NOTES for Lev 20:1-27
Today we read the continuation of the commandments concerning holiness. Only now, rather than being imperative, they take the form of prohibitions. We consider it perfectly normal to find, for example, points in the instructions for a washing machine or binoculars explaining what must not be done and what would be destructive to the device. Nor do problems arise when a coach forbids an athlete certain foods or harmful habits. Yet when moral life is concerned, we often protest: why is something forbidden? How can anyone prohibit me from doing anything? But if we understand that moral and religious commandments also describe a particular path that a person seeking God is called to follow, we will see that in spiritual life it is equally natural to limit what may be destructive to our relationship with Him.