You shall not wear clothes of wool and linen woven together.
Not to wear a garment made of a mixture of wool and linen (shatnez)
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
לֹא תִלְבַּשׁ שַׁעַטְנֵז צֶמֶר וּפִשְׁתִּים יַחְדָּו
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
הזהירנו מללבוש בגד ארוג בצמר ופשתים כמו שהיו לובשים כומרי ע"ז באותו הזמן. והוא אמרו לא תלבש שעטנז, וזה מפורסם היום אצל כומרי ע"ז במצרים. והעובר על לאו זה חייב מלקות. וכבר התבארו משפטי מצוה זו במסכת כלאים ובשבת וסוטה ומכות. (כי תצא, הלכות כלאים פ"י):
He prohibited us from wearing a garment woven of wool and linen, like that which would be worn by the idolatrous priests at that time. And that is His saying, "You shall not wear shatnez" (Deuteronomy 13:18). And this [practice] is famous today among the idolatrous priests in Egypt. And one who transgresses this negative commandment is liable for lashes. And the regulations of this commandment have already been explained in Tractate Kilayim, Shabbat, Sotah and Makkot. (See Parashat Ki Tetzei; Mishneh Torah, Foreign Worship and Customs of the Nations 10.)
Hebrew: Sefer HaMitzvot, Warsaw 1883 (public domain). English: Sefaria Edition, trans. Rabbi Francis Nataf, 2021 (CC0). Via Sefaria; translator’s footnotes omitted.
Literary form: a prohibition
Applicability
How the catalog describes where and when this commandment applies. These are independent descriptions, not a verdict on which laws still count.
- Recorded as practiced today
Classical halakhic consequences
The consequences the classical halakhah attaches to this commandment, grouped by who imposes them. Where a category has none recorded, that absence is itself meaningful.
Imposed by a court
- Lashes (malkot)
At the hands of Heaven
No divinely-imposed consequence is recorded.
Ritual remedy
No ritual remedy is recorded.
How the streams of Judaism treat this commandment
The streams of Judaism read the same commandment differently — an ongoing plurality, not a ranking. Each position below is reported as the catalog records it; none is presented as the correct one.
- Orthodox Binding
- Conservative Binding in principle
- Reform Not binding
- Reconstructionist Not binding
- Karaite Binding
24 of 613 commandments have been examined in depth so far — this one is queued.
How later traditions received this commandment
How later traditions read or reworked this commandment, each attributed to its own voice. The catalog’s own classification of each reception is shown as it records it, never adopted as GEBible’s.
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 4.203-218 (within broader kilayim/diverse-kinds discussion) rationalized it
Josephus
- Ant. 4.208 affirmed it
Where this commandment meets modern human-rights frameworks
One modern normative lens, attributed to it — not GEBible’s assessment. Each row names the framework it measures against and the catalog’s own classification of the relation.
This framework catalogues tensions; it records agreement in only one of its entries. The near-total tension rate is the shape of the instrument, not a finding.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
Mishnah Makkot 3:2 prescribes thirty-nine lashes for wearing a wool-linen garment; modern penal proportionality precludes corporal punishment for a clothing regulation violation affecting no identifiable victim.
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Article 7
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
ICCPR Article 7 prohibits cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment; court-administered flogging for wearing a mixed-fiber garment falls within the class of punishments that international human-rights bodies treat as incompatible with this article.
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abrogated_in_practice
This framework classifies the relation as abrogated in practice.
The malkot sanction has not been administered since the dissolution of the Sanhedrin; the de jure norm exists but has no operative enforcement mechanism, even as shatnez inspection laboratories maintain observance of the underlying prohibition.