Leviticus 20:11-13

20:11 If a man has sexual intercourse with his father’s wife, he has exposed his father’s nakedness. 1  Both of them must be put to death; their blood guilt is on themselves. 2  20:12 If a man has sexual intercourse with his daughter-in-law, both of them must be put to death. They have committed perversion; 3  their blood guilt is on themselves. 20:13 If a man has sexual intercourse with a male as one has sexual intercourse with a woman, 4  the two of them have committed an abomination. They must be put to death; their blood guilt is on themselves.

Leviticus 20:16

20:16 If a woman approaches any animal to have sexual intercourse with it, 5  you must kill the woman, and the animal must be put to death; their blood guilt is on themselves.

Leviticus 20:27

Prohibition against Spiritists and Mediums

20:27 “‘A man or woman who 6  has in them a spirit of the dead or a familiar spirit 7  must be put to death. They must pelt them with stones; 8  their blood guilt is on themselves.’”

1 sn See the note on Lev 18:7 above.

2 tn See the note on v. 9 above.

3 tn The Hebrew term תֶּבֶל (tevel, “perversion”) derives from the verb “to mix; to confuse” (cf. KJV, ASV “they have wrought confusion”).

4 tn Heb “[as the] lyings of a woman.” The specific reference here is to homosexual intercourse between males.

5 tn Heb “to copulate with it” (cf. Lev 20:16).

6 tc Smr, LXX, Syriac, and some Targum mss have the relative pronoun אֲשֶׁר (’asher, “who, which”), rather than the MT’s כִּי (ki, “for, because, that”).

7 tn See the note on the phrase “familiar spirit” in Lev 19:31 above.

8 tn This is not the most frequently-used Hebrew verb for stoning, but a word that refers to the action of throwing, slinging, or pelting someone with stones (see the note on v. 2 above). Smr and LXX have “you [plural] shall pelt them with stones.”

sn At first glance Lev 20:27 appears to be out of place but, on closer examination, one could argue that it constitutes the back side of an envelope around the case laws in 20:9-21, with Lev 20:6 forming the front of the envelope (note also that execution of mediums and spiritists by stoning in v. 27 is not explicitly stated in v. 6). This creates a chiastic structure: prohibition against mediums and spiritists (vv. 6 and 27), variations of the holiness formula (vv. 7 and 25-26), and exhortations to obey the Lord’s statutes (and judgments; vv. 8 and 22-24). Again, in the middle are the case laws (vv. 9-21).