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LEVITICAL STATUTES

assertion; and shown too that these Levitical prohibitions forbid marriages with certain relatives, as well as single incestuous acts. His quotation seems to be singularly defective; and of course misrepresents the meaning of Selden. There are two defects, one at the beginning, and the other at the end; and the supply of both is necessary to show the true meaning of the passage.

We shall supply these defects, and mark the first omission by brackets.

["Lex sacra de incestu ad hunc modum loquitur,] (we omit the Hebrew text,) Nullus ad propinquum carnis suæ accedat ad revelaudum turpitudinem ejus, &c. Scilicet το ערוה sic in Vulgata nec male vertitur, uti et Græcis ασχημοσυνη, quod idem sonat." So far the Puritan; but immediately after Selden says, "Nuditas item (quæ primaria est vocis significatio) verenda, pudibunda, pro eodem hic substituitur; unde עריוה Rabbinis tum omni modo incestus genere tum pro fœminis hoc nomine hic interdictis usurpari solet, uti et ערוה pro earum qualibet, ut matre, sorore, amita, martertera, nuru."[1]

  1. Uxor Ebr. Lib. I. chap. 3, p. 539.