Hebrew word used for the vilest kind of lewdness in Judges xx. 6, Ezek. xvi. 43, and xxii. 11.
We are now in a condition to apply the "parity of reason" argument: but, "Hold!" say some eager partisans; "what right have you to, make any inferences at all in this matter? why should you go beyond the express letter of the enactment?" First, because it is only common sense to do so; and secondly because we must do it, if we would not throw open the gates of incest. If we may not go by "parity of reasoning,"' that is, regard no moral parallelism, make no inferences, but be bound only by the bare letter; than a man marry his own daughter or sister! for they are not expressly prohibited.
To apply this to the case in hand: Lev. xviii. 16. "Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother's wife; it is thy brother's nakedness "—repeated in chap. xx. 21 with a special curse. Here a woman is forbidden to marry her deceased husband's brother; and the strict parallel is that a man is forbidden to marry his deceased wife's sister. To see anything "wonderful" in this except its entire fairness argues a degree of moral obliquity which we may well shudder at. Where is there an unperverted mind which does not feel that the moral relation of two sisters successively to one or the same man as husband, is strictly parallel to that of two brothers to one and the same woman as wife? And even if the Law, in spite of this moral identity, did not entirely recognize the practical equality of obligation in both cases, there is no reason why Christians should not do it. The Law aimed at elevating the condition of woman towards an equality of moral rights, but, as we know, this was imperfectly acccomplished. While slavery and polygamy lasted, the moral rights and, consequently, the moral responsibilities of woman could not be equal. In Christ there is nether bond nor free, neither male nor female. The obligations of holiness are equal, and the propinquity which excludes two brothers from marrying in succession the same woman, must equally exclude two sisters from marrying in sucession the same man." (Galloway).
But, it is again objected, the death of the person through whose marriage the nearness of kin began, alters that nearness. The Rev. W. Abner Brown, no "High Church ascetic," but a friend and biographer of the well-known C. Simeon, answers well: "A step-son may not marry his father's widow; and yet there is no kin between them, except through the woman's former marriage with his father, who is now dead. The death of the person through whose marriage the bond of kindred began, must either dissolve that bond in all cases, or it dissolves it in none. It dissolves it in none." (Quoted by Bp. Wordsworth in Com. Levit.) The ground of the prohibition is the nearness of his step-mother to his father—becoming "one flesh" with him; and as soon as this became a fact, the propinquity was complete. How then could the father's death undo a pre-existent fact, and thereby cause the relation between step-mother and step-son to cease?" Does the maxim admit of controversy that any person with whom, at any time it would have been incest to cohabit, will forever remain forbidden? The question seems unequivocally determined by the principle of affinity arising out of the nature of the marriage union.", (Professor Bush). Ah, but this places us in a "dilemma," says Mr. Punshon. Many dilemmas are wonderfully spectral, and frighten more a good deal than they hurt. Levit. xx. 21 threatens "childlessness" for the infraction of this prohibition, and he knows cases where "no such penalty followed. Either then the Script-
