Lev 18:23And you shall not lie with any animal and so make yourself unclean with it, neither shall any woman give herself to an animal to lie with it: it is perversion.

Lev 18:24

Lev 18:24“Do not make yourselves unclean by any of these things, for by all these the nations I am driving out before you have become unclean,

Lev 18:25

Lev 18:25and the land became unclean, so that I punished its iniquity, and the land vomited out its inhabitants.

Lev 18:26

Lev 18:26But you shall keep my statutes and my rules and do none of these abominations, either the native or the stranger who sojourns among you

Lev 18:27

Lev 18:27(for the people of the land, who were before you, did all of these abominations, so that the land became unclean),

Lev 18:28

Lev 18:28lest the land vomit you out when you make it unclean, as it vomited out the nation that was before you.

Lev 18:29

Lev 18:29For everyone who does any of these abominations, the persons who do them shall be cut off from among their people.

Lev 18:30

Lev 18:30So keep my charge never to practice any of these abominable customs that were practiced before you, and never to make yourselves unclean by them: I am the LORD your God.”

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ESV Footnotes

(18:4)

Or my just decrees; also verse 5

(18:21)

Hebrew to make them pass through [the fire]

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