Leviticus 21:9

_THEY SHALL NOT TAKE A WIFE THAT IS A WHORE, OR PROFANE; NEITHER SHALL THEY TAKE A WOMAN PUT AWAY FROM HER HUSBAND: FOR HE IS HOLY UNTO HIS GOD._ They shall not take a wife. Private individuals might form several connections, which were forbidden as inexpedient or improper in priests. The respectability of their office, and the honour of religion, required unblemished sanctity in their families as well as themselves; and departures from it in their case were visited with severer punishment than in that of others. Verse 9. BURNT WITH FIRE - (see the note at Leviticus 20:14.)...

9._And the daughter of any priest. _The moderation and chastity (required in the priest (191)) is extended also to his daughter; and by _synecdoche _all that relates to good discipline is comprised under a single head; viz., that his children should be educated in the study of virtue, and in decent and pure morality. A heavy punishment is denounced against a priest’s daughter if she should play the harlot, because sacrilege would be combined with her disgraceful licentiousness. But it is no light crime to violate God’s sanctuary; and, if the priest had tolerated such an iniquity in his daughter, he would have been no severe avenger of the same turpitude in strangers; nay, he would not have been at liberty to punish crimes, unless he made a beginning in his own house....

Verse Leviticus 21:9. _SHE SHALL BE BURNT WITH FIRE._] Probably not burnt alive, but strangled first, and then burnt afterward. Though it is barely possible that some kind of _branding_ may be intended....

BURNT WITH FIRE - See the Leviticus 20:14 note....

PART III. SECTION IV. THE UNCLEANNESS AND DISQUALIFICATION OF PRIESTS. EXPOSITION The two remaining chapters of this division of the book (Leviticus 21:1, Leviticus 22:1) deal with the ease of defilements attaching to the priesthood, over and above those which affect other men, whether ceremonial (Leviticus 21:1, Leviticus 21:10-3; Leviticus 22:

AND THE DAUGHTER OF ANY PRIEST,.... The Targum of Jonathan restrains it to one that is betrothed; but others, as Jarchi and Aben Ezra, whether betrothed or married; and all confess, as the former says, that the Scripture does not speak of one that is single or entirely free: but there is no exception in the text; and besides, the daughter of any man that was betrothed to a man, and guilty of the crime here spoken of, was to die, Deuteronomy 22:23; and therefore such a law respecting the priest's daughter would be needless; unless it can be thought that it was made merely for the sake of the different kind of death she was to be put to, and that burning was a more terrible one than stoning: IF SHE PROFANE HERSELF BY PLAYING THE WHORE; which brings scandal and disgrace on any person, and much more on anyone that had the honour of being related to a person in such a

4. LAWS FOR THE PRIESTS CHAPTER 21 _ 1. Laws concerning the person of the priests (Leviticus 21:1)_ 2. Laws concerning their family (Leviticus 21:7) 3. Laws concerning the high priest (Leviticus 21:10) 4. Concerning blemishes (Leviticus 21:16) We come now to the special laws and precepts for the priestly class among the people. The preceding laws concerned the nation as such. The requirements of the priests are the highest in the entire book of Leviticus. Responsibility is always according to relationship. The priests, as we have seen before, typify the church. The grace

RESTRICTIONS FOR THE PRIESTS. To approach a corpse was to suffer defilement (_cf._ Numbers 5:2 * Numbers 19*, Tob_2:8 ff., Sir_34:25); this is, therefore, forbidden to the priest, except in the case of the nearest relations; Ezekiel (Ezekiel 44:26) prescribes a period of seven days-' cleansing even in this latter case. The mourning is looked upon as something needed by the dead or due to their memory; a married sister would ordinarily be mourned by her husband this is probably the meaning of the original text of Leviticus 21:4; if his sister were a widow, the priest might act in place of her husband. Similar restrictions are common elsewhere for priests, as also are the prohibitions of the outward signs of mourning. A

BURNT. burnt up Hebrew. _saraph._ App-43....

For the form of punishment, cp. Leviticus 20:14....