Lectionary Calendar
Sunday, December 21st, 2025
the Fourth Week of Advent
Attention!
For 10¢ a day you can enjoy StudyLight.org ads
free while helping to build churches and support pastors in Uganda.
Click here to learn more!

Read the Bible

Bible in Basic English

Leviticus 18:8

And you may not have sex relations with your father's wife: she is your father's.

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Abomination;   Copulation;   Incest;   Marriage;   The Topic Concordance - Sexual Activities;  

Dictionaries:

- American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Affinity;   Marriage;   Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Fornication;   Marriage;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Family Life and Relations;   Immorality, Sexual;   Incest;   Worship;   Easton Bible Dictionary - Affinity;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Reuben;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Bastard;   Incest;   Leviticus;   Naked;   Pentateuch;   Sex, Biblical Teaching on;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Canon of the Old Testament;   Congregation, Assembly;   Crimes and Punishments;   Deuteronomy;   Hexateuch;   Holiness;   Law;   Marriage;   Priests and Levites;   Sanctification, Sanctify;   Slave, Slavery;   People's Dictionary of the Bible - Marriage;   Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary - Incest;  

Encyclopedias:

- Condensed Biblical Cyclopedia - Peculiarities of the Law of Moses;   International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Bastard;   Genesis;   Law in the Old Testament;   Leviticus;   Woman;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Capital Punishment;   Chastity;   Incest;   Leviticus;   Marriage Laws;  

Parallel Translations

Hebrew Names Version
"'You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife: it is your father's nakedness.
King James Version
The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy father's nakedness.
Lexham English Bible
You must not expose the nakedness of your father's wife—it is your father's nakedness.
New Century Version
You must not have sexual relations with your father's wife; that would shame your father.
New English Translation
You must not have sexual intercourse with your father's wife; she is your father's nakedness.
Amplified Bible
'You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is your father's nakedness.
New American Standard Bible
'You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is your father's nakedness.
Geneva Bible (1587)
The shame of thy fathers wife shalt thou not discouer: for it is thy fathers shame.
Legacy Standard Bible
You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is your father's nakedness.
Contemporary English Version
And don't disgrace him by having sex with any of his other wives.
Complete Jewish Bible
You are not to have sexual relations with your father's wife; that is your father's prerogative.
Darby Translation
The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy father's nakedness.
Easy-to-Read Version
You must not have sexual relations with your father's wife, even if she is not your mother, because that is like having sexual relations with your father.
English Standard Version
You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is your father's nakedness.
George Lamsa Translation
You shall not approach your fathers wife; it is your fathers nakedness.
Good News Translation
Do not disgrace your father by having intercourse with any of his other wives.
Christian Standard Bible®
You are not to have sex with your father’s wife; she is your father’s family.
Literal Translation
You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is the nakedness of your father.
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Thou shalt not vncouer ye preuytie of yi fathers wife, for it is yi fathers preuytie.
American Standard Version
The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover; it is thy father's nakedness.
Bishop's Bible (1568)
The nakednesse of thy fathers wife shalt thou not discouer: for it is thy fathers nakednesse.
JPS Old Testament (1917)
The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy father's nakedness.
King James Version (1611)
The nakednesse of thy fathers wife shalt thou not vncouer: it is thy fathers nakednesse.
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s wife; it is thy father’s nakedness.
English Revised Version
The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy father's nakedness.
Berean Standard Bible
You must not have sexual relations with your father's wife; it would dishonor your father.
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Thou schalt not vnhile the filthe of the wijf of thi fadir, for it is the filthe of thi fadir.
Young's Literal Translation
`The nakedness of the wife of thy father thou dost not uncover; it [is] the nakedness of thy father.
Update Bible Version
You shall not have sex with your father's wife, it is your father's nakedness.
Webster's Bible Translation
The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover: it [is] thy father's nakedness.
World English Bible
The nakedness of your father's wife you shall not uncover: it is your father's nakedness.
New King James Version
The nakedness of your father's wife you shall not uncover; it is your father's nakedness.
New Living Translation
"Do not have sexual relations with any of your father's wives, for this would violate your father.
New Life Bible
Do not take the clothes off your father's wife. Her body is for your father.
New Revised Standard
You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is the nakedness of your father.
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
The shame of thy father's wife, shalt thou not uncover, - thy father's shame, it is.
Douay-Rheims Bible
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s wife: for it is the nakedness of thy father.
Revised Standard Version
You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is your father's nakedness.
THE MESSAGE
"Don't have sex with your father's wife. That violates your father.
New American Standard Bible (1995)
'You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is your father's nakedness.

Contextual Overview

6 You may not have sex connection with anyone who is a near relation: I am the Lord. 7 You may not have sex relations with your father or your mother: she is your mother, you may not take her. 8 And you may not have sex relations with your father's wife: she is your father's. 9 You may not take your sister, the daughter of your father or of your mother, wherever her birth took place, among you or in another country. 10 You may not have sex relations with your son's daughter or your daughter's daughter, for they are part of yourself; 11 Or your father's wife's daughter, the child of your father, for she is your sister. 12 You may not have sex connection with your father's sister, for she is your father's near relation. 13 You may not have sex connection with your mother's sister, for she is your mother's near relation. 14 You may not have sex relations with the wife of your father's brother, for she is of your family; 15 Or with your daughter-in-law, for she is your son's wife, and you may not take her.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Leviticus 20:11, Genesis 35:22, Genesis 49:4, Deuteronomy 22:30, Deuteronomy 27:20, 2 Samuel 16:21, 2 Samuel 16:22, Ezekiel 22:10, Amos 2:7, 1 Corinthians 5:1

Reciprocal: 1 Chronicles 5:1 - forasmuch

Cross-References

Genesis 19:3
But he made his request more strongly, so they went with him into his house; and he got food ready for them, and made unleavened bread, of which they took.
Deuteronomy 32:14
Butter from his cows and milk from his sheep, with fat of lambs and sheep of Bashan, and goats, and the heart of the grain; and for your drink, wine from the blood of the grape.
Judges 5:25
His request was for water, she gave him milk; she put butter before him on a fair plate.
Judges 13:15
And Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, Now let us keep you while we make ready a young goat for you.
Nehemiah 12:44
And on that day certain men were put over the rooms where the things which had been given were stored, for the lifted offerings and the first-fruits and the tenths, and to take into them the amounts, from the fields of every town, fixed by the law for the priests and the Levites: for Judah was glad on account of the priests and the Levites who were in their places.
Luke 12:37
Happy are those servants who are watching when the lord comes; truly I say to you, he will make himself their servant and, placing them at the table, he will come out and give them food.
Luke 17:8
Will he not say, Get a meal for me, and make yourself ready and see to my needs till I have had my food and drink; and after that you may have yours?
Luke 24:30
And when he was seated with them at table, he took the bread, and said words of blessing and, making division of it, he gave it to them.
Luke 24:43
And before their eyes he took a meal.
John 12:2
So they made him a meal there, and he was waited on by Martha, and Lazarus was among those who were seated with him at table.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover,.... That is, who is indeed a man's father's wife, but not his own mother, but a stepmother or mother-in-law; or otherwise this law would coincide with the former; a man lying with such an one is accursed by the law,

Deuteronomy 27:23; such an incestuous copulation was that of Reuben with Bilhah, and Absalom with his father's concubines or secondary wives, and such an incestuous marriage was that of the Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 5:1; and of Antiochus Soter, king of Syria, with Stratonice his mother-in-law c: and even it was criminal to do this after a father's death, as Jarchi interprets it; and though she was only betrothed, and not married, and the father dead after such betrothing; as Gersom; nay, though she was divorced by the father, yet was not lawful for the son to have, no, not after his death:

it is thy father's nakedness; being espoused to him, and so one flesh with him; and the son and father being one flesh, such a mixture must be unlawful; and since then the nakedness of a mother-in-law is the father's, then surely that of an own mother's must be so likewise, which confirms a sense given of it in Leviticus 18:7: Cicero d exclaims against such marriages as incredible and unheard of, as instances of unbridled lust and singular impudence.

c Vid. Julian. in Misopogon, p. 72, &c. d Orat. 14. pro A. Cluentio Avito.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Compare the case of Reuben, Genesis 49:3-4. See 1 Corinthians 5:1.


 
adsfree-icon
Ads FreeProfile