22:30 (23:1) 2 A man may not marry 3 his father’s former 4 wife and in this way dishonor his father. 5
1 tn Heb “the prisoners.” The pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons, to avoid redundancy.
2 sn Beginning with 22:30, the verse numbers through 23:25 in the English Bible differ from the verse numbers in the Hebrew text (BHS), with 22:30 ET = 23:1 HT, 23:1 ET = 23:2 HT, 23:2 ET = 23:3 HT, etc., through 23:25 ET = 23:26 HT. With 24:1 the verse numbers in the ET and HT are again the same.
3 tn Heb “take.” In context this refers to marriage, as in the older English expression “take a wife.”
4 sn This presupposes either the death of the father or their divorce since it would be impossible for one to marry his stepmother while his father was still married to her.
5 tn Heb “uncover his father’s skirt” (so ASV, NASB). This appears to be a circumlocution for describing the dishonor that would come to a father by having his own son share his wife’s sexuality (cf. NAB, NIV “dishonor his father’s bed”).