10 And the man that committeth adultery with another man’s wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.
13 If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
15 And if a man lie with a beast, he shall surely be put to death: and ye shall slay the beast.
16 And if a woman approach unto any beast, and lie down thereto, thou shalt kill the woman, and the beast: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
18 And if a man shall lie with a woman having her sickness, and shall uncover her nakedness; he hath discovered her fountain, and she hath uncovered the fountain of her blood: and both of them shall be cut off from among their people.
We now move into the verses prohibiting various sexual relations, much like the ones we just saw in Leviticus 18. The main difference is that this chapter includes punishments for each of these crimes. Not every punishment is the same, and so we learn which sexual relations were more egregious, and we can hypothesize as to why.
This category of sin covers verses 10 through 21, and I have decided to rearrange the verses to group them by categories that stood out to me during my study. Today includes all the examples of sex with someone or something who is not a close relation. Most prohibitions have to do with those close relationships, but there were other aberrant relationships also called out, almost all of them with a death penalty attached.
Specifically, adultery with an unrelated person, male homosexuality, and bestiality were all relationships that would result in the death of both parties. As I consider these, I see a pattern emerge. Each of these sexual acts is tended towards a sort of end or extinction. Homosexual males and people who have sex with animals cannot reproduce, their desires lead to the end of a line, not the continuation of it. Adultery can produce children, but it confuses bloodlines and dissolves the family identity. Each of these aberrant behaviors are already naturally dead acts, and assigning the penalty of death to them seems to point to that fact.
And then, of course, there is the example of having sex with a woman during her period. This, too, is a non-reproductive act, given that the woman’s body is incapable of fertilization at this time. Even so, the penalty for this act is not death, and that makes sense, given that the sexual union of man and woman is still of the type to reproduce, it’s just that the timing is wrong, whereas all the other acts are not even of the type to reproduce, no matter the timing.
With these laws God seems to be acknowledging a fundamental principle of the universe. It is good and life-giving to be of the type that can reproduce. Those that choose to live after the manner of extinction or act only in impotence are in transgression of their very nature. They live according to death.
