Deuteronomy 21

Deuteronomy 21:1 “If a murder victim is found lying in a field in the land Yahveh your God is giving you to take possession of, and it is not known who killed him,

Deuteronomy 21:2 your elders and judges are to come out and measure the distance from the victim to the nearby cities.

Deuteronomy 21:3 The elders of the city nearest to the victim are to get a young cow that has not been yoked or used for work.

Deuteronomy 21:4 The elders of that city will bring the cow down to a continually flowing stream, to a place not tilled or planted, and they will break its neck there by the stream.

Deuteronomy 21:5 Then the priests, the sons of Levi, will come forward, because Yahveh your God has chosen them to minister to him and pronounce empowerments in his name, and they are to give a ruling in every dispute and case of assault.

Deuteronomy 21:6 All the elders of the city nearest to the victim will wash their hands by the stream over the young cow whose neck has been broken.

Deuteronomy 21:7 They will answer, ‘Our hands did not shed this blood; our eyes did not see it.

Deuteronomy 21:8 Yahveh, absolve[1] the guilt of your people, Israel, whom you redeemed, and do not hold the shedding of innocent blood against them.’ Then, the responsibility for bloodshed will be absolved from them.

Deuteronomy 21:9 You must purge from yourselves the guilt of shedding innocent blood because you will be doing what is right in Yahveh’s sight.

Deuteronomy 21:10 “When you go to war against your enemies and Yahveh your God hands them over to you and you take some of them prisoner, and

Deuteronomy 21:11 if you see a beautiful woman among the captives, desire her, and want to take her as your wife,

Deuteronomy 21:12 you are to bring her into your house. She is to shave her head, trim her nails,

Deuteronomy 21:13 remove the clothes she was wearing when she was taken prisoner, live in your house, and mourn for her father and mother a whole month. After that, you may have sexual relations with her and be her husband, and she will be your wife.

Deuteronomy 21:14 But if you do not treasure her, you are to let her go as her personality prefers, and you must not sell her or treat her as merchandise because you have humiliated her.

Deuteronomy 21:15 “If a man has two wives, one cared about and the other not cared about, and both the cared about and the not cared about bear him sons, and if the wife not cared about has the firstborn son,

Deuteronomy 21:16 when that man gives what he has to his sons as an inheritance, he is not to show favoritism to the son of the wife cared about as his firstborn over the firstborn of the not cared about wife.

Deuteronomy 21:17 He must acknowledge the firstborn, the son of the wife he did not care about, by giving him two shares of his estate because he is the first of his virility; he legally deserves the firstborn’s share.

Deuteronomy 21:18 “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father or mother and doesn’t listen to them even after they discipline him,

Deuteronomy 21:19 his father and mother are to take hold of him and bring him to the elders of his city, to the gate of his hometown.

Deuteronomy 21:20 They will say to the elders of his city, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he doesn’t obey us. He’s a glutton and a drunkard.’

Deuteronomy 21:21 Then all the men of his city will stone him to death. You must purge the evil from you, and all Israel will hear and be afraid.

Deuteronomy 21:22 “If anyone is found guilty of a failure deserving the death penalty and is executed, and you hang his body on a tree,

Deuteronomy 21:23 you are not to leave his corpse on the tree overnight but are to bury him that day, for anyone hung on a tree is under God’s affliction. You must not defile the land Yahveh your God is giving you as an inheritance.

[1]כָּפַר (piel) = absolve. Deuteronomy 21:8; 32:43.

Deuteronomy 21 quotes:

“A very suggestive and interesting passage of holy Scripture now lies open before us, and claims our attention. A sin is committed — a man is found slain in the land, but no one knows aught about it; no one can tell whether it is murder ov manslaughter, or who committed the deed. It lies entirely bej’ond the range of human knowledge ; and yet there it is — an undenialjle fact. Sin has been committed, and it lies as a stain on the Lord’s land, and man is wholly incompetent to deal with it.

What, then, is to be done ? The glory of God and the purity of His land must be maintained. He knows all about it, and He alone can deal with it; and truly His mode of dealing with it is full of most precious teaching.

First of all, tlie elders and judges appear on the scene. Tlie claims of truth and righteousness must be duly attended to ; justice and judgment must be perfectly maintained. This is a gieat cardinal truth, running all through the Word of God. Sin must be judged ere siiis can be forgiven or the sinner justified. Ere mercy’s heavenly voice can be beard, justice must be perfectly satisfied, the throne of God vindicated, and His name glorified. Grace must reign through I’ighteousness. Blessed be God that it is so ! Wiiat a glorious truth for all who have taken their true place as sinners ! God has been glorified as to the question of sin, and therefore He can, in perfect righteousness, pardon and justify the sinner.”

Mackintosh Charles Henry. Notes on the Book of Deuteronomy. Loizeaux Bros 1880. pp. 330-331.

“In the earlier legislation, distinctions have been made between manslaughter and murder, together with the manner of dealing with such crimes (17:8; 19:4–13). In this passage it is envisaged that a crime has taken place (presumably murder, though it could have been manslaughter), but the authorities do not know who was responsible for the crime. Because of the religious implications of murder, incurring guilt for the whole land, the matter could not simply be left (to use modern language) as an open file at the police headquarters. Some action had to be taken immediately, though the action described in these verses does not preclude the continuing investigation into the cause of the death by the officers of the law. Both the crime and the procedure involved have parallels in Near Eastern literature and legal texts,1 though at a number of points the Israelite practice is quite distinctive.”

Craigie, Peter C.. The Book of Deuteronomy (The New International Commentary on the Old Testament) (p. 278). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.. Kindle Edition.