You are the children of the LORD your God: you shall not cut yourselves, nor make any bald place on your foreheads for the dead.
Read Chapter 14
George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
Be ye. Hebrew, "you are "It may be connected with the preceding chapter.
Cut, as the barbarians and infidels do, who have no hope, 1 Thessalonians iv. 12., and Leviticus xix. 29.
Dead idols, Adonis The Arabs and Saracens cut the hair on the forepart of the head only, and so did the ancient Scotch monks, in imitation, as they pretended, of St. John. The Egyptians cut off the hair of their head and eye-brows, when they were initiated in the mysteries of Isis, (St. Ambrose, ep. 58,) to testify that they partook in her sorrow for the death of her husband, Osiris. Hence, it is probable, that Moses forbids any conformity in such superstitious practices; particularly as the Israelites were consecrated to the service of the living God. (Calmet)
