Sexual Morality (Leviticus 18)

How serious is God about sexual immorality? Were sexual perversions one reason why the previous inhabitants lost their land? Did they also practice child sacrifice? Are we also to avoid sexual sins? Let’s look at Leviticus 18.

Whose law was Israel to follow, that of surrounding nations or God?

Yahweh said to Moses, “Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘I am Yahweh your God. You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt, where you lived. You shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. You shall not follow their statutes. You shall do my ordinances. You shall keep my statutes and walk in them. I am Yahweh your God. You shall therefore keep my statutes and my ordinances, which if a man does, he shall live in them. I am Yahweh. (Leviticus 18:1-5 WEB)

Is sexual intercourse allowed with a close relative?

No one is allowed to approach any blood relative for sexual contact: I am the Lord. You must not uncover your father’s nakedness, which is your mother’s nakedness. She is your mother; you must not have sexual contact with her. You must not uncover the nakedness of your father’s wife; it is your father’s nakedness. You must not have sexual contact with your sister—regardless of whether she is your father’s daughter or your mother’s daughter, whether born into the same household as you or outside it. (Leviticus 18:6-9 CEB)

What are some other specific examples of a close relative with whom sex is forbidden?

Don't disgrace yourself by having sex with your granddaughter or half sister or a sister of your father or mother. Don't disgrace your uncle by having sex with his wife. Don't have sex with your daughter-in-law or sister-in-law. 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. As long as your wife is alive, don't cause trouble for her by taking one of her sisters as a second wife. (Leviticus 18:10-18 CEV)

What are some other examples of sexual misconduct according to God’s law? Was child sacrifice included in this list?

You shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness while she is in her menstrual uncleanness. And you shall not lie sexually with your neighbor's wife and so make yourself unclean with her. You shall not give any of your children to offer them to Molech, and so profane the name of your God: I am the Lord. You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination. And you shall not lie with any animal and so make yourself unclean with it, neither shall any woman give herself to an animal to lie with it: it is perversion. (Leviticus 18:19-23 ESV)

Were these sexual malpractices one reason why God punished those nations by taking away the right to their land?

Do not defile yourselves by any of these practices, for the nations I am driving out before you have defiled themselves by all these things. The land has become defiled, so I am punishing it for its sin, and the land will vomit out its inhabitants. But you are to keep My statutes and ordinances. You must not commit any of these detestable things—not the native or the foreigner who lives among you. (Leviticus 18:24-26 HCSB)

Would Israel likewise lose their land if they committed any of these sexual perversions?

because the inhabitants of the land did all of these detestable things and by doing so defiled the land before you. So you are not to let the land vomit you up because of your uncleanness as it is vomiting the nations that were here before you. Anyone who does any of these detestable things—whoever the person may be—is to be eliminated from contact with his people. Therefore, keep my injunctions so that you won’t practice these detestable things that have been done before you, and so that you won’t be defiled in them. I am the Lord. (Leviticus 18:27-30 ISV)

Is changing the qualifications for elders without God’s authority from “the husband of one wife” (1 Timothy 3:2; Titus 1:6), to celibacy one possible reason for the gross sexual misconduct in the Roman church?

Nevertheless, to avoid fornication [sexual immorality], let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband. (1 Corinthians 7:2 KJV)

What are the four things that the early church commanded gentiles to obey?

But concerning the Gentiles who have believed, we wrote, having decided that they should keep from meat sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from sexual immorality. (Acts 21:25 LSB)