(15) Come not at your wives.--Comp. 1 Samuel 21:4-5 :1 Corinthians 7:5. It was the general sentiment of antiquity that a ceremonial uncleanness attached even to the chastest sexual connection. (Herod. I. 189, ii. 64; Hesiod. Op. et D., 11. 733-4: Tibull, Carni. ii. 1, 11. 11, 12; Porphyr., De Abstinentia, 4:7.) The Levitical law took the same view (Leviticus 15:18), as did the Indian law (Menu, v. 63), the Persian (Zendavesta, quoted by Bahr, Symbolik, vol. ii., p. 466), and the Mahometan (Koran, iv. 5).
Verse 15. - Come not at your wives. Compare 1 Samuel 21:4, 5; 1 Corinthians 7:5. A similar obligation lay on the Egyptian priests (Porphyr. De Abstin. 4:7); and the idea which underlies it was widespread in the ancient world (See Herod. 1:198; Hesiod. Op. et Di. 733-4; Tibul. Carm. 2:1; 51:11, 12.) The subject is well treated, from a Christian point of view, by Pope Gregory the First, in his answers to S. Augustine's questions (Bode, Hist. Eccl. 2.).
19:9-15 The solemn manner in which the law was delivered, was to impress the people with a right sense of the Divine majesty. Also to convince them of their own guilt, and to show that they could not stand in judgment before God by their own obedience. In the law, the sinner discovers what he ought to be, what he is, and what he wants. There he learns the nature, necessity, and glory of redemption, and of being made holy. Having been taught to flee to Christ, and to love him, the law is the rule of his obedience and faith.
And he said unto the people, be ready against the third day,.... The third day from thence, the sixth of the month Sivan, against which day they were to prepare themselves, by washing their garments, and all other outward acts of sanctification and purity they were directed to, that they might be ready for the service of that day, to hear and receive the law from God himself: Aben Ezra has this note on the passage,"perhaps not a man slept that night, that he might hear the voice of the Lord in the morning, as was the way or custom of the high priest on the day of atonement;''that is, not to sleep the night before:
come not at your wives; or, "do not draw nigh to a woman" (q), to lie with her; meaning not with a strange woman, or one that was not his wife, for that was not lawful at any time; nor with a menstruous woman who was unclean, and so forbidden, but with a man's own wife: what was lawful must now be abstained from, for the greater sanctification and solemnity of the service of this day, see 1 Corinthians 7:5, so Chaeremoh (r) the stoic says of the Egyptian priests, that when the time is at hand that they are to perform some very sacred and solemn service, they spend several days in preparing for it; sometimes two and forty, sometimes more, sometimes less, but never under seven; when they abstain from all animals, and from all kind of herbs and pulse, and especially from venereal conversation with women; and to this latter Juvenal (s) the poet has respect.
(q) Sept. "to a woman", Ainsworth. (r) Apud Porphyr, de Abstinentia, l. 4. sect. 7. Vid Clement. Alexand Stromat. l. 1. p. 306. (s) "Ille petit veniam quoties non abstinet uxor, "Concubitu, sacris observandisque diebus". Juvenal, Satyr 6.
CHAPTER 19:16-20
come not at your wives; or, "do not draw nigh to a woman" (q), to lie with her; meaning not with a strange woman, or one that was not his wife, for that was not lawful at any time; nor with a menstruous woman who was unclean, and so forbidden, but with a man's own wife: what was lawful must now be abstained from, for the greater sanctification and solemnity of the service of this day, see 1 Corinthians 7:5, so Chaeremoh (r) the stoic says of the Egyptian priests, that when the time is at hand that they are to perform some very sacred and solemn service, they spend several days in preparing for it; sometimes two and forty, sometimes more, sometimes less, but never under seven; when they abstain from all animals, and from all kind of herbs and pulse, and especially from venereal conversation with women; and to this latter Juvenal (s) the poet has respect.
(q) Sept. "to a woman", Ainsworth. (r) Apud Porphyr, de Abstinentia, l. 4. sect. 7. Vid Clement. Alexand Stromat. l. 1. p. 306. (s) "Ille petit veniam quoties non abstinet uxor, "Concubitu, sacris observandisque diebus". Juvenal, Satyr 6.