Leviticus 20:10
If any man commit adultery with the wife of another, and defile his neighbour's wife, let them be put to death, both the adulterer and the adulteress.
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- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Si mœchatus quis fuerit cum uxore alterius, et adulterium perpetraverit cum conjuge proximi sui, morte moriantur et mœchus et adultera.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- ἄνθρωπος ὃς ἂν μοιχεύσηται γυναῖκα ἀνδρός, ἢ ὃς ἂν μοιχεύσηται γυναῖκα τοῦ πλησίον, θανάτῳ θανατούσθωσαν ὁ μοιχεύων καὶ ἡ μοιχευομένη.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וְאִ֗ישׁ אֲשֶׁ֤ר יִנְאַף֙ אֶת אֵ֣שֶׁת אִ֔ישׁ אֲשֶׁ֥ר יִנְאַ֖ף אֶת אֵ֣שֶׁת רֵעֵ֑הוּ מֽוֹת יוּמַ֥ת הַנֹּאֵ֖ף וְהַנֹּאָֽפֶת
Haydock's commentary
Adulteress. Philo (de Josephus) says, whoever discovered a man in the very act, might kill him; and the Roman law allowed the same liberty, impunè necato. But God requires a juridical process, and witnesses, as we see in the case of Susanna, (Daniel xiii.) and in that of the woman who was brought to our Saviour. [John viii.] One witness might authorize a person to put his wife away, and if he then retained her, he was esteemed a fool, Proverbs xviii. 23. But more witnesses were requisite before she could be put to death. They put their hands on the heads of the guilty, thus taking their blood upon themselves, if they accused them wrongfully. Solon allowed the husband to kill the adulterer. The woman was not permitted to wear any ornaments, or to enter any temple afterwards. If she did, any one might tear her clothes, and beat, but not kill her.
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
Clement of Alexandria The Stromata, or Miscellanies, Chapter XXIII. On Marriage
Now that the Scripture counsels marriage, and allows no release from the union, is expressly contained in the law, “Thou shalt not put away thy wife, except for the cause of fornication;” and it regards as fornication, the marriage of those separated while the other is alive. Not to deck and adorn herself beyond what is becoming, renders a wife free of calumnious suspicion, while she devotes herself assiduously to prayers and supplications; avoiding frequent departures from the house, and shutting herself up as far as possible from the view of all not related to her, and deeming housekeeping of more consequence than impertinent trifling. “He that taketh a woman that has been put away,” it is said, “committeth adultery; and if one puts away his wife, he makes her an adulteress,” that is, compels her to commit adultery. …
Tertullian The Five Books Against Marcion, Marcion Forbids Marriage. Tertullian Eloquently Defends It as Holy, and Carefully Discriminates Between Marcion's Doctrine and His Own Montanism
The flesh is not, according to Marcion, immersed in the water of the sacrament, unless it be in virginity, widowhood, or celibacy, or has purchased by divorce a title to baptism, as if even generative impotents did not all receive their flesh from nuptial union. Now, such a scheme as this must no doubt involve the proscription of marriage. Let us see, then, whether it be a just one: not as if we aimed at destroying the happiness of sanctity, as do certain Nicolaitans in their maintenance of lust and luxury, but as those who have come to the knowledge of sanctity, and pursue it and prefer it, without detriment, however, to marriage; not as if we superseded a bad thing by a good, but only a good thing by a better. For we do not reject marriage, but simply refrain from it. …
St Cyprian Treatise III
6. Christ gave this judgment when, being inquired of, He said that a wife must not be put away, save for the cause of adultery; such honour did He put upon chastity. Hence arose the decree: “Ye shall not suffer adulteresses to live.” Hence the apostle says: “This is the will of God, that ye abstain from fornication.” Hence also he says the same thing: “That the members of Christ must not be joined with the members of an harlot.” Hence the man is delivered over unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, who, treading under foot the law of chastity, practises the vices of the flesh. Hence with reason adulterers do not attain the kingdom of heaven. Hence it is that every sin is without the body, but that the adulterer alone sins against his own body. …
The Apostolic Constitutions Book VI, Sec. V. The Teaching of the Apostles in Opposition to Jewish and Gentile Superstitions, Especially in Regard to Marriage and Funerals
XXVIII . But we do not say so of that mixture that is contrary to nature, or of any unlawful practice; for such are enmity to God. For the sin of Sodom is contrary to nature, as is also that with brute beasts. But adultery and fornication are against the law; the one whereof is impiety, the other injustice, and, in a word, no other than a great sin. But neither sort of them is without its punishment in its own proper nature. For the practisers of one sort attempt the dissolution of the world, and endeavour to make the natural course of things to change for one that is unnatural; but those of the second sort, the adulterers, are unjust by corrupting others’ marriages, and dividing into two what God hath made one, rendering the children suspected, and exposing the true husband to the snares of others. …