Don Isaac Abravanel, sometimes spelled Abarbanel (1437-1508) was a probing and penetrating Jewish thinker, as well as a prolific
Biblical commentator. Biblical ethics takes front and center stage in Leviticus Chapter 18. Neatly, Abravanel
categorizes the two ancient cultures of Egypt and Canaan. Neither social structure, to be polite, were
enviable from the perspective of upright conduct.
“And God spoke unto Moses saying, speak unto the Children of Israel
and say to them. I am God your Almighty. After the doings of the land of
Egypt, wherein you dwelt, shall you not do. And after the doings of the
land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall you not do. Neither shall you
walk in their statutes.”
What were their respective moral shortcomings? Abravanel investigates.
Further, Abravanel asks why the Torah prefaced the commandment with allusions to Egypt and Canaan,
something Bible students don’t find elsewhere. Clearly, God could simply have skipped any mention of
both lands and peoples, and preceded directly to the ensuing verse: “My ordinances shall you do, and
My statutes you shall keep, to walk therein. I am God Almighty.”
Abravanel notes that the previous chapter (Leviticus 17) discussed the divine prohibition of dashing or
spilling sacrificial animal blood in the desert. The rationale for said ban had to do with the Torah’s
interest in distancing the Hebrews from Egypt’s devil worship practices; blood dashing played a central
role in their service to demons. God wanted to rinse clean from the Jews’ collective psyche any traces of
the sordid – and sanguinary – rite.
In sum, “After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein you dwelt, shall you not do” refers to idolatrous
behavior.
What stoked the Canaanites fiery passions? Well, for one thing, Canaan didn’t share Egypt’s blood fetish,
and did not make it a national beverage. Canaan did, though, act perversely and promiscuously; sex was
boundaryless – the kinkier the better. The Torah flags Canaan’s morass and moral climate, one that
broke every taboo imaginable.
“And after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall you not do. Neither shall you walk
in their statutes.” The God of Israel abhors sexual misconduct. Accordingly, He instructs the Chosen
People to have no part of it.
Biblical ethics conforms to the Creator’s rules, as a later verse states: “You shall therefore keep My
statutes and My ordinances, which if a man do, he shall live by them. I am God.”
