Page:The ancient interpretation of Leviticus XVIII. 18 - Marriage with a deceased wife's sister is lawful.djvu/47

 incorporated into that family and tribe, and their property would have passed into the possession of that tribe. Their husbands would not have become part of Zelophehad's family or tribe, nor competent to continue Zelophehad's name; and so universally was this principle acknowledged, that it was necessary to make a general law that heiresses should marry in their own family, that a family in Israel should not become extinct. On the same principle a priest was not allowed to mourn for his married daughter (Lev. xxi. 3); and the priest's daughter, if married to a stranger, i. e., to one not of a priestly family, was forbidden to eat an offering of the holy things. (Lev. xxii. 12.) By her marriage with the stranger he had not been incorporated into the priestly family, but she had so become incorporated into the stranger's family as to lose the privileges of her priestly birth. In the same way none of the wife's relations could be a, avenger of blood — nor were they required to redeem one of the husband's relations who had become poor — nor could a wife's sister's husband marry the widow of a man who had died without children, even though he had left no male relations to perform that office. Thus, according to the law of Moses, the wife's relations are not regarded as the husband's relations, but the wife herself is considered as having renounced her own family to be incorporated into that of her husband; and, thus, the inference from the brother's wife to the wife's sister is on Mosaic principles invalid. It is equally so, accordingly, to the analogy based on a passage in the New Testament, and confidently referred to by those who advocate the inference from the brother's wife, namely, Ephesians v. 30-32, "For we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a