Adultery

Thou shalt not commit adultery.
—Exodus 20:14

Adultery (from Latin adulterium) is extramarital sex that is considered objectionable on social, religious, moral, or legal grounds.

B

  • Since man with that inconstancy was born,
    To love the absent, and the present scorn.
    • Aphra Behn, "To Alexis in Answer to his Poem against Fruition. Ode", in Paul Tallemant, Lycidus, or, The Lover in Fashion (1688), p. 130
  • I went and paid a visit to a lady, who argued with me that marriage was certainly no more but a political institution, as we see it has subsisted in so many different forms in different parts of the world. "Therefore," said she, "it is merely a mutual contract which if one party breaks, the other is free. Now," said she, "my husband I know has been unfaithful to me a thousand times. I should therefore have no scruple of conscience, I do declare, to have an intrigue, and I am restrained only by my pride, because I would not do what is thought dishonourable in this country, and would not put myself in the power of a gallant." I argued that the chastity of women was of much more consequence than that of men, as the property and rights of families depend upon it. "Surely" said she, "that is easily answered, for the objection is removed if a woman does not intrigue but when she is with child." I really could not answer her. Yet I thought she was wrong, and I was uneasy.
    • James Boswell, diary entry (5 April 1776); in Charles Ryskamp and Frederick A. Pottle, eds., Boswell: The Ominous Years 1774-1776 (1963), p. 320
  • I'll match my private wife against any man's.
    • Irving Brecher, c. March 1933, a play on ex-NYC mayor Jimmy Walker's public statement regarding his "private life", made in light of Walker's then recently publicized adultery; as quoted in Ben Schwartz, Written By (April 2006), p. 41
  • It’s a question of taking married men but not taking them seriously. . . . Use them in a perfectly nice way just as they use you.
  • Ȝyf weddyd man, sengle woman takeþ,
    Forsoþe spousebrechë þere he makyþ.
    Ȝyf weddyd wyfe take sengle man,
    Alle spousebreche tel y hyt þan;
    For þey haue broke with-outë fayle
    Þe chastë bondë of spousayle.
  • What men call gallantry, and gods adultery,
    Is much more common where the climate’s sultry.

C

  • I’ve looked on a lot of women with lust. I’ve committed adultery in my heart many times. This is something that God recognizes I will do–and I have done it–and God forgives me for it.
  • Sara could commit adultery at one end and weep for her sins at the other, and enjoy both operations at once.
  • Moses comes down from the mountain after getting the ten commandments from God. At the bottom he sees the Children of Israel waiting. He says, "Look. I've got some good news and some bad news. First the good news. There's only ten. And now the bad news. Adultery's in."
    • Carol Clewlow, A Woman's Guide to Adultery (1984)
  • Do not adultery commit;
    Advantage rarely comes of it
  • Adultery it is not fit
    Or safe, for women, to commit.
  • It had even been the feeling of that House—indeed, it was a feeling common to mankind in general—that, although the sin in both cases was the same, the effect of adultery on the part of the husband was very different from that of adultery on the part of the wife. It was possible for a wife to pardon a husband who had committed adultery; but it was hardly possible for a husband ever really to pardon the adultery of a wife, and therefore it was that in their practice in that House their Lordships had always made a great distinction between the two cases.

D

No greater grief than to remember days of joy, when mis’ry is at hand!
  •      Nessun maggior dolore
    che ricordarsi del tempo felice
    ne la miseria.
  • If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel.
  • If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour’s wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you.
    • Deuteronomy 22:23–24 (KJV)

E

  • Thou shalt not commit adultery. . . . Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

H

  • If a man's wife be surprised with another man, both shall be tied and thrown into the water, but the husband may pardon his wife and the king his slaves.
       If a man violate the wife [betrothed or child-wife] of another man, who has never known a man, and still lives in her father's house, and sleep with her and be surprised, this man shall be put to death, but the wife is blameless.
       If a man bring a charge against one's wife, but she is not surprised with another man, she must take an oath and then may return to her house.
       If the "finger is pointed" at a man's wife about another man, but she is not caught sleeping with the other man, she shall jump into the river for her husband.
  • The days of the far-off future would toil onward, still with the same burden for her to take up, and bear along with her, but never to fling down; for the accumulating days, and added years, would pile up their misery upon the heap of shame. Throughout them all, giving up her individuality, she would become the general symbol at which the preacher and moralist might point, and in which they might vivify and embody their images of woman’s frailty and sinful passion. Thus the young and pure would be taught to look at her, with the scarlet letter flaming on her breast,—at her, the child of honorable parents,—at her, the mother of a babe, that would hereafter be a woman,—at her, who had once been innocent,—as the figure, the body, the reality of sin.
  • Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts;
       Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst.
  • They are all adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker, who ceaseth from raising after he hath kneaded the dough, until it be leavened.
    • Hosea 7:4 (KJV)

J

  • The eye also of the adulterer waiteth for the twilight, saying, No eye shall see me: and disguiseth his face.
    • Job 24:15 (KJV)
  • Jesus went unto the mount of Olives.
       And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them.
       And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst,
       They say unto him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act.
       Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou?
       This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not.
       So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.
       And again he stooped down, and wrote on the ground.
       And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst.
       When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee?
       She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.
  • Confusion of progeny constitutes the essence of the crime of adultery.
    • Samuel Johnson, quoted by James Boswell in The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
  • . . . noui
    consilia et ueteres quaecumque monetis amici,
    'pone seram, cohibe'. sed quis custodiet ipsos
    custodes, qui nunc lasciuae furta puellae
    hac mercede silent? crimen commune tacetur.
    prospicit hoc prudens et ab illis incipit uxor.
    • I hear the advice that my good friends of ancient days would give—"Put on a lock! keep her in confinement!" But who is to guard the guards themselves? Your wife is as cunning as you, and begins with them.
    • Juvenal, Satire VI (tr. Lewis Evans, 1881)

L

  • And the man that committeth adultery with another man’s wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.
  • I saw a little burnished fly
    Within my Mistress' bodice lie,
    Sipping lovely stolen sweets
    From her ample rosy teats.
    "Small adulterer," said I,
    "Dost thou know where thou dost lie?
    'Tis my lady’s bosom fine,
    And thou dost sip what is not thine."
    • Richard Le Gallienne, "Adultery—Ad Absurdum", in T. R. Smith, ed., Poetica Erotica (New York, 1922), vol. iii, pp. 251-2
  • When I had thrust open the door of the bedroom those who entered first saw a man still lying beside my wife, those who came afterwards saw him standing naked on the bed. I, gentlemen, knocked him down, bound both his arms behind him and asked him why he had insulted the honour of my house. He admitted that he had done wrong, but begged and prayed me not to kill him, but to take from him a sum of money. To this I answered, "I will not kill you, but the law of the State will kill you".
    • Lysias, De Caede Eratosthenis 24 (tr. Hans Licht via J. H. Freese, 1932)

M

Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.
—Matthew 5:28
  • Barnadine: Thou hast committed—
    Barabas: Fornication: but that was in another country;
    And besides, the wench is dead.
  • You have heard that it was said, "You shall not commit adultery." But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
  • It has been said, ‘Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’
    But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
  • You know, of course, that the Tasmanians, who never committed adultery, are now extinct.
  • The woman and the man
    Guilty of adultery or fornication,—
    Flog each of them
    With a hundred stripes:
    Let not compassion move you
    In their case, in a matter
    Prescribed by God, if ye believe
    In God and the Last Day:
    And let a party
    Of the Believers
    Witness their punishment.
  • Let no man guilty of
    Adultery or fornication marry
    Any but a woman
    Similarly guilty,
    Or an Unbeliever:
    Nor let any but such a man
    Or an Unbeliever
    Marry such a woman:
    To the Believers such a thing
    Is forbidden.
    • Muhammad, Quran 24:3 (tr. A. Yusuf Ali, 1934)

N

  • A true marriage may be what the laws call adultery, while the real adultery is an unloving marriage.

O

  • In fields not ours the crops are ever more bounteous, and the neighbouring herd has richer udders.
  • Sometimes your lover to incite the more,
    Pretend your husband's spies beset the door:
    Tho' free as Thais, still affect a fright;
    For seeming danger heightens the delight.
    • Ovid, Ars Amatoria (tr. Several Hands, 1709)

P

  • To the married I give charge, not I but the Lord, that the wife should not separate from her husband . . . and that the husband should not divorce his wife. To the rest I say, not the Lord, . . . But if the unbelieving partner desires to separate, let it be so; in such a case the brother or sister is not bound. For God has called us to peace.
  • If a husband has brought home some strumpet, unbeknown to his wife, and she finds it out, the husband goes scot free. But once a wife steps out of the house unbeknown to her husband, he has his grounds and she's divorced. Oh, I wish there was the same rule for the husband as for the wife! Now a wife, a good wife, is content with just her husband; why should a husband be less content with just his wife? Mercy me, if husbands, too, were taken to task for wenching on the sly, the same way as wanton wives are divorced, I warrant there'd be more lone men about than there now are women!
    • Plautus, Mercator 819–829 (tr. Paul Nixon, 1924)
  • It is told...of Geradas, a very ancient Spartan, that, being asked by a stranger what punishment their law had appointed for adulterers, he answered, "There are no adulterers in our country." "But," replied the stranger, "suppose there were?" "Then," answered he, "the offender would have to give the plaintiff a bull with a neck so long as that he might drink from the top of Taygetus of the Eurotas river below it." The man, surprised at this, said, "Why, 'tis impossible to find such a bull." Geradas smilingly replied, "'Tis as possible as to find an adulterer in Sparta."
  • For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil:
       But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.
       Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell.
       Lest thou shouldest ponder the path of life, her ways are moveable, that thou canst not know them.
  • But whoso committeth adultery with a woman lacketh understanding: he that doeth it destroyeth his own soul.
    • Proverbs 6:32 (KJV)
  • Such is the way of an adulterous woman; she eateth, and wipeth her mouth, and saith, I have done no wickedness.
    • Proverbs 30:20 (KJV)

R

Adultery is treason to the family; adulterers should be put to death.
—Rousas John Rushdoony
  • Adultery is treason to the family; adulterers should be put to death.

S

  • Adultery? Thou shalt not die: die for adultery! No:
    The wren goes to’t, and the small gilded fly
    Does lecher in my sight. Let copulation thrive;
    For Gloucester’s bastard son was kinder to his father
    Than my daughters got ’tween the lawful sheets.
    • William Shakespeare, King Lear (c. 1606), act 4, sc. 6 (Lear)
  • And then they called me foul adulteress,
    Lascivious Goth.
  • Do it not with poison, strangle her in her bed, even the bed she hath contaminated.
    • William Shakespeare, Othello (c. 1603), act 4, sc. 1 (Iago)
  •      Let husbands know
    Their wives have sense like them: they see, and smell
    And have their palates both for sweet and sour,
    As husbands have. What is it that they do
    When they change us for others? Is it sport?
    I think it is. And doth affection breed it?
    I think it doth. Is’t frailty that thus errs?
    It is so too. And have not we affections,
    Desires for sport, and frailty, as men have?
    Then let them use us well: else let them know,
    The ills we do, their ills instruct us so.
    • William Shakespeare, Othello (c. 1603), act 4, sc. 3 (Emilia)
  • It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul,
    Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars!
    It is the cause. Yet I’ll not shed her blood,
    Nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow,
    And smooth as monumental alabaster.
    Yet she must die, else she’ll betray more men.
    • William Shakespeare, Othello (c. 1603), act 5, sc. 2 (Othello)
  • Othello: He hath confess’d.
    Desdemona: What, my lord?
    Othello: That he hath us’d thee.
    Desdemona: How? Unlawfully?
    Othello: Ay.
    Desdemona: He will not say so.
    Othello: No, his mouth is stopp’d.
    • William Shakespeare, Othello (c. 1603), act 5, sc. 2 (Othello)
  • Not even his friends could deny that he often committed adultery, though of course they said, in justification, that he did so for reasons of state, not simple passion — he wanted to discover what his enemies were at by getting intimate with their wives or daughters.

T

  • A young wife suits not with an aged husband;
    For she will not obey the pilot's helm
    Like a well-managed boat; nor can the anchor
    Hold her securely in her port, but oft
    She breaks her chains and cables in the night,
    And headlong drives into another harbour.
  • The Tyrrhenians bring up all the children who are born, often without knowing who their father is. When they are grown up, they live in the same manner as those who reared them, often arrange drinking bouts and have connection with all the women they meet.
    • Theopompus, in Athenaeus XII.517d; FHG, i, 315 (tr. Hans Licht via J. H. Freese, 1932)

V

  • No man worth having is true to his wife, or can be true to his wife, or ever was, or ever will be so.
  •      Curam Clymene narrabat inanem
    Vulcani Martisque dolos et dulcia furta,
    aque Chao densos divum numerabat amores.
    • Fair Clymene was telling o'er the tale
      Of Vulcan's idle vigilance and the stealth
      Of Mars' sweet rapine, and from Chaos old
      Counted the jostling love-joys of the Gods.
    • Virgil, Georgics IV.345 (tr. J. B. Greenough, 1900)

W

  • I want to have it all. I want to have a family, a career, and a side piece.
    • Ali Wong, Don Wong (2022), commenting on the disparity of public reaction to successful men having extramarital affairs versus women
  • A mistress should be like a little country retreat near the town; not to dwell in constantly, but only for a night and away, to taste the town the better when a man returns.

Anonymous

  • No one walks together with him or directs their steps towards him. Life passes him by like water. He is dear to no just man, plague prevails over him. Like a worthless penny. [...] He is clothed with a garment as if a heavy punishment were assigned to him. Who is he? His name? A man sleeping with someone's wife.
  • But when the night was half spent he bethought him that he had forgotten in his palace somewhat which he should have brought with him, so he returned privily and entered his apartments, where he found the Queen, his wife, asleep on his own carpet-bed, embracing with both arms a black cook of loathsome aspect and foul with kitchen grease and grime. When he saw this the world waxed black before his sight and he said, " If such case happen while I am yet within sight of the city what will be the doings of this damned whore during my long absence at my brother's court?" So he drew his scymitar and, cutting the two into four pieces with a single blow, left them on the carpet and returned presently to his camp without letting anyone know of what had happened.
  • They . . . climbed to the top of the tree, which was a lofty; whence they gazed to see what might be the matter. And behold, it was a Jinni, huge of height and burly of breast and bulk, broad of brow and black of blee, bearing on his head a coffer of crystal. He strode . . . to the tree whereupon were the two Kings, seated himself beneath it. He then set down the coffer on its bottom and out of it drew a casket, with seven padlocks of steel, which he unlocked with seven keys of steel he took from beside his thigh, and out of it a young lady to come was seen, white-skinned and of winsomest mien, of stature fine and thin, and bright as though a moon of the fourteenth night she had been, or the sun raining lively sheen. . . . He laid his head upon the lady's thighs, and stretching out his legs which extended down to the sea, slept and snored and snarked like the roll of thunder. Presently she raised her gracious head towards the tree-top and saw the two Kings perched near the summit; then she softly lifted off her lap the Jinni's pate which she was tired of supporting and placed it upon the ground; then standing upright under the tree signed to the Kings, "Come ye down, ye two, and fear naught from this Ifrit." . . . She then took from her pocket a purse and drew out a knotted string, whereon were strung five hundred and seventy seal rings. . . . Then quoth she, "These be the signets of five hundred and seventy men who have all embraced me upon the horns of this foul, this foolish, this filthy Ifrit; so give me also your two seal rings, ye pair of brothers." When they had drawn their two rings from their hands and given them to her, she said to them, "Of a truth this Ifrit bore me off on my bride-night, and put me into a casket and set the casket in a coffer and to the coffer he affixed seven strong padlocks of steel and deposited me on the deep bottom of the sea that raves, dashing and clashing with waves; and guarded me so that I might remain chaste and honest, quotha! that none save himself might have connexion with me. But I have embraced as many of my kind as I please, and this wretched Jinni wotteth not that Destiny may not be averted nor hindered by aught, and that whatso woman willeth the same she fulfilleth however man nilleth."
    • The Thousand and One Nights (tr. R. F. Burton, 1897), "Story of King Shahryar and his Brother"

See also

  • Encyclopedic article on Adultery on Wikipedia
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