Forbidden Sex
1 The Lord told Moses 2 to tell the people of Israel:
I am the Lord your God! 3 So don't follow the customs of Egypt where you used to live or those of Canaan where I am bringing you. 4 I am the Lord your God, and you must obey my teachings. 5 Obey them and you will live. I am the Lord.
6 Don't have sex with any of your close relatives, 7 especially your own mother. This would disgrace your father. 8 And don't disgrace him by having sex with any of his other wives. 9 Don't have sex with your sister or stepsister, whether you grew up together or not. 10 Don't disgrace yourself by having sex with your granddaughter 11 or half sister 12-13 or a sister of your father or mother. 14 Don't disgrace your uncle by having sex with his wife. 15 Don't have sex with your daughter-in-law 16 or sister-in-law. 17 And don't have sex with the daughter or granddaughter of any woman that you have earlier had sex with. You will be having sex with her closest relatives, and that would make you unclean. 18 As long as your wife is alive, don't cause trouble for her by taking one of her sisters as a second wife.
19 When a woman is having her monthly period, she is unclean, so don't have sex with her.
20 Don't have sex with another man's wife—that would make you unclean.
21 Don't sacrifice your children on the altar fires to the god Molech. I am the Lord your God, and that would disgrace me.
22 It is disgusting for a man to have sex with another man.
23 Anyone who has sex with an animal is unclean.
24 Don't make yourselves unclean by any of these disgusting practices of those nations that I am forcing out of the land for you. They made themselves 25 and the land so unclean, that I punished the land because of their sins, and I made it vomit them up. 26-27 Now don't do these sickening things that make the land filthy. Instead, obey my laws and teachings. 28 Then the land won't become sick of you and vomit you up, just as it did them. 29-30 If any of you do these vulgar, disgusting things, you will be unclean and no longer belong to my people. I am the Lord your God, and I forbid you to follow their sickening way of life.
Forbidden Sexual Practices
1 The Lord told Moses 2 to say to the people of Israel, “I am the Lord your God. 3 Do not follow the practices of the people of Egypt, where you once lived, or of the people in the land of Canaan, where I am now taking you. 4 Obey my laws and do what I command. I am the Lord your God. 5 Follow the practices and the laws that I give you; you will save your life by doing so. I am the Lord.”
6 The Lord gave the following regulations. Do not have sexual intercourse with any of your relatives. 7 Do not disgrace your father by having intercourse with your mother. You must not disgrace your own mother. 8 Do not disgrace your father by having intercourse with any of his other wives. 9 Do not have intercourse with your sister or your stepsister, whether or not she was brought up in the same house with you. 10 Do not have intercourse with your granddaughter; that would be a disgrace to you. 11 Do not have intercourse with a half sister; she, too, is your sister. 12-13 Do not have intercourse with an aunt, whether she is your father's sister or your mother's sister. 14 Do not have intercourse with your uncle's wife; she, too, is your aunt. 15 Do not have intercourse with your daughter-in-law 16 or with your brother's wife. 17 Do not have intercourse with the daughter or granddaughter of a woman with whom you have had intercourse; they may be related to you, and that would be incest. 18 Do not take your wife's sister as one of your wives, as long as your wife is living.
19 Do not have intercourse with a woman during her monthly period, because she is ritually unclean. 20 Do not have intercourse with another man's wife; that would make you ritually unclean. 21 Do not hand over any of your children to be used in the worship of the god Molech, because that would bring disgrace on the name of God, the Lord. 22 No man is to have sexual relations with another man; God hates that. 23 No man or woman is to have sexual relations with an animal; that perversion makes you ritually unclean.
24 Do not make yourselves unclean by any of these acts, for that is how the pagans made themselves unclean, those pagans who lived in the land before you and whom the Lord is driving out so that you can go in. 25 Their actions made the land unclean, and so the Lord is punishing the land and making it reject the people who lived there. 26-27 They did all these disgusting things and made the land unclean, but you must not do them. All of you, whether Israelites or foreigners living with you, must keep the Lord's laws and commands, 28 and then the land will not reject you, as it rejected the pagans who lived there before you. 29 You know that whoever does any of these disgusting things will no longer be considered one of God's people.
30 And the Lord said, “Obey the commands I give and do not follow the practices of the people who lived in the land before you, and do not make yourselves unclean by doing any of these things. I am the Lord your God.”