# Unlawful Marriage/Chapter 11

CHAPTER XI.
Subject continued.—Rules of interpretation.—Proofs that the marriage is unlawful.—Opinion of Basil the Great.—Meaning of near of kin.—Omicron's interpretation.—His error.—His imaginary relation.—But two kinds of relations.
Let the reader review the rules of interpretation laid down in the preceding chapter, and examine whether they are sound and correct. That he may see them in one view, we repeat them.
I. This law is to be interpreted in conformity with its general and permanent character.
II. This law settles the degrees of marriage, without specifying all the particular cases which come within the compass of these degrees.
III. This law is addressed to women as well as to men.
IV. In interpreting this law we are to avail ourselves of the light of Christianity.
V. Affinity is as permanent as consanguinity.
​By these rules of interpretation, the marriage of a man with his deceased wife's sister can be proved to be unlawful.
1. The fifth rule shows that the near relation which a man sustains to his wife's sister, is not destroyed by her death; and, by the second rule, she is brought within the interdicted degrees: for she sustains to her sister's husband precisely the same relation he sustains to his brother's wife, whom he is expressly forbidden to marry.
2. Such a marriage is unlawful by the third rule; for it teaches us that the law addresses women as well as men. When, therefore, it prohibits a man to marry his brother's wife, it virtually prohibits a woman to marry her sister's husband.
3. This marriage is prohibited by the general rule laid down in the sixth verse of the chapter; for the husband is "near of kin" to the sister of his deceased wife, according to the true meaning of the phrase, as explained by the subsequent prohibitions, which prove that it refers to relations by affinity as well as by consanguinity.
Basil, surnamed the Great, who flourished in the fourth century, denominates this mar​riage "an obscene transaction;" and afterwards, in proving it to be unlawful, reasons thus: "We might, in the first instance, object, (and in matters of this kind, such objection is of great importance,) that among Christians, there is no such custom; and custom has the authority of law. But I am far from admitting that the divine Lawgiver has been silent on this subject. On the contrary, I assert that he has most severely and pointedly condemned such marriages; for that alone, Thou shalt not approach to any who is near of kin, certainly includes this species of relation; for what is so near to a man as his wife? are they not one flesh? By the wife, therefore, her sister becomes nearly related to the husband. For as he may not marry the mother of his wife, or the daughter of his wife, so, for the same reason that he may not take the mother or the daughter, he may not take the sister of his wife; yea, no more than he may take his own sister by blood."
In this extract we have, besides the reasoning of this great Christian divine, his testimony to ​two points:—first, that such marriages were not customary among Christians, being deemed unlawful: and, secondly, that the Levitical law was held by the Church to be binding.
To all this Omicron will object. He lays great stress on the original terms, in the sixth verse, translated near of kin, and attempts to prove that they refer only to blood-relation. We think he has failed in his criticism.
The plain and obvious interpretation is, that they comprehend all the degrees specified, whether of consanguinity or of affinity, and that the specifications are designed to show the true extent and compass of the general rule.
Jeremy Taylor says, "For near of kin is an indefinite word, and may signify as uncertainly as great and little; nothing of itself determinately, but what you will comparatively to others; and it may be extended to all generations, where any records are kept, as among the Jews they were; from Judah to Joseph, the espoused of the Blessed Virgin."
Again, "Affinity makes conjunctions equal to those of consanguinity: and, therefore, thou must not uncover that nakedness which is thine ​own in another person of blood or affinity, or else is thy father's or thy mother's, thy brother's or thy sister's, thy son's or thy daughter's nakedness."
There is justice in Taylor's remarks on the meaning of the words he quotes. Jesus Christ is our Redeemer, the Goel, near kinsman, (Levit. 25:49,) who redeems the forfeited inheritance. "We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones," Ephes. 5:30. And what does this signify? Why, that Jesus Christ assumed human nature, and thus became our near kinsman; or, as the apostle says, "Forasmuch, then, as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them who, through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage," Heb. 2:14.
Paul calls all the Israelites "his brethren, his kinsmen according to the flesh," Rom. 9:3; and what did he mean but that he and they were descended from the same patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob?
​Every man is my kinsman according to the flesh. Why? Because we are all descended from the same common pair, have the same blood flowing in our veins, and partake of the same nature. "God," says an inspired writer, "hath made of one blood all the nations of the earth, for to dwell on all the face of the earth." Acts 17:26. Hence the language of the prophet, "And that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh," (original מִבְּשָׂרְךָ; Sept. ἀπὸ τῶν οἰϰείων τοῠ σπερματός,) Isai. 58. 7. All these expressions are to be determined by the context and the occasion. They are, according to the context and occasion, more general or more restricted in their meaning.
The meaning of the terms in Levit. 18:6, is explained in the context, by the prohibitions; which obviously show, that it includes relations by affinity, as well as relations by consanguinity; and that it is to be extended as far as the degrees specified, and no farther.
Philology does not, as Omicron asserts, "confine the prohibition in verse 6 to blood-kindred," (p. 27,) in his sense of the terms. He means, as is manifest from the two preceding ​paragraphs, blood-kindred, to the exclusion of "affinity, or relationship by marriage." Neither the original Hebrew nor Greek terms will justify the assertion. Look at his proofs in the paragraphs. בָּשָׂר, as we have already seen, is a word of extensive signification. In Gen. 6:12, it means all mankind; and in Gen. 7:21, it signifies all animals as well as men. Simon, in his Lexicon, says it means relatives by blood and affinity. That the latter are embraced, see Judg. 9:2, and 2 Sam. 19:11, 12. The passages referred to by Omicron, use the Hebrew word שְׁאֵר for blood-kindred; but his comment on Num. 27:11, is not correct. He says, "This last passage in Numbers, is especially decisive; for it directs that the inheritance of land, in default of a son or other near heir to any person, shall go to the next of his 'kin;' שְׁאֵר, (she-er,) in his clan or division of his tribe, (not in his family, as in the English version.) But inheritance went only by blood, never by affinity; and in this very instance it passed over all the nearest relations by affinity, to go to a blood-kinsman, however remote. This word, then, did not of itself include even the nearest degrees of affinity."
​On this passage of Omicron we offer the following remarks:
1. His censure of the English version is groundless; for the original word is not the one quoted by him, but a very different word, which is rightly rendered by the English word family.
2. The kinsman spoken of is the kinsman of the deceased man's father, that is next to him of his family.
3. When a Hebrew died without a son, the inheritance went, according to law, to his daughter, (v 8:) but if he had no daughter, then it went to his brethren; if he had no brethren, then to his father's brethren; and if his father had no brethren, then to his father's kinsman that is next to him of his family. It is true that the inheritance passed the nearest affinity-relations; and so, with the exception of a daughter, it passed the nearest female blood-relations, as sisters and mother, and even his father, that it might go to his father's brethren or a more remote kinsman, (Num. 27:9–11.) Now, from this legal arrangement about inheritance, what argument can, with propriety, be drawn to limit the signification of the Hebrew word to blood​kindred, to the exclusion of relations by affinity, or marriage? It will be seen, by examining the prohibitions, (although Omicron thinks this exclusive signification is confirmed by the addition of another Hebrew term,) that the meaning of the original term does include affinity, as well as consanguinity, even by his own admission.
It is added by Omicron, "The Seventy also understood it in the same restricted sense; and have always rendered it by some form of οιϰος οιϰειος, and the like, implying a relationship in one's own house or family, that is, by blood; and not contracted from abroad by marriage."
Now we undertake to prove that the meaning of this Greek term is not restricted to relationship by blood, and that instead of excluding relationship by marriage, it really includes it. "And the LORD said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house (οιϰος, בֵיהְךָ) into the ark," Gen. 7:1. Who constituted all Noah's family? Were they all blood-relations, and none by affinity? Noah obeyed the command; and whom did he take with him into the ark? We have an answer in the seventh verse: "And Noah went ​in, and his sons, and his wife, and his son's wives with him, into the ark." Were the wives of Noah's sons blood-relations? Take another proof. "For I know him, that he will command his children and his household (οιϰος) after him," &c. (Gen. 18:19.) Who constituted the household of Abraham, as distinguished from his children? We find an answer in chap. 17:23. "And Abraham took Ishmael, his son, and all that were born in his house, (οιϰογενεις,) and all that were bought with his money, every male among the men of Abraham's house, (οιϰος,) and circumcised the flesh of their foreskin in the self-same day, as God had said unto him." So extensive is this Greek term, that it includes in its meaning not only relations by affinity, but even servants bought with money. Robinson, in his Greek and English Lexicon, gives as the meaning of this term, under "c) meton. a household, family, those who live together in a house." See also Gen. 35:2; 42:33; 47:12, 24. Exod. 1:1; 12:4. Levit. 16:17, and twenty more. Omicron is entirely mistaken as ​to the meaning of this Greek term. It certainly includes relations by affinity.
Omicron, to establish what he deems the meaning of the original term translated "near of kin," subjoins this remark, (p. 27:) "Farther, the addition here of the other Hebrew word בְשִׂרוֹ, be-sa-ro, 'of his flesh,' renders the expression still more specific, and makes it equivalent to 'flesh of his flesh.'"
The comprehensive import of this Hebrew term, has already been shown. Manifestly it is more extensive than the other term, שְׁאֵר; it certainly embraces relation by affinity, as well as relation by consanguinity. Its addition, therefore, must extend, not limit, the import of the latter word. Indeed the two words seem to have been designedly selected by the Lawgiver, that the general rule in the sixth verse might accord with the subsequent prohibitions, and embrace both kinds of relations, as they clearly do.
The view we have taken of the meaning of the Hebrew term "near of kin," is confirmed by the Targums of Onkelos and of Jonathan The Targum of Onkelos, which, according to Dr. Clarke, was written "some time before the ​Christian era," translates Levit. 18:6, thus: "Vir vir ad omnem proximam carnis suæ (קְרִיב בִּשְׂרֵיהּ) non accedet, ut revelet turpitudinem: Ego Deus."
The Targum of Jonathan, who is placed by Dr. Clarke, A. D. 50, gives this version of the same verse: "Vir juvenis aut senex, ad ullam propinquam carnis suæ (קְרֵיבַת בִּישְׂרֵיהּ) non accedetis ad contemnendum turpitudinem ejus concubitu, aut nudatione turpitudinis: ego Dominus."
The word proximus used by the former, and the word propinquus by the latter, (and the original terms,) signify a relation by affinity, as well as by consanguinity. So that both these celebrated Jewish Rabbies differ from Omicron in the interpretation they give of the Hebrew terms rendered in our English version "near of kin."
It is manifest, then, that "Philology" does not confine the prohibition in the sixth verse to blood-kindred.
Omicron, presuming that his philology is ​sustained by the prohibitions, adds: "But how is this borne out by the subsequent verses? I agree with Dr. Hodge, that all that follows is only the amplification and application of this general rule, showing what degrees of nearness of kin constitute a bar to marriage. Hence, when there could be no possible doubt as to the meaning of 'flesh of his flesh,' no specification is given; as in the case of one's own daughter. But in cases where doubt could arise, or where there could be any possible evasion, a specific prohibition is subjoined; hence the wife's daughter is expressly prohibited in verse 17; because, although no one could doubt that my own daughter is 'flesh of my flesh,' yet it might be a question, whether my step-daughter is to be so regarded."
The following remarks on this quotation will test the correctness of Omicron's reasoning.
1. As his object is to prove, from the verses subsequent to the sixth, that they restrict the prohibitions to blood-kindred, he must mean, by "flesh of his flesh," and "flesh of my flesh," blood-kindred; unless he intends, very improperly, to shift his ground.
2. Omicron has been most unfortunate in his ​inspection of the prohibitions. Can any one doubt whether a mother is a blood-relation? Is evasion here possible? Let the reader open his Bible, and look at the first prohibition, (v. 7.) What is it? "The nakedness of thy mother shalt thou not uncover: she is thy mother; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness." Observe, too, the prohibition is repeated.
3. Omicron in fact yields the point in dispute; for he shows that a step-daughter is expressly prohibited, in verse 17. What is a step-daughter? Not a blood-relation, as he represents her to be, but manifestly a relation by affinity, or marriage.
Thus, by his own showing, the general rule in the sixth verse includes relations by affinity, as well as by consanguinity. If there were no other cases of the kind, this single prohibition would be decisive of the question. But there are more; not less than eight, as already shown, (page 177,) viz., step-mother, father's brother's wife, daughter-in-law, brother's wife, wife's daughter or step-daughter, wife's son's daughter, and her daughter's daughter, and wife's sister. So that the number of affinity-relations is ​equal to the number of blood-relations found in the prohibitions.
But Omicron has contrived, by inventing a new relative, to reduce the number to three only: the wife's "mother, daughter, and grand-daughter," (p. 28.) This new relative is denominated by him affinity through blood. He distributes relations into three kinds. The relation of a step-mother he calls "affinity through blood;" that of a wife's step-mother, "affinity through marriage;" that of a sister, "blood," (p. 28, near the top.) Affinity through blood we regard as a mere abuse of terms. A step-mother sustains no such relation. Her relation is by affinity or marriage. Equally erroneous is it in Omicron to denominate "paternal uncle's wife," "son's wife," and "brother's wife," "affinity through blood."
There are but two kinds of relatives; one by blood, and the other by marriage. Consanguinity is applied to the former, and affinity to the latter. Webster defines affinity, "The relation contracted by marriage, between a husband and his wife's kindred, and between a wife and her husband's kindred; in contradistinction from ​consanguinity, or relation by blood." Johnson's definition is the same. There is no such relation as affinity of or through blood. It is a mere invention of Omicron's imagination. By this contrivance he strikes four relations from the affinity class; "father's wife, paternal uncle's wife, brother's wife, son's wife," (p. 28,) and by speaking of the "blood-kin" of a wife; he presents "the rule of prohibition on the ground of blood, under three aspects," (p. 28.) But let Omicron return to the use of proper terms, and lay aside his imaginary relation, and what will follow? He will then present the rule of prohibition on two grounds, that of blood and that of affinity; and will, of course, exhibit it under two aspects. His rule will read thus: "I may not cohabit,
"1. With my own blood-kin, in the six nearest degrees.
"2. With my affinity relations, in the eight nearest degrees."
If Omicron feels particularly attached to his rule of "three aspects of blood," we think we shall not object to it, provided he will strike out of the preceding paragraph his paren​thesis, "(omitting verse 18 for the present,)" and add to the wife's kindred her sister, who is certainly a blood-kin of her body. Then his third aspect will read thus, "With the four nearest blood-kin of her body with whom I have cohabited."
"If affinity," inquires Omicron (p. 28, last par. but one,) "be the same with blood in the eye of the divine law, where is the limit to be drawn?" This question we answer by another. If blood be the only reason of the law, where is the limit to be drawn? We answer both by saying, The law prescribes the limit. He adds, "If my wife's sister be to me in this respect as my own sister by blood, then why does she not stand in just the same relation to my own brother? A singular question! With the same propriety might Omicron ask, If, by marriage, I and my wife are so intimately related as to be one flesh, why does she not stand in just the same relation to my own brother? Because she is not married to him.
The relation which a man bears to his brother's wife has generally been admitted to be the same as the relation he bears to his wife's sister. ​Omicron denies this; and, styling a "Brother's wife affinity through blood," he says, "Parallel, not the wife's sister, as is often assumed, but the wife's brother's wife:" (p. 28:) that is, the relation of a wife's brother's wife, which results from two intervening marriages, is the same as the relation of a brother's wife, which results from a single marriage. A singular parallel! My brother's wife might say, "The relation I sustain to my husband is the nearest of all human relations; we are 'one flesh;' I therefore bear a near relation to his brother." In like manner, I may say, "The relation I sustain to my wife is the nearest of all human relations; we are 'one flesh:' I, therefore, bear a near relation to her sister." Are not these two relations parallel?
Omicron is not correct in saying that marriage with a wife's mother is expressly forbidden in verse 17. That verse does not expressly prohibit such a marriage. Its unlawfulness is determined by inference; and the terrible penalty denounced against it, in chap. 20:14, shows the inference to be correct. See above, chap. vii: p. 124.
Further, let it be observed, that, by one of his ​own rules, on p. 28, No. 2, the marriage of a man with his deceased wife's sister, can be proved to be unlawful. The rule laid down by us for interpreting this law of marriage, in Levit. 18, (p. 181,) that the Lawgiver speaks in it to women, as well as to men, we deem perfectly just, and not to be disproved. Now, as a man can, according to Omicron's direction, say, "I may not cohabit with that with which my own blood-kin of the four nearest degrees has cohabited;" among which degrees is a brother; or, in other words, I may not marry his wife: so a woman can say, "I may not cohabit with that with which my blood-kin of the four nearest degrees has cohabited;" among which degrees is a sister: or, in other words, I may not marry her husband.
If, then, it be unlawful for a woman to cohabit with, or marry her sister's husband, it must be unlawful for that man to marry his deceased wife's sister.
One remark more, and we have done with his objections. Speaking of a man who has married a second time, Omicron says, (p. 28,) "The former prohibitions as to blood and blood-affinity," ​(blood-affinity! an abuse of terms!) "all remain: but his marriage has brought him into a new affinity with the female relations of his late wife." New relations! what new relations to the female relations of his late wife? They remain unchanged. He goes on to inquire, "Do the same prohibitions pass over now upon, and include all these new relations?" When Omicron has proved that affinity to a wife's kindred is destroyed or changed by her death, he may ask this question. This he has not done, nor is he likely to do so. The prohibitions passed upon and included the kindred of the first wife, as soon as she was married; and after her decease they remain upon them, and abide on them, during their lives, and the life of her husband.
* ↑ Dr Livingston's Disser. pp. 149, 150.
* ↑ Duct. Dubit. pp. 230, 231.
* ↑ Omicron is Robinson.
* ↑ Secession of Chris. Literature, p. 48.