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A WIFE TO HER SISTER.

also harmonize with other portions of Scripture bearing upon this point? As regards the first question, it is necessary for the information of those who may not be familiar with Hebrew idioms to state, that the English phrase one to another, if referring to masculine objects, may be expressed by אישׁ אל אחיו (ish el achiv), literally a man to his brother. So, for example, Gen. xxxvii., 19, "And they said a man to his brother," i. e., one to another," Behold, this dreamer Cometh." So again. Exodus xvi. 15) "And when the children of Israel saw it, they said, a man to his brother," (Eng. vers.: "one to another.") And so very frequently in other places. Hence, by the same idiom, when the phrase refers to feminine objects, it is sometimes expressed by אשׁה אל אחתה (Ish-shah el achothah), i. e., a wife to her sister, as for example Exodus xxvi. 3, "The five curtains shall be coupled together one to another," Hebrew, "a woman to her sister"; "and other five curtains shall be coupled one to another," Hebrew again, "a woman to her sister." So Ezek. i., 9, "Their wings were joined one to another." Hebrew, "a woman to her sister." Compare also Exod. xxvi. 5, 17, Ezek. iii. 13. Many commentators have therefore assumed that the Hebrew words might, in our verse, be likewise rendered, one wife to another. On examining, however, the various passages where this idiom occurs, it will be found that in all cases it is only used in a reciprocal or distributive sense, and hence, it is always preceded by a plural noun with a plural verb, or by a plural verb alone referring to some previously mentioned subjects, as may be seen in the above quoted passages. Such is not the case in Lev. xviii., 8, where the words "ish-shah el achothah" are neither accompanied by a plural noun nor a plural verb, but by the singular verb "לא תקח (lo thikkach), thou shalt not take," referring to no precise person, and hence no mutual action is there indicated, as in