Deuteronomy 23:1 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Ver. 1. Shall not enter into the congregation— This law is directed against the infamous practice of making eunuchs: such persons were not to be deemed Israelites, nor have their names entered in the public register, and consequently were not to be accounted members of the Jewish community. See Selden de Jure N. & G. lib. 5: cap. 14 and Nehemiah 13:1-3, compared with 23, 24, 25. Eunuchs were so much abhorred by some of the pagans, that Lucian, in Eunucho, tells us, they were not only excluded from the schools of the philosophers, but from their lustrations, their holy offices, and all common meetings. It should, however, be observed, that paganism, in some places, recommended this practice; the priests of Cybele, the mother of the gods in particular, were all of this class. Casaubon observes upon Athenaeus, that some heathens anciently put such a mark of infamy upon bastards, mentioned in the next verse, as to prohibit both males and females from coming to their sacred offices.