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Leviticus 18:21

Context
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!

Leviticus 19:18

Context
19:18 You must not take vengeance or bear a grudge 3  against the children of your people, but you must love your neighbor as yourself. 4  I am the Lord.

Leviticus 25:41

Context
25:41 but then 5  he may go free, 6  he and his children with him, and may return to his family and to the property of his ancestors. 7 

Leviticus 25:54

Context
25:54 If, however, 8  he is not redeemed in these ways, he must go free 9  in the jubilee year, he and his children with him,

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.

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

3 tn Heb “and you shall not retain [anger?].” This line seems to refer to the retaining or maintaining of some vengeful feelings toward someone. Compare the combination of the same terms for taking vengeance and maintaining wrath against enemies in Nahum 1:2 (see J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 305).

4 sn Some scholars make a distinction between the verb אָהַב (’ahav, “to love”) with the direct object and the more unusual construction with the preposition לְ (lamed) as it is here and in Lev 19:34 and 2 Chr 19:2 only. If there is a distinction, the construction here probably calls for direct and helpful action toward one’s neighbor (see the discussion in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 305, and esp. 317-18). Such love stands in contrast to taking vengeance or bearing a grudge against someone and, in NT terms, amounts to fulfilling the so-called “golden rule” (Matt 7:12).

5 tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have adversative force here.

6 tn Heb “may go out from you.”

7 tn Heb “fathers.”

8 tn Heb “And if.”

9 tn Heb “go out.”



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