Do not dishonor your father's brother by approaching his wife to have sexual relations; she is your aunt.



Do not have sexual relations with your daughter-in-law. She is your son's wife; do not have relations with her.



Do not have sexual relations with your brother's wife; that would dishonor your brother.

- Lev. 18:14-16

forbidden

My Religion prof pointed out that the reason repeatedly given in this passage for not having sex with a female relative is that it would bring dishonor on the male to whom she belongs. Of all the reasons not to have sex - consensual or otherwise - with your mother, the one given (ostensibly) by God is that it would dishonor your father. Not you. Not her. Her husband.It occurred to me that this might explain why a Biblical prohibition on premarital sex is difficult to find. (Maybe I should have another contest.) Apparently the violation of a woman is less deplorable if she has no male lord to be dishonored by it. Indeed, Deut. 22 says that a man who rapes a betrothed woman must die, but a man who rapes a woman who is not betrothed must pay her father the bride-price and marry her. And they can never be divorced.If I understand this correctly, a man who rapes a betrothed girl has committed a far greater sin than a man who rapes a girl who is not yet betrothed. (Bear in mind that in this society everyone gets married, and does so as soon as they're physically able to bear children. So a girl who is not yet pledged to be married is probably younger than one who is. Probably prepubescent.) Following the logic of Lev. 18 , it seems that in the first case the rapist brings disgrace to the girl's betrothed, for which he must die, whereas in the second case he has sinned against the girl's father (who had the right to choose his daughter's husband) for which he must pay the father a pound of silver. This second sin is not a serious one because he has not stolen what is another man's, but merely claimed it for himself - albeit in a somewhat unscrupulous manner.I'm not going to dwell on what I think about forcing rape victims to marry their attackers, but the word "abhorrent" comes to mind. In fact I can't think of many thingsin the Bible that strike me as so cruel and reprehensible as what is commanded here.I've heard the argument that the ancient Near East was a brutal and barbaric place, and that the Mosaic Law was far less brutal and barbaric than anything else at the time, and that it would have been impossible in that context to introduce a 21st century - or even first century - legal code, so God just did the best he could. I can accept this argument, to a point. (I'm not a Kantian.) I can accept that ancient Jews may not have been ready for the concept of gender equality. And I might be able to accept that God would permit slavery in this context (I'm not entirely sure) so maybe I can accept that God would permit women to be treated as property. But I cannot accept that God would order rape victims to marry their attackers.Bear in mind that I've only been thinking about this for a few hours, and I haven't really done any research yet. So if you have some insight in this matter please let me know. Either way, I'd like to hear what you think of this. Are you as sickened by this law as I am? Can you worship a god who wrote it?