hese were sexual partners of an even lower status than a wife was. As implied in Genesis 21:10, she could be dismissed when no longer needed.
             Another example of this inferiority to men it is the book of Exodus. In Exodus 20:17 it lists the last of the Ten Commandments. It forbids coveting your neighbor's house, wife, slaves, animals or anything else that the neighbor owns. The wife is clearly regarded as equivalent to a piece of property and in no way would a piece of property be superior to a man. Also in Exodus 21:22-25 it describes a situation in which two men are fighting and hit a pregnant woman. If the woman has a miscarriage because of the blow, the men must pay a fine for their act - not to the woman, but to her husband, presumably because he has been deprived of a child.
             Leviticus 12:1-5 explains that a woman who has given birth to a boy is ritually unclean for 33 days. If the baby is a girl, the mother is unclean for 66 days. It would appear that the act of having a baby is a highly polluting act. To give birth to a girl is twice as polluting as is giving birth to a boy.
             In Leviticus 18:20 and 20:10, adultery was defined as a man having sexual intercourse with his neighbor's wife. Deuteronomy 22:23 extends this prohibition to a man sleeping with a woman who is engaged to be married. If a man has an affair with an unmarried woman, the act is not considered adultery. Although God wanted men to only have one wife, married men on many occasions visited prostitutes and received no punishment for this sin. This was a double standard among the sexes for a woman got severely punished if she committed such a sin. A man who committed adultery did not commit a wrongful act against his wife, but rather against his male neighbor implying that a woman did not mat
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