DON’T EMULATE EGYPTIANS OR CANAANITES (1)

Before launching into the list of laws concerning sexual morality, the Torah warns the Jewish nation not to emulate the inhabitants of Egypt, among whom they had resided, nor to copy the behavior of the Canaanites once they took over the Land of Canaan.

Rabbi Dunner examines this curious instruction, and various other anomalies at the beginning and end of this chapter in Vayikra, offering insights that give broader context and depth to this seemingly parochial and timebound directive.