Commandment Profile:

-347) No adultery with a married woman
Application to gentiles:
Required
Mandated punishment for violation:
Death penalty
Brief description:
For a man not to have intercourse with a married woman. Theocratic Law forbids a woman from having multiple husbands, and therefore any relations between a married woman and another man are forbidden under this commandment. Both adulterers, the man and the woman, would face capital punishment.

Since a man is permitted by the basic Torah Law to have multiple wives (unless prohibited by additional government laws), extra-marital relations between a single woman and a married man would not be adultery, and neither person would face prosecution in the theocratic courts; nevertheless, it would be a violation of the prohibition on relations outside marriage (see commandment -355), and would bring punishment from Heaven.

Category:
Biblical source(s) (Rambam): Lev. 18:20; Ex. 20:13
Biblical source (Sefer HaChinuch): Ex. 20:13
Number in Sefer HaChinuch: 35
Sources explaining relevance to gentiles:

  • Rambam, Mishneh Torah, Issurei Biah 14:10; Melachim 9:5,7
    Adulterous relations prohibited for gentiles with death penalty.