Sex with a Betrothed Woman – The Seventh Commandment

Sex with a Betrothed Woman

The Seventh Commandment

Again, sex is reserved for marriage.

Deuteronomy 22:23, 24

“If there is a betrothed virgin, and a man meets her in the city and lies with her, then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them to death with stones, the young woman because she did not cry for help though she was in the city, and the man because he violated his neighbor’s wife. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.”

A betrothed woman was one who had committed to marriage and was, thus, considered to be married, to be a “wife.” Thus, for a man to have sex with a betrothed woman, even consensual sex, was a violation of the seventh commandment and was to be treated with the most severe punishment.

The situation covered in this statute is considered to be consensual—the woman did not cry for help.

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In the Gates is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T.M. Moore, editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001, 2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.