6‘None of you shall approach any blood relative of his to uncover nakedness; I am the LORD. 7‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father, that is, the nakedness of your mother. She is your mother; you are not to uncover her nakedness. 8‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s wife; it is your father’s nakedness. 9‘The nakedness of your sister, either your father’s daughter or your mother’s daughter, whether born at home or born outside, their nakedness you shall not uncover. 10‘The nakedness of your son’s daughter or your daughter’s daughter, their nakedness you shall not uncover; for their nakedness is yours. 11‘The nakedness of your father’s wife’s daughter, born to your father, she is your sister, you shall not uncover her nakedness. 12‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s sister; she is your father’s blood relative. 13‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of your mother’s sister, for she is your mother’s blood relative. 14‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s brother; you shall not approach his wife, she is your aunt. 15‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of your daughter-in-law; she is your son’s wife, you shall not uncover her nakedness. 16‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of your brother’s wife; it is your brother’s nakedness. 17‘You shall not uncover the nakedness of a woman and of her daughter, nor shall you take her son’s daughter or her daughter’s daughter, to uncover her nakedness; they are blood relatives. It is lewdness. 18‘You shall not marry a woman in addition to her sister as a rival while she is alive, to uncover her nakedness.

      19‘Also you shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness during her menstrual impurity. 20‘You shall not have intercourse with your neighbor’s wife, to be defiled with her. 21‘You shall not give any of your offspring to offer them to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the LORD. 22‘You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination. 23‘Also you shall not have intercourse with any animal to be defiled with it, nor shall any woman stand before an animal to mate with it; it is a perversion.

      24‘Do not defile yourselves by any of these things; for by all these the nations which I am casting out before you have become defiled. 25‘For the land has become defiled, therefore I have brought its punishment upon it, so the land has spewed out its inhabitants. 26‘But as for you, you are to keep My statutes and My judgments and shall not do any of these abominations, neither the native, nor the alien who sojourns among you 27(for the men of the land who have been before you have done all these abominations, and the land has become defiled); 28so that the land will not spew you out, should you defile it, as it has spewed out the nation which has been before you. 29‘For whoever does any of these abominations, those persons who do so shall be cut off from among their people. 30‘Thus you are to keep My charge, that you do not practice any of the abominable customs which have been practiced before you, so as not to defile yourselves with them; I am the LORD your God.’”

Parallel Verses

New American Standard Bible (©1995)
'So you shall keep My statutes and My judgments, by which a man may live if he does them; I am the LORD.

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
Live by my standards, and obey my rules. You will have life through them. I am the LORD.

King James Bible
Ye shall therefore keep my statutes, and my judgments: which if a man do, he shall live in them: I am the LORD.

Douay-Rheims Bible
Keep my laws and my judgments, which if a man do, he shall live in them. I am the Lord.

Darby Bible Translation
And ye shall observe my statutes and my judgments, by which the man that doeth them shall live: I am Jehovah.

English Revised Version
Ye shall therefore keep my statutes, and my judgments: which if a man do, he shall live in them: I am the LORD.

Webster's Bible Translation
Ye shall therefore keep my statutes and my judgments: which if a man doeth, he shall live in them: I am the LORD.

World English Bible
You shall therefore keep my statutes and my ordinances; which if a man does, he shall live in them: I am Yahweh.

Young's Literal Translation
and ye have kept My statutes and My judgments which man doth and liveth in them; I am Jehovah.

Cross References

Matthew 19:17 And He said to him, "Why are you asking Me about what is good? There is only One who is good; but if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments."

Luke 10:28 And He said to him, "You have answered correctly; DO THIS AND YOU WILL LIVE."

Romans 7:10 and this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me;

Romans 10:5 For Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is based on law shall live by that righteousness.

Galatians 3:12 However, the Law is not of faith; on the contrary, "HE WHO PRACTICES THEM SHALL LIVE BY THEM."

Leviticus 18:6 'None of you shall approach any blood relative of his to uncover nakedness; I am the LORD.

Deuteronomy 4:1 "Now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the judgments which I am teaching you to perform, so that you may live and go in and take possession of the land which the LORD, the God of your fathers, is giving you.

Nehemiah 9:29 And admonished them in order to turn them back to Your law. Yet they acted arrogantly and did not listen to Your commandments but sinned against Your ordinances, By which if a man observes them he shall live. And they turned a stubborn shoulder and stiffened their neck, and would not listen.

Isaiah 55:3 "Incline your ear and come to Me. Listen, that you may live; And I will make an everlasting covenant with you, According to the faithful mercies shown to David.

Ezekiel 18:9 if he walks in My statutes and My ordinances so as to deal faithfully-- he is righteous and will surely live," declares the Lord GOD.

Ezekiel 20:11 "I gave them My statutes and informed them of My ordinances, by which, if a man observes them, he will live.

Ezekiel 20:13 "But the house of Israel rebelled against Me in the wilderness. They did not walk in My statutes and they rejected My ordinances, by which, if a man observes them, he will live; and My sabbaths they greatly profaned. Then I resolved to pour out My wrath on them in the wilderness, to annihilate them.

Commentary

Matthew Henry's Whole Bible Commentary

Chapter 18

Here is, I. A general law against all conformity to the corrupt usages of the heathen (v. 1-5). II. Particular laws, 1. Against incest (v. 6-18). 2. Against beastly lusts, and barbarous idolatries (v. 19-23). III. The enforcement of these laws from the ruin of the Canaanites (v. 24-30).

Verses 1-5

After divers ceremonial institutions, God here returns to the enforcement of moral precepts. The former are still of use to us as types, the latter still binding as laws. We have here, 1. The sacred authority by which these laws are enacted: I am the Lord your God (v. 1, 4, 30), and I am the Lord, v. 5, 6, 21. "The Lord, who has a right to rule all; your God, who has a peculiar right to rule you." Jehovah is the fountain of being, and therefore the fountain of power, whose we are, whom we are bound to serve, and who is able to punish all disobedience. "Your God to whom you have consented, in whom you are happy, to whom you lie under the highest obligations imaginable, and to whom you are accountable." 2. A strict caution to take heed of retaining the relics of the idolatries of Egypt, where they had dwelt, and of receiving the infection of the idolatries of Canaan, whither they were now going, v. 3. Now that God was by Moses teaching them his ordinances there was aliquid dediscendum-something to be unlearned, which they had sucked in with their milk in Egypt, a country noted for idolatry: You shall not do after the doings of the land of Egypt. It would be the greatest absurdity in itself to retain such an affection for their house of bondage as to be governed in their devotions by the usages of it, and the greatest ingratitude to God, who had so wonderfully and graciously delivered them. Nay, as if governed by a spirit of contradiction, they would be in danger, even after they had received these ordinances of God, of admitting the wicked usages of the Canaanites and of inheriting their vices with their land. Of this danger they are here warned, You shall not walk in their ordinances. Such a tyrant is custom that their practices are called ordinances, and they became rivals even with God's ordinances, and God's professing people were in danger of receiving law from them. 3. A solemn charge to them to keep God's judgments, statutes, and ordinances, v. 4, 5. To this charge, and many similar ones, David seems to refer in the many prayers and professions he makes relating to God's laws in the 119th Psalm. Observe here, (1.) The great rule of our obedience-God's statutes and judgments. These we must keep to walk therein. We must keep them in our books, and keep them in our hands, that we may practise them in our hearts and lives. Remember God's commandments to do them, Ps. 103:18. We must keep in them as our way to travel in, keep to them as our rule to work by, keep them as our treasure, as the apple of our eye, with the utmost care and value. (2.) The great advantage of our obedience: Which if a man do, he shall live in them, that is, "he shall be happy here and hereafter." We have reason to thank God, [1.] That this is still in force as a promise, with a very favourable construction of the condition. If we keep God's commandments in sincerity, though we come short of sinless perfection, we shall find that the way of duty is the way of comfort, and will be the way to happiness. Godliness has the promise of life, 1 Tim. 4:8. Wisdom has said, Keep my commandments and live: and if through the Spirit we mortify the deeds of the body (which are to us as the usages of Egypt were to Israel) we shall live. [2.] That it is not so in force in the nature of a covenant as that the least transgression shall for ever exclude us from this life. The apostle quotes this twice as opposite to the faith which the gospel reveals. It is the description of the righteousness which is by the law, the man that doeth them shall live ev autois-in them (Rom. 10:5), and is urged to prove that the law is not of faith, Gal. 3:12. The alteration which the gospel has made is in the last word: still the man that does them shall live, but not live in them; for the law could not give life, because we could not perfectly keep it; it was weak through the flesh, not in itself; but now the man that does them shall live by the faith of the Son of God. He shall owe his life to the grace of Christ, and not to the merit of his own works; see Gal. 3:21, 22. The just shall live, but they shall live by faith, by virtue of their union with Christ, who is their life.

Calvin's Commentary

5. Ye shall therefore keep my statutes and my judgments; which if a man do, he shall live in them: I am the Lord.

5. Custodite statuta mea, et judicia mea, quae homo si faciat, rivet in ipsis.

5. Ye shall therefore keep my statutes. Although Moses introduces this passage, where he exhorts the Israelites to cultivate chastity in respect to marriage, and not to fall into the incestuous pollutions of the Gentiles, yet, as it is a remarkable one, and contains general instruction, from whence Paul derives his definition of the righteousness of the Law, (Romans 10:5,) it seems to me to come in very appropriately here, inasmuch as it sanctions and confirms the Law by the promise of reward. The hope of eternal life is, therefore, given to all who keep the Law; for those who expound the passage as referring to this earthly and transitory life are mistaken. [195] The cause of this error was, because they feared that thus the righteousness of faith might be subverted, and salvation grounded on the merit of works. But Scripture does not therefore deny that men are justified by works, because the Law itself is imperfect, or does not give instructions for perfect righteousness; but because the promise is made of none effect by our corruption and sin. Paul, therefore, as I have just said, when he teaches that righteousness is to be sought for in the grace of Christ by faith, (Romans 10:4,) proves his statement by this argument, that none is justified who has not fulfilled what the Law commands. Elsewhere also he reasons by contrast, where he contends that the Law does not accord with faith as regards the cause of justification, because the Law requires works for the attainment of salvation, whilst faith directs us to Christ, that we may be delivered from the curse of the Law. Foolishly, then, do some reject as an absurdity the statement, that if a man fulfills the Law he attains to righteousness; for the defect does not arise from the doctrine of the Law, but from the infirmity of men, as is plain from another testimony given by Paul. (Romans 8:3.) We must observe, however, that salvation is not to be expected from the Law unless its precepts be in every respect complied with; for life is not promised to one who shall have done this thing, or that thing, but, by the plural word, full obedience is required of us. The pratings of the Popish theologians about partial righteousness are frivolous and silly, since God embraces at once all the commandments; and who is there that can boast of having thoroughly fulfilled them? If, then, none was ever clear of transgression, or ever will be, although God by no means deceives us, yet the promise becomes ineffectual, because we do not perform our part of the agreement.

Footnotes:

[195] "This some understand only of temporal life and prosperity in this world, Origen, Tostat. Oleaster, Vatablus; and make this to be the meaning, -- that, as the transgressors of the Law were to die, so they which kept it should preserve their life, Thom. Aquin. 1. 2. q. 100, a. 12; but I prefer rather Hesychius' judgment, -- Per quas oeterna vita hominibus datur," etc. -- Willet Hexapla, in loco. There appears to be unusual discrepancy on this point between the commentators, whether Romanist or Protestant. Bush and Holden apply it to temporal life. Bonar says, "If, as most think, we are to take, in this place, the words live in them,' as meaning eternal life to be got by them,' the scope of the passage is, that so excellent are God's laws, and every special minute detail of these laws, that if a man were to keep these always and perfectly, the very keeping would be eternal life to him. And the quotations in Romans 10:5, and Galatians 3:12, would seem to determine this to be the true and only sense here." C.'s view appears to be confirmed by our Lord's reply in Matthew 19:17, referred to in Poole's Synopsis.

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Bible Browser

"They have Corrupted Themselves; their Spot is not the Spot of his Children; they are a Perverse and Crooked Generation. "
Deut. xxxii. 5.--"They have corrupted themselves; their spot is not the spot of his children; they are a perverse and crooked generation." We doubt this people would take well with such a description of themselves as Moses gives. It might seem strange to us, that God should have chosen such a people out of all the nations of the earth, and they to be so rebellious and perverse, if our own experience did not teach us how free his choice is, and how long-suffering he is, and constant in his choice. …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

The Doctrine of Arbitrary Scriptural Accommodation Considered.
"But the Righteousness which is of Faith speaketh on this wise,--Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into Heaven?' (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) or, Who shall descend into the deep?' (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.) But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth; and in thine heart:' that is, the word of Faith, which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from …
John William Burgon—Inspiration and Interpretation

Epistle Lxiv. To Augustine, Bishop of the Angli .
To Augustine, Bishop of the Angli [174] . Here begins the epistle of the blessed Gregory pope of the city of Rome, in exposition of various matters, which he sent into transmarine Saxony to Augustine, whom he had himself sent in his own stead to preach. Preface.--Through my most beloved son Laurentius, the presbyter, and Peter the monk, I received thy Fraternity's letter, in which thou hast been at pains to question me on many points. But, inasmuch as my aforesaid sons found me afflicted with the …
Saint Gregory the Great—the Epistles of Saint Gregory the Great

The Two Sabbath-Controversies - the Plucking of the Ears of Corn by the Disciples, and the Healing of the Man with the Withered Hand
IN grouping together the three miracles of healing described in the last chapter, we do not wish to convey that it is certain they had taken place in precisely that order. Nor do we feel sure, that they preceded what is about to be related. In the absence of exact data, the succession of events and their location must be matter of combination. From their position in the Evangelic narratives, and the manner in which all concerned speak and act, we inferred, that they took place at that particular …
Alfred Edersheim—The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah

Obedience
Take heed, and hearken, O Israel; this day thou art become the people of the Lord thy God. Thou shalt therefore obey the voice of the Lord thy God, and do his commandments.' Deut 27: 9, 10. What is the duty which God requireth of man? Obedience to his revealed will. It is not enough to hear God's voice, but we must obey. Obedience is a part of the honour we owe to God. If then I be a Father, where is my honour?' Mal 1: 6. Obedience carries in it the life-blood of religion. Obey the voice of the Lord …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments

The Blessings of Noah Upon Shem and Japheth. (Gen. Ix. 18-27. )
Ver. 20. "And Noah began and became an husbandman, and planted vineyards."--This does not imply that Noah was the first who began to till the ground, and, more especially, to cultivate the vine; for Cain, too, was a tiller of the ground, Gen. iv. 2. The sense rather is, that Noah, after the flood, again took up this calling. Moreover, the remark has not an independent import; it serves only to prepare the way for the communication of the subsequent account of Noah's drunkenness. By this remark, …
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

Meditations for Household Piety.
1. If thou be called to the government of a family, thou must not hold it sufficient to serve God and live uprightly in thy own person, unless thou cause all under thy charge to do the same with thee. For the performance of this duty God was so well pleased with Abraham, that he would not hide from him his counsel: "For," saith God, "I know him that he will command his sons and his household after him that they keep the way of the Lord, to do righteousness and judgment, that the Lord may bring upon …
Lewis Bayly—The Practice of Piety

Appendix ii. Philo of Alexandria and Rabbinic Theology.
(Ad. vol. i. p. 42, note 4.) In comparing the allegorical Canons of Philo with those of Jewish traditionalism, we think first of all of the seven exegetical canons which are ascribed to Hillel. These bear chiefly the character of logical deductions, and as such were largely applied in the Halakhah. These seven canons were next expanded by R. Ishmael (in the first century) into thirteen, by the analysis of one of them (the 5th) into six, and the addition of this sound exegetical rule, that where two …
Alfred Edersheim—The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah

Leviticus
The emphasis which modern criticism has very properly laid on the prophetic books and the prophetic element generally in the Old Testament, has had the effect of somewhat diverting popular attention from the priestly contributions to the literature and religion of Israel. From this neglect Leviticus has suffered most. Yet for many reasons it is worthy of close attention; it is the deliberate expression of the priestly mind of Israel at its best, and it thus forms a welcome foil to the unattractive …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament