Holiness code

Initially, the Holiness Code was considered part of the Priestly source by some scholars holding to the documentary hypothesis. However, other scholars generally believed it to have been an originally separate legal code (referred to as "H") which the Priestly source edited and chose to embed into their writing after. He pointed to similarities in content, such as the focus on purification in Numbers 5:1–4, chapter 19 and 31:19–24, as well as in linguistics in Numbers 10:9, 27:17, 31:6,19 and Exodus 40:15, all of which had been previously identified with the Holiness School (HS) by other scholars. Some scholars think that the text of Numbers 25:6–18 was written at a time when the priestly line of Phinehas' descendants was being challenged. Sarah Shectman (2009) agreed with Knohl and other scholars that Numbers 25:6–18 is to be identified as an H text, and argued that traditional interpretations of verse 25:6 as an act of sexual transgression were incorrect. In fact, Zimri and Kozbi were not guilty of sexual transgressions at all; sex with a foreigner is never even considered a capital offence by the Holiness code (H). • Exodus 20:18 • Exodus 31:12–17 (verses 16 and 17 contested) • Exodus 40:15 • Numbers 5:1–4 • Numbers 8:19 • Numbers 10:9 • Numbers 15:34–41 • Numbers 17:11–12 • Numbers 19 • Numbers 25:6–18, see also Numbers 31 § Authorship and Numbers 31 § Motive • Numbers 27:1–11 • Numbers 27:17 • Numbers 31 • Numbers 36:1–12 ==Composition==

The Holiness Code is a collection of many laws concerning several subjects. Critical scholarship therefore regards it as being generally a work constructed by the collecting together of a series of earlier collections of laws. One of the most noticeable elements of the work is a large section concerning various sexual activities, which are prohibited "lest the land vomit you out". These prohibitions include sexual relations with one's mother, step-mother, sister, step-sister, sister-in-law, aunt, granddaughter, daughter-in-law, with a woman as well as her daughter, with a ritually unclean woman, with the wife of a neighbor, with another man, or with an animal; and the sacrifice of children to Molech (numerated just prior to Lev.18:22. These prohibitions are listed in Leviticus 18, and again in chapter 20, both times with the warning "lest the land vomit you out." While Leviticus 18 presents them as a simple list, Leviticus 20 presents them in a chiastic structure based on how serious a crime they are viewed, as well as presenting the punishment deemed appropriate for each, ranging from excommunication to execution. Leviticus 20 also presents the list in a more verbose manner. Furthermore, Leviticus 22:11–21 parallels Leviticus 17, and there are, according to textual criticism, passages at Leviticus 18:26, 19:37, 22:31–33, 24:22, and 25:55, which have the appearance of once standing at the end of independent laws or collections of laws as colophons. For this reason, several scholars view the five sections preceding between each of these passages as deriving from originally separate documents. In particular, the two segments containing the sexual prohibitions, Leviticus 17:2–18:26 and Leviticus 20:1–22:33, are seen as being based on essentially the same law code, with Leviticus 20:1–22:33 regarded as the later version of the two. Chapter 19, which ends in a colophon, has a similarity with the Ten Commandments (Ethical Decalogue), although presenting a more detailed and expanded version, leading critical scholars to conclude it represents a much later version of that decalogue. Notably, it contains the commandment popularly referred to as love thy neighbour as thyself (the Great Commandment). By this reckoning, there are thus at least five earlier law collections which were redacted together, with an additional hortatory conclusion, to form the Holiness Code. Two of which contain a list of sexual prohibitions, and one of which was a development of the Ritual Decalogue. ==Comparison with other biblical law codes==

Most critical scholars and religious commentaries regard the Holiness Code as bearing strong resemblance, in several places, to the writing of Ezekiel. Ezekiel dwells repeatedly on offences which the Holiness Code condemns, and spends little time concerned with those outside it (e.g. Leviticus 18:8–17 in comparison with Ezekiel 22:10–11), and several extensive lists of such parallels exist. There is also a great similarity between Ezekiel's writing and the hortatory elements, particularly the conclusion, of the Holiness Code. These strong similarities have led many critical scholars to question whether Ezekiel was the author of the code, or at least the collector, and it remains an open question whether the Holiness Code influenced Ezekiel, or Ezekiel influenced the Holiness Code. The Holiness Code has a similarity of structure with both the Covenant Code and the Deuteronomic Code. Like these, it opens with a law regulating ceremonies at the altar, lists a series of disparate laws, and then closes with a set of promises for obeying the law, and curses for failing to do so. While some of the laws appear more developed than Deuteronomy, for example, the law concerning weights and measures is more detailed, the majority show less development, and the implication of multiple sanctuaries implied by the Holiness Code's laws, concerning altar ceremonies, is usually understood to imply a date prior to the banning of sanctuaries outside the temple at Jerusalem. A similar comparison with the Covenant Code implies that the date of the Holiness Code is between that of the Covenant Code, and that of the Deuteronomic Code, highly suitable for the position it finds itself within the Torah. In the documentary hypothesis, the Priestly source is a work which, after its initial edition, suffered under the hand of several later, less skilled, editors, who each variously inserted documents, added additional laws, or expanded on the laws already present. Thus the original narrative, and the legal code within it, became surrounded by an extensive body of legal, and ritual, elements, as well as numerical, genealogical, and geographic, data. The underlying narrative, in the hypothesis, is based on JE, which already possessed a legal code, namely the Covenant Code and Ritual Decalogue. The majority of critical scholars thus support the position that, while the Ritual Decalogue was replaced by the Ethical Decalogue, the Holiness Code was chosen, or designed, to replace the Covenant Code. == Modern view of Leviticus ==

The Holiness Code is believed to have been written as a form to avoid sexual deviations, sexually transmittable diseases and other forms of physical illness for the people of Israel with some specified as applicable for Proselytes. Some of its teachings are still in practice in the evangelical church, however see Leviticus 18 and Biblical law in Christianity for details. Among Mainline Protestants, there is debate about how much of this passage can be applicable today since the Levitical priesthood and animal sacrifice ended in AD 70, with the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans. Many in these groups see references to sexuality therein and as being reiterated for emphasis elsewhere in the Bible; for example, in the Epistle to the Romans. Orthodox Jews continue many of the practices, but they generally regard precepts not in current practice as being in only temporary abeyance until a Third Temple can be rebuilt and they can be restored. == See also ==