We have Taryag mitzvot (613 commandments), 613 mitzvot, broken up into two categories: mitzvot aseh and mitzvot lo ta'aseh (negative commandments). Mitzvot aseh are things that we have to do, positive commandments, for example, putting on tefillin (phylacteries). And lo ta'aseh are negative commandments, things that we're not allowed to do, for example, eating non-kosher food. The Torah punishes people who violate a lo ta'aseh, things they're not allowed to do, with malkut, with lashes. In general, all violations of a lo ta'aseh receive malkut, but there are three categories that are exceptions to that rule.
Number one, a lav she'ein bo ma'aseh, a prohibition that happens when a person doesn't do anything. For example, the commandment that a person has to eat his korban (offering) by a certain time. If he doesn't do that, let's say he refrains from eating the meat, and there's leftover meat, at that point in time he violated a lo ta'aseh. But that was only done through inaction. He didn't eat, and therefore he violated. So, with a lav she'ein bo ma'aseh, a person does not receive malkut.
Secondly, a lav hanitak la'aseh. If the Torah gives a commandment that enables you to fix up the aveirah (sin) that you did. For example, the Torah says, “If a person did steal, he has to return what he stole.” That's a lav hanitak la'aseh. So the lo ta'aseh was fixable by an aseh. By returning the lost object, by returning the stolen object over here, a person fixed up the lav that he did, the lo ta'aseh of theft.
The third category is any lav that carries the death penalty; it is not subject to malkut. We mention the amount of lashes, which the Torah calls 40 lashes, but the chachamim (sages) understand that it's really 39 lashes. Those 39 lashes are a maximum, if a person is able to go through with it. If they're healthy enough to survive those 39 lashes, they would be given it, but if they're not able to, they would receive less than that number. Therefore, they're examined by a doctor before they go through this process.
As with all other punishments, a person is not given malkut unless it is first established that he did the aveirah intentionally, that there were two witnesses to testify about him, and that he received proper warning before he did the aveirah. Then a person is punished with malkut.
The Mishnah now says, “These are some of the people who are given malkut.” This perek (chapter) will list a lot of the different aveirot that people receive malkut for. Somebody has relations with his sister, or with his father's sister, or his mother's sister, or his mother's sister, or his wife's sister, or his brother's wife. Of course, we're talking about when they're not married: his brother's ex-wife. If it was his brother's wife when they were married, that would be adultery, and that would be chayav mita (liable to the death penalty). His father's brother's wife. Likewise, here, they're not married; it's his ex-wife. Or a woman who was a niddah, a woman who had her period. Her husband is not allowed to have relations with her.
If an almanah (widow) married a kohen gadol (high priest), the kohen gadol is not allowed to marry an almanah. A divorced woman or a woman who went through the chalitzah (levirate release ceremony) process is not allowed to marry a regular kohen (priest); both are prohibited. Or if a regular Yisrael (Jewish person) marries a mamzeret. That's somebody who is the product of a prohibited relationship. Or a netinah. Netinah is somebody from the giv'onim (Gibeonites), a group of Kena'anim (Canaanites) who tricked Yehoshua into making a peace treaty with them. They're forbidden to marry Jewish people. Bat Yisrael laNetin velaMamzer. Or likewise, a regular Jewish girl who marries a netinah or a mamzer. All of these people are given malkut.
Now the Torah will tell us about a person who marries a woman who's forbidden to him with more than one prohibition. Almanah u-gerushah (divorcee). A woman is both a widow and a divorcee. So she was widowed from her first husband, then got remarried to her second husband, and then got a divorce from him. So she has the status of both, an almanah and a gerushah. Chayav aleha mishum shnei shemot. If a kohen gadol marries her, he has violated two prohibitions. So therefore he would receive two different sets of malkut for the two sins that he did.
Gerushah v'chalutzah (a woman who went through the chalitzah process). But if a woman was both a divorced woman and a chalutzah, she was divorced from her first husband and then became a chalutzah. She did chalitzah when her second husband died. Eino chayav ela mishum achat bilvad. The kohen who marries her only gets one set of malkut, because it's as if he only violated one prohibition, one aveirah. The prohibition against marrying a chalutzah is learned from the same pasuk (verse) as the prohibition against marrying a divorced woman. So therefore we learn that they're both considered to be part of the same prohibition. And if a kohen violates the Torah by marrying this woman, it's a prohibition. It's as if he only did one aveirah in terms of punishment, and he would only receive one set of malkut.