Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Deuteronomy 25:1
If there be a controversy between men, and they come unto judgment, that [the judges] may judge them; then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked.
1. controversy ] litigation.
and shall have declared righteous him who is in the right and declared guilty him who is guilty ] The vbs. and adjs. are to be taken in a legal sense: see above on Deu 9:5.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Deu 24:5 to Deu 25:4. Thirteen Laws of Equity and Humanity
Besides the humane temper common to most of them, and a few cue-words, there are no apparent reasons for their being grouped or for the order in which they occur. They have various openings, mostly conditional, otherwise negative. Three are not in the direct form of address, and two only close with this; the rest are in the Sg. form, except one mixed of Sg. and Pl. Some are peculiar to D, others have parallels in E and H. In particular note the separation of the three laws on pledges, and their use of two different terms for ‘pledge.’ All this suggests a compilation from different sources.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Render it:
(1) If there be a controversy between men, and they come to judgment, and the judges judge them, and justify the righteous and condemn the wicked (compare the marginal reference. and Exo 23:7; Pro 17:15);
(2) then it shall be, etc.
Deu 25:2
Scourging is named as a penalty in Lev 19:20. The beating here spoken of would be on the back with a rod or stick (compare Pro 10:13; Pro 19:29; Pro 26:3).
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
CHAPTER XXV
Punishment by whipping not to exceed forty stripes, 1-3.
The ox that treads out the corn is not to be muzzled, 4.
The ordinance concerning marrying the wife of that brother who
has died childless, 5-10.
Of the woman who acts indecently in succouring her husband,
11, 12.
Of false weights and measures, 13-16.
Amalek is to be destroyed, 17-19.
NOTES ON CHAP. XXV
Verse 1. They shall justify the righteous] This is a very important passage, and is a key to several others. The word tsadak is used here precisely in the same sense in which St. Paul sometimes uses the corresponding word , not to justify or make just, but to acquit, declare innocent, to remit punishment, or give reasons why such a one should not be punished; so here the magistrates hitsdiku, shall acquit, the righteous-declare him innocent, because he is found to be righteous and not wicked: so the Septuagint: they shall make righteous the righteous-declare him free from blame, not liable to punishment, acquitted; using the same word with St. Paul when he speaks of a sinner’s justification, i. e., his acquittance from blame and punishment, because of the death of Christ in his stead.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
A controversy about criminal matters, as it follows. They shall justify, i.e. acquit him from guilt and false accusations, and free him from punishment.
Condemn the wicked; declare him guilty, and pass sentence of condemnation to suitable punishments upon him.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
If there be a controversy between men,…. Between two or more:
and they come unto judgment; into a court of judicature, bring their cause thither:
that [the judges] may judge them; who were never less than three; the great sanhedrim at Jerusalem consisted of seventy one, the lesser court was of twenty three, and the least of all three only:
then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked: acquit the one, whose cause is good, and condemn the other to punishment, who is guilty of a crime, and as that deserves; which is to do righteous judgment; the contrary to this is an abomination to the Lord, Pr 17:15.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Corporal Punishment. – The rule respecting the corporal punishment to be inflicted upon a guilty man is introduced in Deu 25:1 with the general law, that in a dispute between two men the court was to give right to the man who was right, and to pronounce the guilty man guilty (cf. Exo 22:8 and Exo 23:7).
Deu 25:2 If the guilty man was sentenced to stripes, he was to receive his punishment in the presence of the judge, and not more than forty stripes, that he might not become contemptible in the eyes of the people. , son of stripes, i.e., a man liable to stripes, like son (child) of death, in 1Sa 20:31. “ According to the need of his crime in number,” i.e., as many stripes as his crime deserved.
Deu 25:3 “ Forty shall ye beat him, and not add,” i.e., at most forty stripes, and not more. The strokes were administered with a stick upon the back (Pro 10:13; Pro 19:29; Pro 26:3, etc.). This was the Egyptian mode of whipping, as we may see depicted upon the monuments, when the culprits lie flat upon the ground, and being held fast by the hands and feet, receive their strokes in the presence of the judge (vid., Wilkinson, ii. p. 11, and Rosellini, ii. 3, p. 274, 78). The number forty was not to be exceeded, because a larger number of strokes with a stick would not only endanger health and life, but disgrace the man: “ that thy brother do not become contemptible in thine eyes.” If he had deserved a severer punishment, he was to be executed. In Turkey the punishments inflicted are much more severe, viz., from fifty to a hundred lashes with a whip; and they are at the same time inhuman (see v. Tornauw, Moslem. Recht, p. 234). The number, forty, was probably chosen with reference to its symbolical significance, which it had derived from Gen 7:12 onwards, as the full measure of judgment. The Rabbins fixed the number at forty save one (vid., 2Co 11:24), from a scrupulous fear of transgressing the letter of the law, in case a mistake should be made in the counting; yet they felt no conscientious scruples about using a whip of twisted thongs instead of a stick (vid., tract. Macc. iii. 12; Buxtorf, Synag. Jud. pp. 522-3; and Lundius, Jd. Heiligth. p. 472).
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| Stripes Not to Exceed Forty. | B. C. 1451. |
1 If there be a controversy between men, and they come unto judgment, that the judges may judge them; then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked. 2 And it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his fault, by a certain number. 3 Forty stripes he may give him, and not exceed: lest, if he should exceed, and beat him above these with many stripes, then thy brother should seem vile unto thee. 4 Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn.
Here is, I. A direction to the judges in scourging malefactors, v. 1-3. 1. It is here supposed that, if a man be charged with a crime, the accuser and the accused (Actor and Reus) should be brought face to face before the judges, that the controversy may be determined. 2. If a man were accused of a crime, and the proof fell short, so that the charge could not be made out against him by the evidence, then he was to be acquitted: “Thou shalt justify the righteous,” that is, “him that appears to the court to be so.” If the accusation be proved, then the conviction of the accused is a justification of the accuser, as righteous in the prosecution. 3. If the accused were found guilty, judgment must be given against him: “Thou shalt condemn the wicked;” for to justify the wicked is as much an abomination to the Lord as it is to condemn the righteous, Prov. xvii. 15. 4. If the crime were not made capital by the law, then the criminal must be beaten. A great many precepts we have met with which have not any particular penalty annexed to them, the violation of most of which, according to the constant practice of the Jews, was punished by scourging, from which no person’s rank or quality did exempt him if he were a delinquent, but with this proviso, that he should never be upbraided with it, nor should it be looked upon as leaving any mark of infamy or disgrace upon him. The directions here given for the scourging of criminals are, (1.) That it be done solemnly; not tumultuously through the streets, but in open court before the judge’s face, and with so much deliberation as that the stripes might be numbered. The Jews say that while execution was in doing the chief justice of the court read with a loud voice Deu 28:58; Deu 28:59; Deu 29:9, and concluded with those words (Ps. lxxviii. 38), But he, being full of compassion, forgave their iniquity. Thus it was made a sort of religious act, and so much the more likely to reform the offender himself and to be a warning to others. (2.) That it be done in proportion to the crime, according to his fault, that some crimes might appear, as they are, more heinous than others, the criminal being beaten with many stripes, to which perhaps there is an allusion, Luk 12:47; Luk 12:48. (3.) That how great soever the crime were the number of stripes should never exceed forty, v. 3. Forty save one was the common usage, as appears, 2 Cor. xi. 24. It seems, they always gave Paul as many stripes as ever they gave to any malefactor whatsoever. They abated one for fear of having miscounted (though one of the judges was appointed to number the stripes), or because they would never go to the utmost rigour, or because the execution was usually done with a whip of three lashes, so that thirteen stripes (each one being counted for three) made up thirty-nine, but one more by that reckoning would have been forty-two. The reason given for this is, lest thy brother should seem vile unto thee. He must still be looked upon as a brother (2 Thess. iii. 15), and his reputation as such was preserved by this merciful limitation of his punishment. It saves him from seeming vile to his brethren, when God himself by his law takes this care of him. Men must not be treated as dogs; nor must those seem vile in our sight to whom, for aught we know, God may yet give grace to make them precious in his sight.
II. A charge to husbandmen not to hinder their cattle from eating when they were working, if meat were within their reach, v. 4. This instance of the beast that trod out the corn (to which there is an allusion in that of the prophet, Hos. x. 11) is put for all similar instances. That which makes this law very remarkable above its fellows (and which countenances the like application of other such laws) is that it is twice quoted in the New Testament to show that it is the duty of the people to give their ministers a comfortable maintenance, 1Co 9:9; 1Co 9:10, and 1Ti 5:17; 1Ti 5:18. It teaches us in the letter of it to make much of the brute-creatures that serve us, and to allow them not only the necessary supports for their life, but the advantages of their labour; and thus we must learn not only to be just, but kind, to all that are employed for our good, not only to maintain but to encourage them, especially those that labour among us in the word and doctrine, and so are employed for the good of our better part.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
DEUTERONOMY – CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Verses 1-3:
Corporal punishment was an accepted judicial sentence in ancient times, and is still practiced among some societies. This text prescribes regulations for Israel to follow when this method of judgment was called for.
“Controversy,” rib, “strife, contention, cause,” a legal dispute in which no capital offense was involved.
In the event two men brought to court a legal dispute which they were unable to resolve privately, the magistrates were to weigh all the evidence, and determine the guilty and the innocent parties. If the matter called for corporal punishment, the judges were to fix the number of stripes to be inflicted upon the guilty. This number must not exceed forty, possibly because this number often symbolizes completeness.
An important reason for limiting the number of stripes to forty was that the culprit, though guilty, must not be degraded to the statutes of a brute.
The rabbis limited the number of stripes to thirty-nine, likely as a precautionary measure that they not exceed the prescribed number, see 2Co 11:24.
Stripes were administered by various means:
(1) A stick, or rod, Exo 21:25; 2Sa 7:14.
(2) A branch with thorns, Jdg 8:7; Jdg 8:16.
(3) Whips and “scorpions,” or whips made of strong cords or leather thongs studded with sharp points or hard knots, 1Ki 12:11; 1Ki 12:14.
The blows were administered to the shoulders and back, Pro 10:13; Pro 19:29; Pro 26:3, as the culprit lay prone on the ground.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
Inasmuch as moderation and humanity are here enjoined, it is a Supplement of the Sixth Commandment. The sum is, that, if any one is judicially condemned to be beaten with stripes, the chastisement should not be excessive. The question, however, is as to a punishment, which by lawyers is called a moderate correction, (43) and which ought to be such, as that the body torn by the whip should not be maimed or disfigured. Since, therefore, God has so far spared the guilty, as to repress even just severity, much more would He have regard paid to innocent blood; and since He prohibits the judge from using too great rigor, much less will He tolerate the violence of a private individual, if he shall employ it against his brother. But it was necessary that zeal should be thus restrained, because judges, in other respects not unjust, are often as severe against lesser offenses ( delicta) as against crimes. An equal measure of punishment is not indeed prescribed, as if all were to be beaten alike; it is only prohibited that the judges should order more than forty stripes in all to be inflicted for an offense. Thus the culprits were beaten deliberately, and not in such an indiscriminate manner as when it was not requisite to count the stripes; besides, they were not so injured for the future as to be deprived of the use of any of their limbs. With the same intent God would have the judges themselves to be present, that by their authority they may prevent any excess: and the reason is added, lest “thy brother should seem vile unto thee,” because he had been beaten immoderately. This may be explained in two ways, either, lest his body should be disfigured by the blows, and so he should be rendered unsightly; or, lest, being stained for ever with ignominy and disgrace, he should be discouraged in mind; for we know how grievous and bitter it is to be mocked and insulted. A third sense, (44) which some prefer, is too far-fetched, viz., lest he should die like some vile and contemptible beast; for God only provides that the wretched man should be improved by his chastisement, and not that he should grow callous from his infamy. As the Jews were always ostentatious of their zeal in trifling matters, they invented a childish precaution, in order that they might more strictly observe this law; for they were scrupulous in not proceeding to the fortieth stripe, but, by deducting one, they sought after an empty reputation for clemency, as if they were wiser than God Himself, and superior to Him in kindness. Into such folly do men fall, when they dare out of their own heads to invent anything in opposition to God’s word! This superstition already prevailed in Paul’s time, as we gather from his words, where he reports that “five times he received forty stripes save one.” (2Co 11:24.)
(43) “Ce que les jurisconsultes appellent une reprimande moyenne.” — Fr.
(44) This exposition is attributed to Vatablus in Poole’s Synopsis.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
THE RECAPITULATION OF THE LAW
Deu 5:1 to Deu 26:19 record for us a recapitulation of the Law. The study of this section sets out clearly certain fundamental truths.
The Decalog is repeated with significant variations. Chapter 5, fundamental to all the laws of God is the Decalog. In Exodus, Moses delivered the same as he brought it from the tip of the fingers Divine. In Deuteronomy, the Law is given again. From the first to the tenth commandment, the very language of Exodus is employed, save in the instance of the fourth. Here, the reason assigned to the Jew for keeping the Sabbath, is strangely and significantly changed, namely, from because the Lord in six days made heaven and earth and rested on the seventh day, to Remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm; therefore, the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day (Deu 5:15).
This change is so strange and so unexpected that it arrests immediate attention and demands adequate explanation. Why did God shift the reason for keeping the Sabbath from the finished creation to a completed redemption? The answer is not difficult. In the Divine plan, redemption is a far greater event than creation; the soul of man exceeds the weight of the world; for that matter, of all worlds. The Law was given by Moses, but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ. The Law was given for Jews; the Gentiles were never in bondage to it, and above all, believing Gentiles are not bound by it. To them, the Law is not a great external or outside force created for practices of restraint. Its spirit is transcribed to their souls rather; they walk at liberty while seeking Divine precepts. This is not to inveigh against the Law. The Law is just, and true and good, but by Law no man has ever been redeemed. It is to exalt Grace, which God hath revealed through Jesus Christ, in whom men have redemption from sin. If I only love my father and mother because the Law commands it, I do not love them at all; if I refrain from making images and bowing down before them because this is the demand of the Law, my heart may yet be as full of idolatry as a heathen temple. Redemption is not by the Law; it is by Grace in Jesus Christ!
The early Church was shortly called upon to settle this question of salvation by Law or Grace, and in the Jerusalem Conference Peter rose up and said unto them,
Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the Word of the Gospel, and believe.
And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as He did unto us;
And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.
Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? (Act 15:7-10).
Later he said, We believe that through the Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ (not by Law) we shall be saved, even as they (Act 15:7-11). Mark you, in that very sentence, Peter, the Apostle, proves his realization of the fact that the Law had failed as a savior and the very Jew himself had hope alone in grace. How strange, then, for men of the Twentieth Century to turn back to Law and proclaim the Law as though it were a redeemer, and protest that men who ignore the Jewish Saturday as the Sabbath will plunge themselves into the pit thereby, when the Law never saved! The keeping of the Sabbath was the one Law that contained in itself no ethical demand. The Law to worship, the Law to honor father and mother, the Law against killing, stealing and covetousnessthese are all questions of right and wrong; but to tithe time by the keeping of the Sabbath was a command solely in the interest of mans physical life. When, therefore, by the pen of inspiration the reason for it was shifted from a finished creation to a finished redemption, the act was lifted at once to a high spiritual level and became a symbol of the day when Christ, risen from the grave, should have completed redemptions plan. That great fortune to mankind fell out on the first day of the week, creating not so much a Christian Sabbath as making forever a memorial day for redemption itself, for the eighth day, or the first day of the week, clearly indicated the new order of things, or the new creation through Christ.
We have no sympathy whatever with secularizing each one of the seven days; but we would have the first day of the week kept in the spirit of rejoicing as redemptions memorial. On that day our Lord rose from the dead; on that day He met his disciples again and again; on that day the brethren at Troas assembled with the Apostles and broke bread; on that day the Christians laid aside their offerings; on that day they met for prayer and breaking of breadthe fellowship of the saints; on that day John was caught up in the spirit and witnessed the marvels recorded in his apocalyptic vision. Oh, what a day! No legal bondage, for what have we to do with holy days, sabbaths and new moons; but salvations memorial, a day of special service to the Son of God, our Saviour, a day for the souls rejoicing in Jesus. Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness to every one that believeth.
But as we pass on in the study of this section of Scripture, we find Moses defends the Decalog in character and consequence. He reminds them of the glory out of which the voice spake (Deu 5:24). He reminds them of the obligation in the words themselves (Deu 5:32). He reminds them of the relationship of the possession of the land to obedience of the precepts. He pleads with them as a father, Hear, therefore, O Israel (Deu 6:4). He anticipates the day of prophecy and begs that these words have place in their hearts (Deu 6:6), to be diligently taught to their children (Deu 6:7); bound for a sign upon their hands and frontlets between their eyes, lest they be forgotten (Deu 6:8); written upon the posts of the house and on the gates, where they could not be unobserved (Deu 6:9). Moses knew the relationship of law-keeping to national living. It is doubtful if modernists now have or will ever again entertain the same sacred reverence for Law that characterized the ancients, even the heathen of far-off days.
We cannot forget how Socrates, when he was sentenced to death and, after an imprisonment of thirty days, was to drink the juice of the hemlock, spent his time preparing for the end; friends conceived and executed plans for his escape and earnestly endeavored to prevail upon him to avail himself of the opportunity, but he answered, That would be a crime to violate the law even when the sentence is unjust. I would rather die than do evil. If a heathen philosopher could treat unjust laws with such reverence, Moses was justified in pleading with his people to regard the laws that were true and just and good, and such were the mandates of Deuteronomy.
It is easy enough for one to pick out some one of these precepts and, by detaching it from its context, create the impression that it was foolish or superficial or even utterly unjust; but when one reads the whole Book, he sees the effectual relationship of laws, general and particular, to the life Israel was leading, and for that matter, catches the supreme spiritual significance of the same as they interpret themselves in the light of New Testament teaching. There is not a warning that was not needed, nor an exhortation which, if heeded, would have failed to profit the people. It all came to one conclusion for Israel.
What doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul (Deu 10:12)?
And as there was not a law in the Old Testament but was fitted for the profit of Israel, so there is not a command in the New Testament but looks to the conquest of the Christian soul.
Among these enactments were personal and significant suggestions. They gave dietary and sanitary suggestions (Deuteronomy 14); they established the Sabbatic year (Deuteronomy 13); they fixed the time of the Passover (Deuteronomy 16); they set forth the character of the offerings (Deuteronomy 17); they determined the duties of the Levites (Deuteronomy 18); they gave direction concerning the cities of refuge (Deuteronomy 19); they determined the way of righteous warfare (chap. 20); they established a court of inquest (Deuteronomy 21); they announced the law of brotherhood (Deuteronomy 22); they descended to the minute instances of social life and regulations of the same (Deuteronomy 23); they dealt with the great and difficult question of divorce (Deuteronomy 24); they ended (Deuteronomy 23) in an almost unlimited series of regulations concerning the social life of the people knowing a wilderness experience, including the law of the first fruits (Deuteronomy 26).
It is interesting to study not alone the laws enacted here, but the penalties declared, including the blessings and curses from Ebal to Gerizim. There is about them all an innate righteousness that has been unknown to those purely human codes for which God never assumed responsibility. From the curse against bribery to the curse against brutal murder to this day the sentences are justified in the judgment of the worlds most thoughtful men.
In all they contrast the injustice and inordinately severe punishments often afflicted by godless governments. Plutarch, in writing about Solon, tells us that he repealed the laws of Draco except those concerning murder. Such was the severity of their punishments in proportion to the offense that we are amazed as we read them. If one was convicted of idleness, death was the penalty. If one stole a few apples or potherbs, he must surely die, and by as ignominious a method as did the murderer. And out of that grew the saying of Demades that Draco wrote his laws, not with ink but with blood. And when Draco was asked why such severe penalties, he answered, Small ones deserve it, and I can find no greater for the most heinous. Such were human laws in contrast to these laws Divine.
But a further study of these laws involves a third lesson.
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
Critical Notes.Corporal punishment. Controv., dispute arising from inflicted injury. Justify pronounce just, Exo. 23:7; Pro. 17:15.
Deu. 25:2. Lie down. Precisely the same as the Egyptian bastinado, which was applied to the bared back of the culprit, who was stretched flat on the ground, his hands and feet being held by attendants (Jam). The law of Moses introduced two restrictions, the infliction of punishment In presence of the judge and the limit to 40 stripes. If a criminal deserved severer punishment he was executed.
Deu. 25:5. Ox In other kinds of labour oxen were muzzled. The spiritual sense is applied, 1Co. 9:9; 1Ti. 5:18; Hos. 10:11.
Deu. 25:5-10. Law of Levirate Marriages. This usage existed before the law of Moses (Gen. 38:8-11) and seems to have originated in patriarchal times, for preserving the name and honour of the eldest sonthe chieftain of the family. The Mosaic law rendered the custom obligatory (Mat. 22:25) on younger brothers, or the nearest kinsman, to marry the widow (Rth. 4:4), by associating the natural desire of perpetuating of a brothers name with the preservation of property in the Hebrew families and tribes (Num. 33:54; Num. 36:9). If a younger brother declined to comply with law, the widow brought her claim before the authorities in public assembly (the gate of the city); she was ordered to loose the thong of his shoe (Deu. 25:9) a sign of degradationfollowing up that act by spitting, not in his face, but in his presence before him on the ground (Jam.)
Deu. 25:11-12. Severe penalty imposed upon a shameless woman, who wilfully should endanger or take away the power of offspring from a man, Exo. 21:22.
Deu. 25:13-16. Weights and measures. Divers. lit., a stone and a stoneone just and one false, or a light and heavy one. Weights consisted of stones; facility in procuring them tempted to fraud. Measures, lit., an ephah and an ephah, the common or standard measure in Israel. Lengthened. cf. Deu. 4:26; Deu. 5:16. Unrighteously. Moses sums up all the breaches of the law. (Keil.)
Deu. 25:17-19. Doom of Amalek. Did, met, thee, i.e., stealthily and in hostile encounter; not found in Exo. 17:14. The Jews had not only to manifest love and kindness, but often to inflict punishment upon Gods enemies. They were executors of Divine judgment upon Amalek and others; cf. 1Sa. 15:3; 1Sa. 15:32-33.
PUNISHMENT OF THE GUILTY.Deu. 25:1-3
God took special care for the administration of justice. The guilty must be punished, and the innocent defended. It is the duty of earthly tribunals to govern in equity.
I. Punishment incurred. There must not be mere report or accusation. The accused and accuser must be brought face to face, the dispute decided before the authorities, and the criminal be found worthy to be beaten. The wicked cannot sin with impunity. Punishment was demanded under the theocracy. Conscience predicts retribution and human magistrates are appointed to administer it. In doing so they are types of the eternal judge.
II. Punishment inflicted. We have special directors given to make the penal system just and effective.
1. By the authority of the judge. Not by some private heartless official wishing for revenge. Magistrates bear the sword, (Rom. 14:4; 1Pe. 2:14; 1Pe. 2:21).
2. In publicity. Before his face. This would be itself a part of punishment and a check to cruelty and excesss.
3. According to desert. According to his fault. There must be discrimination and rectitude. To justify the wicked and condemn the just would reverse the order of justice, and become an abomination to the Lord (Pro. 17:15).
4. In measured degree. Forty stripes he may give and not exceed, Deu. 5:3. Stripes, few or many, according to guilt, but never to exceed forty. Punishment should ever be measured according to strictest justice. Our penal code has been disgraced by cruel administration, and punishment has often been excessive, outrageous, and beyond moral desert. They shall judge it according to my judgments.
5. With scrupulous fear. Lest thy brother should seem vile unto thee. Excessive punishment degrades humanity, dishonours law, and hardens the criminal. He must be corrected, reformed, and treated with humanity. Count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother.
THE RIGHTS OF LABOUR.Deu. 25:4
The command not to put a muzzle upon the ox, is no doubt proverbial in its nature, and even in the context before us is not intended to apply merely literally to an ox employed in threshing, but to be understood, in the general sense in which the Apostle Paul uses it in (1Co. 9:9, and 1Ti. 5:18), viz.: that a labourer was not to be deprived of his wages. Keil.
I. Rights enforced by common usage. The use of oxen in treading out corn unmuzzled still prevails among Arabs and eastern nations. If God takes care for oxen, we must treat them kindly. The ox is not a mere animal, but a labourer, contributing to the sustenance and help of man.
II. Rights enforced by special enactment. This was a wonderful provision in the law of Moses. Nothing was too trivial connected with men or brutes. God defends the rights of every creature, and teaches us to recognise the nobility of labour in the smallest law.
III. Rights enforced by Divine law. This is a general principle, extending to the plougher and the sower. Toilers of hand and brain are not mere drones, but essential to the well-being of society. In all departments the labourer is worthy of his hire. The highest authority applies the law to ministerial support (Luk. 10:1). If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things? (Tim. Deu. 5:18).
HOMILETIC HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS
Deu. 25:3. Exceed. Abuse of power in excessive punishment. Power given for edification not destruction (2Co. 13:10). There is an honour due to all men (1Pe. 2:17), and though we must hate the sin, yet not the sinner, Trapp. The reason assigned by the legislator in this statute for restricting the number of stripes is very remarkable. It is not simply a motive of compassion for a suffererit is a respect for human nature, the rights of which are preserved even in a criminal. To inflict upon a man an excessive and degrading punishment is to outrage the feelings of those who witness it, and to pour contempt upon humanity itself. This humane character of the Mosaic legislation is deserving of special notice. How rigorous soever it may be in some respects, it upholds the dignity of mans nature, and does not permit even a guilty offender to seem vile unto others.Jamieson.
Deu. 25:4. Not muzzle the ox. Though enacted in a particular case, it teaches the humane lesson that animals, while engaged in the service of man, are entitled to his indulgence and kindness. Paul quotes this law (1Co. 9:9; 1Ti. 5:18), and shows that God did not appoint it for the sake of oxen alone, but that every labourer is worthy of his hire, and hence declares the obligation of men to exercise justice in properly rewarding those who labour for their advantage, especially those who labour for the good of their souls. The application, so far from weakening, seems to confirm its obligation and reference to that point, inasmuch as it displays to us that, in the eye of God, the same principles of equity are expected to prevail amongst all His creatures, and that they are not to be confined to our dealings with men.Jamieson.
THE LAW OF LEVIRATE MARRIAGE.Deu. 25:5-10
This law is not peculiar to the Jews, but is found in all essential respects the same among various Oriental nations, ancient and modern, and exists at present among the South African tribes, the Arabians, the Druses, and the tribes of the Caucasus (Speak. Com.)
I. The duty imposed. The obligation was onerous and recognised as one of affection for the memory of the deceased. It devolved upon the neighbouring kinsmanbrethren that dwell together, not a stranger. Affection is needful in married life. This cannot be forced. Love leads to duty and self-sacrifice.
II. The design of the obligation. (a) To prevent alienation of property; (b) To raise up seed. To be without issue was considered a great calamity (Gen. 16:4); a successor and heir a great blessing; (c) To perpetuate a name, that his name be not put out of Israel. Parents are anxious to maintain the honour and preserve the name of the family. Loss of inheritance, alienation of the rights of the firstborn, are a disgrace. Gods favour is better than fame which is the shade of immortality, and in itself a shadow.
Unblemished let me live, or die unknown,
Oh! grant me honest fame, or grant me none.Pope.
III. The reproach of neglecting the obligation. It was not so binding as to permit no escape. If the brother preferred to submit to reproach. If the man like not, he might refuse (Deu. 25:7). Then the thong of his shoe was loosed, he was stripped of power and degraded as a slave. Spitting in the face or in his presence, was the strongest expression of insult and contempt. The man was not worthy to take his brothers place, was scornfully rejected by the woman herself, and his name became a bye word in Israel. The house of him that hath his shoe loosed.
TRADE MORALITY.Deu. 25:13-16
The language of Scripture on this point demands the serious attention of all engaged in trade. Principles of life are given in minute detail and enforced by special sanctions.
I. God requires honesty in trade. Not only in courts of law, but in commercial life, in the market place, and in the shop, justice must be done. There must be no different weights and measures; one for buying and another for selling; one light and another heavy. This was the iniquitous system of Jews. Accurate inspection may restrain gross deceit with us. But trickery and close dealing, evasion of legal rights, and deviation from honest trading are too prevalent. Advantage is taken of ignorance. Impositions, double-dealings and hard bargains are struck with cleverness and self-satisfaction (Pro. 20:14). Christian professors and Christian churches have need of warning and care. That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter (1Th. 4:6).
II. Honesty in trade is enforced by special sanctions. That which is the standard of measure, the rule of justice must of itself be just. If not there will be fraud and deceit.
1. Justice will gain temporal advantage. That thy days may be lengthened in the land (Deu. 25:15). Might prolonged life and made it happy. As a matter of self-interest, Honesty is the best policy. It will enrich spiritual experience, promote social morality and preserve national life.
2. Justice will secure Gods approval. We must act as under his eye and seek a conscience void of offence towards God and man. Equity and not customs of the trade must be our law. A false balance is abomination to the Lord; but a just weight (a perfect stone) is his delight (Pro. 11:1).
3. Injustice will expose to Gods curse. All that do unrighteously are abomination unto the Lord. Man may excuse convenient lies, commend trickery for its wisdom (Luk. 16:1-8) and cry business is business, but such trading is hateful to God, will bring shame and curse upon those who practise it. Divers weights (a stone and a stone) and divers measures (an ephah and ephah), both of them are alike abomination to the Lord (Pro. 20:10).
THE CHRISTIAN IN COMMERCE
The greatest difficulties in the way of a Christian commercial life, arise out of the practices which prevail. Enforce right conduct, you are met by an appeal to general sanction, and a reference to the consequences which would follow from its adoption, in ridicule and condemnation, in loss and suffering. Thus the Christian tradesman must shape his principles in the way of reform and opposition
I. Endeavour to point out what Christianity requires of a man in his dealings in business with his fellow-men.
1. Christianity requires the most rigid adherence to the principles of moral integrity in commerce. Truth is one of these, which lies at the basis of all intercourse, and without which society would be impossible. All positive misrepresentations, all arts by which one thing is passed off for another, all false appearances given to things, and all deficient scales and measures, are condemned. Honesty is another Christian virtue in commerce. In giving everyone his due, in meeting all equitable claims. For a man to refuse to pay his debts is dishonest. Owe no man anything. A debt is a debt until it be paid or forgiven. Bankruptcy is not payment. No earthly tribunal can exempt from the claims of eternal justice, and an honest debtor will deem nothing his while creditors are unsatisfied in fact or feeling. It is a grand saying of De Foe, The obligations of an honest man can never die.
2. Christianity requires the exercise of love and kindness in commerce. A man may be just, and yet a monster of inhumanity. The Christian spirit of love should not be confined to some departments of human life and excluded from others. It is designed to create a higher morality than that of the world, it will dictate much which law cannot take cognizance of, and preserve for the wretched practice of exclusive dealing, of punishing a man for his politics or religion by withholding custom and thus making commerce the instrument of bigotry and exclusiveness.
3. Christianity requires that a man should preserve his soul in peace and patience in commerce. Commerce implies contact with others. It compels intercourse with men of powerful passions, different dispositions and opposite principles. Hence we are sorely tried, exposed to innumerable disappointments, vexations and annoyances. We may be deceived by those we trusted, and injured by those we benefited. All this must be endured in meekness, and the heart must be kept calm and unruffled, seek no revenge, but cherish the spirit of love
4. Christianity requires that commerce should be consecrated and elevated by the spirit of holiness. There is a hardening and corrupting tendency in commercial pursuits. Constant calculation of profit and loss, incessant contemplation of pecuniary interests are apt to contract and debase the soul. The man who gives himself wholly to gain becomes earthly, sensual and devilish. All spiritual generous sensibilities and aspirations are destroyed. He becomes less malleable than the coin with which he deals. But Christianity teaches that commerce is a means, not an end; that a mans life consisteth not in the abundance of things which he possesses; that we may be yet having all things, and rich, yet having nothing. Commerce will be really noble and raised from the dust, when the higher faculties are cultivated with secular pursuits; wealth possessed and used in the spirit of stewardship, and a vigorous habit of Christian liberality finds a constant vent for the acquisitions of Christian industry.
II. Having described what a Christian should be in commerce briefly show Why he should be it. All considerations by which religion and morality are commended and enforced are applicable here. The course pointed out is right in itself, what we owe to God and connected with eternal destiny. It is necessary to inherit the kingdom of heaven. It is presented to us in the example of Christ, whom all disciples should imitate. In one word, Christianity requires it; all its precepts, principles, blessings, and prospects require it. But addnce some particular considerations.
1. Commerce is a most important part of life. It enters largely into our engagements. It is in some form or other the greatest part of the life of multitudes. Could a man be a Christian and yet not be a Christian in his dealings with his fellow-men? Is it possible to retain the spirit of the gospel and yet not bring it into business? The power of religion must be best displayed here. The truest test of a mans spirituality is in his secular life. It is often said, A man is really what he is relatively. I would add a man is spiritually what he is secularly.
2. Commerce is a most influential part of our life. It is part of life with which men have most to do and of which they can best judge. It is the world-side of our religion. Ungodly men cannot see us believe and always hear us pray, but they behold our behaviour towards others. Though ignorant of doctrinal theology, and strangers to true spirituality, they are no bad critics of moral conduct. What then is our influence, if we be not holy in business? What use saying, I know the truth, if it can be replied, You do a lie? What an agency in the conversion of the world would be a blameless secular life throughout the Church! It would be belter than an army of ten thousand missionaries.
3. Commercial holiness is imperatively required by the character and temper of the times. It is a commercial country and age in which we live, and commercial sinfulness is a prevailing feature. It is the duty of the Christian to adapt his example and display the virtue most wanted. Never more necessary for saints to condemn the world by secular integrity, to give a noble example for it to follow, and to bring a spirit from above to bear on its pursuits. (A. J. Morris.)
THE DOOM OF AMALEK.Deu. 25:17-19
Whilst the Israelites were to make love the guiding principle of their conduct in their dealings with a neighbour, and even with strangers and foes, this love was not to degenerate into weakness or indifference towards open ungodliness. To impress this truth upon the people, Moses concludes the discourse on the law by reminding them of the crafty enmity manifested toward them by Amalek on their march out of Egypt, and with the command to root out the Amalekites (cf. Exo. 17:9-16).Keil.
I. Amaleks sin against Israel. How he met thee by the way, stealthily and fierce encounter, in a most difficult and risky place, in Rephidim (cf. Exo. 17:8).
1. This attack was unprovoked. No occasion was furnished for it. Israel had not the remotest intention to injure the persons or seize the territory of Amalek. But they were jealous at the prosperity of Israel, as descendants of Esau entertained a grudge against them, and longed to injure them.
2. This attack was cowardly. It was a mean, dastardly, insidious surprise, not in front, but in the rear, on the hindmostnot on the strong and vigorous, but on the feeble, the faint and weary. We have a kind of reverence for the brave, but cowards are objects of scorn and contempt.
3. This attack was cruel. Upon stragglers, upon a host tired in the march, almost unarmed and unable to resist. The tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.
4. This attack was presumptuous He feared not God. A defiance against God of whom they had heard, and whose mighty acts in Egypt and the Red Sea had defended his people. It was an insult, a lifting up of the hand upon the throne of God (Marg. Exo. 17:16). The fear of God alone can restrain from evil. When this is cast off, there will be no regard for men.
II. Amaleks sin remembered by God. Remember what Amalek did. A record was kept in the book (Exo. 17:14), and this conduct was never forgotten.
1. Sin is never overlooked. Silence may be kept at the time of commission. God may appear to connive, to wink at times of ignorance and sin (Act. 17:30), but they are not overlooked. If no direct interposition, men must not excuse, take courage, and cry God hath forgotten. Gods patience is no proof that He thinks lightly of sin. Sentence is gone forth; Edoms doom was predicted, but warning is given, time for repentance afforded before execution.
2. Sin is kept in remembrance. A book of record is found somewhere. An impress is left upon nature, upon the human mind, and upon moral conduct. Wickedness is read in the pangs of conscience, the power of evil habits, and the moral forces of the universe. God prepares ministers of vengeance, and in due time the judgment will come.
III. Amaleks sin punished by God. Injustice and cruelty towards Gods people will not pass unavenged. Joshua had punished them, but a more terrible doom awaited them.
1. Punishment long delayed. For some wise reason the honour of Jehovah was not vindicated at the time. The base attack was repelled, but the territory was not invadedthe final judgment was delayed. This was inflicted partly by Saul and David (1Sa. 14:48; 1Sa. 27:8; 1Sa. 30:17; 2Sa. 8:12), finally and completely under Hezekiah (1Ch. 4:43). Judgment may linger, but it is laid up in store.
2. Punishment by those who have suffered. Gods people themselves, when fixed in privileges and possession, must inflict it. Power and position are not given for selfish enjoyment. We must be ready for warfare as well as for service. No pity, no pride must prevent us from executing Gods will upon our enemies. Remember, thou shalt not forget it.
3. Punishment most severe. Thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven (Exo. 17:14). Fearful doom! But Scripture, Providence and human history confirm the lawHe shall have judgment without mercy, that hath showed no mercy.
HOMILETIC HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS
Deu. 25:11-12. Shameful insult. No excuse in the plea to help her husband. Modesty is the hedge of chastity, and therefore ought to be very carefully preserved and kept up by both sexes.
Deu. 25:13-16. Customs of trade. Often
(1) sinful,
(2) corrupting, and
(3) dangerous. Shall I count them pure with the wicked balances, and with the bag of deceitful weights? (Mic. 6:11).
Deu. 25:17-19. Amalek.
1. Ungodly principles lead to wicked conduct. Amalek feared not God.
2. Wicked conduct is not allowed to go unpunished in the providence of God.
3. This punishment when inflicted is full of suggestion(a) delayed to prove the patience of God towards his enemies. (b) severe, to avenge His people, and teach the doctrine of retribution. The portion of wicked men is to be forgotten in the city where they had so done (Ecc. 8:10). Their memory dies with them; or if it be preserved, it stinks in keeping, and remains as a curse and perpetual disgrace (Trapp). It is not always consistent with the purposes of the Divine economy to vindicate the honour of Jehovah by any general punishment at the time. But if no further notice had been taken, this contemptuous defiance of the power and majesty of God would have appeared to escape with impunity, a circumstance which might have degraded the Deity in the estimation of Israel, who judged of His power as all other nations then judged of their guardian gods, by His rigour and promptitude in defending His people and punishing their enemies. He would not suffer Amalek to pass finally unpunished, but would authorise and employ them to inflict judgment, thus impressing His people themselves with the Salutary conviction that where the majesty of Jehovah was insulted, present delay of punishment affords no presumption of final impunity.(Graves on Pent.)
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 25
Deu. 25:1-4. Judgment. No obligation to justice does force a man to be cruel, or to use the sharpest sentence. A just man does justice to every man and every thing; and then, if he be also wise, he knows there is a debt of mercy and compassion due to the infirmities of mans nature; and that is to be paid; and he that, is cruel and ungentle to a sinning person, and does the worst to him, dies in his debt and is unjust.Jeremy Taylor.
Deu. 25:13-16. Trade. What signifies. a mans trade? A man of honest trade can make himself respectable if he will (George III.). To be honest as this world goes is to be one picked out of ten thousand.Shakespeare.
Deu. 25:17-19. Not forget. Most just it is that he who breweth mischief should have the first draught of it himself.(Jemmat). For inquisition shall be made into the counsels of the ungodly, and the sound of his words shall come unto the Lord for the manifestation of his wicked deeds (Wis. 1:7-9). Mercy to him that shows it is the rule by which heaven moves in pardoning guilty man; and he that shows none, being ripe in years, and conscious of the outrage ne commits, shall seek it and not find it in his turn.Cowper.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
LESSON NINETEEN Deu. 25:1-16
(16) JUDGING AND PUNISHING MEN IN CONTROVERSY (Deu. 25:1-3)
If there be a controversy between men, and they come unto judgment, and the judges judge them; then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked; 2 and it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his wickedness, by number. 3 Forty stripes he may give him, he shall not exceed; lest, if he should exceed, and beat him above these with many stripes, then thy brother should seem vile unto thee.
THOUGHT QUESTIONS 25:13
431.
Was forty stripes given for every type of crime?
432.
What was used for the administration of such punishment? Cf. Exo. 21:20.
433.
By New Testament times the instrument for beating had changed. Cf. Mat. 10:17; Mat. 23:34.
434.
In what sense was such punishment corrective?
AMPLIFIED TRANSLATION 25:13
If there is a controversy between men, and they come into court, and the judges decide between them, justifying the innocent and condemning the guilty,
2 Then if the guilty man deserves to be beaten, the judge shall cause him to lie down and be beaten in his presence with a certain number of stripes, according to his offense.
3 Forty stripes may be given him, but not more; lest, if he should be beaten with many stripes your brother should [be treated like a beast and] seem low and worthless to you.
COMMENT 25:13
See also Deu. 17:8-13, notes, Deu. 19:15-21. We have discussed the necessity of fair judgment on the part of the judges several times: Deu. 1:16-17; Deu. 16:18-20; Cf. Deu. 24:17-18.
The emphatic way in which the law stated that only forty stripes were to be given the offender, give rise to the custom of giving thirty-nine. A miscount might otherwise cause the offender to deem his persecutor as vile, (Heb. Kalah) to be counted despicable, (Gesenius). Yet by New Testament times the counting process had usually a simpler solutionless actual strokes by the one giving the lashes. See 2Co. 11:24, where Macknight remarks, By the law, Deut. xxv. 3, punishment with stripes was restricted to forty at one beating. The whip with which these stripes were given [in Pauls day] consisting of three separate cords, and each stroke being counted as three stripes, beyond which they never went. Hence the expression, forty stripes save one. One more last would have meant forty-two stripes.
But the original law apparently referred to beating by a rod (Exo. 21:20). Scourging replaced it in later Jewish history (Mat. 10:17; Mat. 23:34) but the number of stripes was retained.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
XXV.
Deu. 25:1-3. HUMANITY IN PUNISHMENTS.
(1) They shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked.I will not justify the wicked (Exo. 23:7). He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are abomination to the Lord (Pro. 17:15). It should be noticed that justify is here used forensically, not meaning to make righteous, but to treat as righteous. Those who object to this sense in St. Pauls Epistles, will find it hard to put any other sense upon the word in the rest of Holy Scripture.
(2) If the wicked man be worthy to be beaten.Literally, a son of beating, or of Haccth, according to the Hebrew. The treatise called Maccth, in the Talmud, describes the infliction of the punishment in later times, when of the Jews five times St. Paul received forty stripes save one. The details have been described by Canon Farrar in an appendix to his Life of St. Paul.
Shall cause him to lie down.The Talmud interprets the position as not sitting nor standing, nor exactly lying, but with the body inclined.
Before his face.This is interpreted as on the front of his body. The thirty-nine stripes were given thirteen on one shoulder, thirteen on the other, and thirteen on the breast.
(3) Forty stripes.The Talmud says that they considered first what a man could bear, and flogged him according to their estimate. In some cases, if the whole punishment could not be administered at once, it was divided. It is contemplated as possibly fatal, however.
Lest . . . thy brother should seem vile unto thee.The punishment was not considered to be any degradation, after it had been inflicted. It was inflicted in the synagogue, and the law was read mean while from Deu. 28:58-59, with one or two other passages.
(4) Thou shalt not muzzle the ox.We have a comment on these words from St. Paul in two places (1Co. 9:9, and 1Ti. 5:18). It is not only written for the sake of the oxen, but to prove that the labourer is worthy of his hire; they that preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
LAWS WITH REGARD TO CORPORAL PUNISHMENT, Deu 25:1-3.
1. A controversy In disputes between two men the court was to give the decision in favour of the one who was in the right. The guilty one was to be punished with stripes, which were to be in proportion to his guilt.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Chapter 25 Doing What Is Truly Right And Avoiding Shame.
This chapter continues with the idea of fairness, and the thought of consideration and doing right and runs throughout, commencing with the requirement for true justice and a fair hearing with a limitation on beatings, and dealing with not muzzling the ox, surrogate motherhood, decency and right behaviour when quarrelling, and correct weights and measures. There is an emphasis on shaming for those who fail (‘vile’ – Deu 25:3; ‘spit in his face’ – Deu 25:9; ‘cut off her hand’ – Deu 25:12; ‘abomination’ Deu 25:16). Thus a beating shames the recipient, and must not therefore be too heavy (Deu 25:3). The woman refused her Levirate rights shames her brother-in-law by spitting in his face (Deu 25:9-10). The violent and unscrupulous woman is to openly bear her shame before all, for they would be able to tell from the mutilation what she had done (Deu 25:12). False weights and measures are an abomination, they bring shame on those who use them (Deu 25:16). It concludes with the fate of Amalek on which comes the greatest shame of all.
(We have here ‘thou, thee’ all the way through).
Judgment Is To Be Righteous Judgment ( Deu 25:1-3 ).
As we have seen this connects up with the previous chapter in the analysis of Deu 24:16 to Deu 25:3. And yet it also connects up in thought with what follows. A reminder that we must nor straitjacket Moses’ thought or delivery.
Deu 25:1
‘ If there be a controversy between men, and they come for judgment, and the judges judge them, then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked.’
Right justice was so important that Moses, like any good preacher repeated the idea a number of times deu (Deu 1:15-18; Deu 16:18-20; Deu 17:8-13; Deu 19:15-21). Here he summarised the situation quite simply by declaring that in any controversy that came for judgment which the judges judge, they must have only one aim in mind, to declare righteous those who are righteous, and condemn those who are unrighteous, without fear or favour.
We are probably to see that one of the combatants may well have charged the other with something that deserved a beating. (Imprisonment at that time was often not an option). A guilty verdict would mean the offender was beaten, a not guilty verdict might see the accuser beaten if he was seen as a false witness (Deu 19:16-21),
The Public Beating (Deuteronomy 2-3)
Deu 25:2-3
‘ And it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his wickedness, by number. Forty stripes he may give him, he shall not exceed it, lest, if he should exceed it, and beat him above this with many stripes, then your brother should seem vile to you.’
But any punishment must be reasonable and controlled. If a man was to be beaten the judge must cause him to lie down, and then he would be beaten in his presence, probably with a rod (Exo 21:20), the number of stripes determined by what was seen as his deserts. But the number of stripes must not be more than forty under any circumstances. Forty stripes as a maximum parallel the Middle Assyrian laws and were probably a recognised standard of what a man could bear at that time, although earlier the Code of Hammurabi had allowed sixty.
Compare here Pro 10:13; Pro 19:29; Pro 26:3. This was the Egyptian method of punishment as depicted on monuments where the guilty party was laid flat on the ground, and being held fast by the hands and feet, received their strokes in the presence of the judge
We notice here the concern for justice with a mixture of mercy. Being prone rather than strung up would ensure that the beating was more limited in power, the judge’s presence would ensure fair play, the fact that he had to be present would, apart from the most heartless, hopefully make him consider his sentence more carefully, the strokes were to be counted, and they must not number more than forty. Much later on they were limited to thirty nine in case of wrong counting, but the means of application became more vicious. This was comparatively compassionate.
If more than forty stripes were given it would mean that they were looking on their fellow-tribesman as vile and worthy of humiliation, which would be contrary to the covenant, and therefore not to be allowed. The dignity of an Israelite was considered to be important, and the purpose of the punishment was restoration to good covenant citizenship.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Deu 25:5-10 The Law of Wife Inheritance Deu 25:5-10 defines the regulations of the practice of wife inheritance to the Israelite. Tribes and nations have practiced the tradition of a man taking the wife of his dead brother for thousands of years; it was not unique to the Hebrew people. In this passage of Scripture, God places a law regarding “wife inheritance” into effect that allows the widow to be treated with respect and dignity, rather than the property of a man. In the following newspaper article, a Kenyan widow reveals how perverse the practice of “wife inheritance” can be in tribes and nations who do not serve God.
“If Mariam Salim had observed local tradition, she would, on the death of her husband, have been obliged to marry another member of his family, such as a brother-in-law or uncle. Had she conformed as other members of the Wanga sub-group of the Luhya tribe do, the man in question could have called on her at will for food and sex. But Salim, like a handful of other Kenyan women living with HIV, has turned her back on this custom because it contributes to the spread of the virus which she has carried since 1990. So-called wife inheritance is widespread in this part of western Kenya, on the shores of Lake Victoria , in an area where polygamy is the norm and 30 percent of the adult population is seropositive, according to official figures. ‘My husband was married to another woman, whose first husband died of AIDS. They all died. I am 34 and have six children. That is enough. The cycle has to stop. I do not want to bring death to somebody, I refuse to be inherited,’ Salim told AFP. Since 1997, her dead husband’s family, which lives just a stone’s throw away, in a Muslim community on the edge of Mumias town, have been giving her a hard time. ‘They say that if a widow is not inherited, her children grow up abnormal. She is blamed for anything that goes wrong in the family. They say she is cursed and they refuse to bury her when she dies,’ explained Salim, who makes a living selling cloth bought in Nairobi and by cultivating a small patch of ground. ‘It is worthless tradition. The man comes to see us and just wants to go to bed. But it is mainly AIDS that makes me refuse,’ she added. Even when they know a woman is HIV positive, brothers-in-law are undeterred, incredulous. ‘They do not believe me. They think I made it up so as not to be inherited,’ said Salim. Salim has got together with half a dozen like-minded widows who meet once a week at Mumias Roman Catholic hospital, under the aegis of the Society of Women Living with AIDS. Together these sellers of fruit and toiletries use a couple of sewing machines to put together a few clothes which they will sell to help pay their children’s school fees. They all said they had not been inherited, although some admit to occasionally sleeping with a brother-in-law to regain access to their late husband’s family. There is a cultural provision for those widows who refuse to give in: when she dies, the family will pay a man, often the village idiot, to have sex with her corpse so that she can be considered ‘inherited.’ Only then can she be properly buried. ‘That happens a lot,’ said Ann Wanalo, a social worker who helps local people living with HIV and tries to educate the population. The biggest hurdles to her fight against AIDS are superstition and scepticism. ‘People have not yet accepted the fact of AIDS, even though people are dying. If a woman refuses to be inherited, nobody will shake her hand,’ she explained. ‘The death certificate shows that the husband died of tuberculosis, diarrhoea, anaemia or other illnesses provoked by HIV, but it does not mention AIDS, so people think the women are lying, especially if they are not yet very thin,’ added the social worker. ‘Elders, chiefs, churchmen, doctors, they are not doing enough and people are dying in the villages. There are funerals all the time,’ she lamented.” [30]
[30] Mumias, “Kenya Widows Reject Forced Remarriage,” in The Monitor Newspaper, Kampala, Uganda, Wednesday, May 9, 2001, page 25.
Deu 25:9 Then shall his brother’s wife come unto him in the presence of the elders, and loose his shoe from off his foot, and spit in his face, and shall answer and say, So shall it be done unto that man that will not build up his brother’s house.
Deu 25:9
Rth 4:7-9, “Now this was the manner in former time in Israel concerning redeeming and concerning changing, for to confirm all things; a man plucked off his shoe, and gave it to his neighbour : and this was a testimony in Israel. Therefore the kinsman said unto Boaz, Buy it for thee. So he drew off his shoe. And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all the people, Ye are witnesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech’s, and all that was Chilion’s and Mahlon’s, of the hand of Naomi.”
Deu 25:19 Therefore it shall be, when the LORD thy God hath given thee rest from all thine enemies round about, in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance to possess it, that thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it.
Deu 25:19
1Sa 15:3, “Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.”
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Of Bodily Punishments
v. 1. If there be a controversy between men, v. 2. And it shall be if the wicked man, v. 3. Forty stripes he may give him, and not exceed, v. 4. Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn.
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
EXPOSITION
LAWS RELATING TO CORPORAL PUNISHMENT, LEVIRATE MARRIAGES, AND WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.
Deu 25:1-3
The first and second verses should be read as one sentence, of which the protasis is in Deu 25:1 and the apodosis in Deu 25:2, thus: If there be a strife between men, and they come to judgment, and they (i.e. the judges) give judgment on them, and justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked, then it shall be, if the wicked deserve to be beaten (literally, be the son of blows), that the judge, etc. It is assumed that the judges shall pronounce just judgment, and apportion to the guilty party his due punishment; and then it is prescribed how that is to be inflicted. In the presence of the judge the man was to be cast down, and the adjudged number of blows were to be given him, not, however, exceeding forty, lest the man should be rendered contemptible in the eyes of the people, as if he were a mere slave or brute. This punishment was usually inflicted with a stick (Exo 21:10; 2Sa 7:14, etc.), as is still the case among the Arabs and Egyptians; sometimes also with thorns (Jdg 8:7, Jdg 8:16); sometimes with whips and scorpions, i.e. scourges of cord or leather armed with sharp points or hard knots (1Ki 12:11, 1Ki 12:14). Though the culprit was laid on the ground, it does not appear that the bastinado was used among the Jews as it is now among the Arabs; the back and shoulders were the parts of the body on which the blows fell (Pro 10:13; Pro 19:29; Pro 26:3; Isa 1:6). According to his fault, by a certain number; literally, according to the requirement of his crime in number; i.e. according as his crime deserved. The number was fixed at forty, probably because of the symbolical significance of that number as a measure of completeness. The rabbins fixed the number at thirty-nine, apparently in order that the danger of exceeding the number prescribed by the Law should be diminished (cf. 2Co 11:24); but another reason is assigned by Maimonides, viz. that, as the instrument of punishment was a scourge with three tails, each stroke counted for three, and thus they could not give forty, but only thirty-nine, unless they exceeded the forty (Maimon; ‘In Sanhedrin,’ 17.2).
Deu 25:4
The leaving the ox unmuzzled when treading out the corn was in order that the animal might be free to eat of the grains which its labor severed from the husks. This prohibition, therefore, was dictated by a regard to the rights and claims of animals employed in labor; but there is involved in it the general principle that all labor is to be duly requited, and hence it seems to have passed into a proverb, and was applied to men as well as the lower animals (cf. 1Co 9:9; 1Ti 5:18). The use of oxen to tread out the corn and the rule of leaving the animals so employed unmuzzled still prevail among the Arabs and other Eastern peoples.
Deu 25:5-10
Levirate marriages. If a man who was married died without issue, his surviving brother was required to marry the widow, so as to raise up a successor to the deceased, who should be his heir. The brother who refused this duty must be publicly disgraced. The design of this institutionwhich was not originated by Moses, but came down from early times (Gen 38:8), and is to be found amongst ether nations than the Jews, and that even in the present daywas to preserve a family from becoming extinct and to secure the property of a family from passing into the hands of a stranger. The notion that the usage “had its natural roots in the desire inherent in man who is born for immortality, and connected with the hitherto undeveloped belief in an eternal life, to secure a continued personal existence for himself and immortality for his name through the perpetuation of his family, and in the life of the son who took his place” (Keil), seems wholly fanciful.
Deu 25:5
Dwell together; i.e. not necessarily in the same house, but in the same community or place (cf. Gen 13:6; Gen 26:7). And have no child; literally, have no son; but this is rightly interpreted as meaning child (so the LXX.; Vulgate; Josephus, ‘Antiq.,’ 4.8, 23; Mat 22:25; Maimon; ‘In Jibbum.,’ 2.6-9); for, if the deceased left a daughter, the perpetuation of the family and the retention of the property might be secured through her (cf. Num 27:4, etc.).
Deu 25:6
Shall succeed in the name of his brother which is dead; literally, shall rise up on the name of his deceased brother; i.e. shall be enrolled in the family register as heir of the deceased, and shall perpetuate his name.
Deu 25:7-10
If the man refused to marry the widow of his deceased brother, he was free to do so; but the woman had her redress. She was to bring the matter before the eiders of the town, sitting as magistrates at the gate, and they were to summon the man and speak to him, and if he persisted in his refusal, the woman was to take his shoe from off his foot, and spit before his face, and say, So shall it be done unto that man that will not build up his brother’s house. The taking off of the shoe of the man by the woman was an act of indignity to him; it amounted to a declaration that he was not worthy to stand in his brother’s place, and was scornfully rejected by the woman herself. As the planting of the shod foot on a piece of property, or the casting of the shoe over a field, was emblematical of taking possession of it with satisfaction (Psa 60:8; Psa 108:9); and as the voluntary handing of one’s shoe to another betokened the giving up to that other of some property or right; so, contrariwise, the forcible removal from one of his shoe and the casting of it aside indicated contemptuous rejection of the owner, and repudiation of all his rights and claims in the matter. To walk barefooted was regarded by the Jews as ignominious and miserable (cf. Isa 20:2, Isa 20:4; 2Sa 15:30). The spitting before the face of the man ( in front of him) is by the Jewish interpreters understood of spitting on the ground in his presence. This seems to be what the words express (cf. Deu 4:37; Deu 7:24; Deu 11:25; Jos 10:8; Eze 10:8, for the rendering of ); and this, according to Oriental notions, would be insult enough (cf. Num 12:14; Isa 1:6; Niebuhr, ‘ Description de l’Arabie,’ 1.49).
Deu 25:11, Deu 25:12
But though the childless widow might thus approach and lay hold on the man, no license was thus granted to women to pass beyond the bounds of decency in their approaches to the other sex. Hence the prohibition in these verses. The severe sentence here prescribed was by the rabbins commuted into a fine of the value of the hand.
Deu 25:13-16
Rectitude and integrity in trade are here anew inculcated (cf. Le 19:35, etc.).
Deu 25:13
Diverse weights; literally, a stone and a stonea large one for buying, and a small one for selling (cf. Amo 8:5). Both weights and measures were to be “perfect,” i.e. exactly correct, and so just. (On the promise in Deu 25:15, see Deu 4:26; Deu 5:16.)
Deu 25:16
(Cf. Deu 22:5; Deu 23:12.) All that do unrighteously; equivalent to all that transgress any law.
Deu 25:17-19
Whilst in their intercourse with each other the law of love and brotherly kindness was to predominate, it was to be otherwise in regard to the enemies of God and his people. Them they were to overcome by force; wickedness was to be removed by the extinction of the wicked. Moses has already repeatedly reminded the Israelites that they had utterly to destroy the wicked nations of Canaan; and he here closes this discourse by reminding them that there was a nation outside of Canaan which was also doomed, and which they were to root out. This was Amalek, which had attacked the Israelites in their journey at Rephidim, and had taken advantage of their exhausted condition to harass their rear and destroy those who, faint and weary, had lagged behind. For this they had been already punished by the Israelites, who, led on by Joshua, had turned upon them and discomfited them with the edge of the sword. This, however, was not enough; Amalek was to be utterly destroyed, and this the Israelites were to effect as soon as the Lord had given them rest in the Promised Land. It was not, however, till the time of David that this was done.
Deu 25:18
And smote the hindmost of thee; literally, and tailed thee; i.e. cut off thy tail, or rear. The verb () occurs only here and in Jos 10:19. It is a denominative from , a tail, and, like many denominatives, both in the Hebrew and in other languages, it has the sense of taking away or cutting off the thing expressed by the noun from which it is formed, like the English verb to skin, for example.
HOMILETICS
Deu 25:1-3
Humanity to be respected in judicial inflictions.
This passage is an interesting illustration of the restraints which the Law of Moses puts on the Hebrews, as to the semi-barbarous customs of other nations. It is well known that punishment by bastinado was common among the ancient Egyptians. It would be not unnaturally adopted by the Hebrews. There are here three matters to be noticed.
1. Here is a principle to be recognized (Deu 25:1).
2. The punishment
(1) is to be inflicted in the presence of the judge, and
(2) is not to exceed forty stripes.
3. The reason given is very impressive, “lest thy brother should seem vile unto thee,” i.e. lest he should be so excessively punished as to be afterwards unfit for service, and lest he should be the common butt of any one who chose to dishonor him. Human nature is to be respected, even in carrying out legal sentences on crime. Trapp says, “The Turks, when cruelly lashed, are compelled to return to the judge that commanded it, to kiss his hand, to give him thanks, and to pay the officer that whipped them!
I. The sight of a human being coming under the sentence of criminal law is matter for intense sadness.
II. The punishment to be inflicted on him should be such in matter and degree as to assert right principle, but not such as needlessly to dishonor him. For
III. Humanity, in spite of crime, has dignity about it still. Sin and the sinner are not inseparable. God can kill one and save the other!
IV. With a view to a criminal’s salvation, whatever of honor remains in his nature should be carefully guarded and tenderly appealed to.
Deu 25:4
Laborers to live by their labor.
The use of this verse by the apostle has brought it out of an obscurity to which it might have been relegated. It is quoted by Paul in 1Co 9:10, and is there applied by him as an illustration in the ancient Law of Moses of the same principle which our Lord affirmed when he appointed that “they that preach the gospel should live of the gospel” (see Mat 10:9, Mat 10:10). We can scarcely go so far as John Calvin in reference to Paul’s allusion to it. He says that Paul here says, God does not care for oxen! Surely his meaning is simply that it was not merely from his care for oxen that God commanded Moses to pen such a precept, but that there was a common care of God for all his creatures, and that if he cared thus for the less, it was very certain he would care even more for the greater. Labor, moreover, is to be like all native growthsit is to have “its seed within itself.” All who employ laborers are to see that their workmen are sufficiently well paid to enable them to live by their labor. Any one desiring to develop this truth in relation to spiritual toil would naturally rather take the New Testament texts referred to above. Keeping, therefore, simply to the earthly sphere, we remark:
1. No precept in this book which is connected with duty or character is too trivial to be “worthy of God.”
2. An apparently small command may wrap up in it a great principle.
3. True benevolence will be kind and thoughtful to the humblest laborer even in minute detail.
4. God does not allow any one selfishly to monopolize the fruits of another’s labor without giving the toiler adequate compensation for his toil.
5. The Great Defender of the rights of the working classes isGod!
6. It is a divinely appointed ordinance forever that the power of toil is to be a means of self-support; that labor shall bring wealth to the laborer. Here is a blow struck at slavery.
Deu 25:5-10
Family honor to be maintained.
This law supposes a state of society and a kind of public opinion which does not now exist, and in detail it is therefore obsolete. But the principle it involves is clear, viz. that in married life the honor of the family on both sides is an object of mutual interest and concern, not only during the events of life, but also in case of arrangements at and after death.
Deu 25:11, Deu 25:12
An offending hand.
This maybe compared with Mat 5:30.
1. Any member of the body may become an instrument of sin.
2. Where there is in any case special danger there should a special watch be kept.
3. Favorite, yet sinful lusts must be crucified, whatever the cost may be.
Deu 25:13-16
Righteousness in trade imperative.
This paragraph requires no preparatory elucidation. The topic for a Homily which it gives is one of the most important in the range of human ethics. It furnishes six lines of thought.
1. In the providence of God men are thrown together for the purposes of trade.
2. Opportunity is thus furnished for the exercise of right principles of mutual justice and equity.
3. There is often given an opportunity also of taking advantage of others by unequal weights and measures.
4. God requires of us absolute justice to others, always and everywhere.
5. No false maxims of men, such as “business is business,” can ever exonerate us from obligations to justice.
6. Our duty to man in this respect is enforced by a double argument.
(1) The neglect of it is an abomination to God (Deu 25:16).
(2) The observance of it will tend to long life, prosperity, and peace (Deu 25:15).
Deu 25:17-19
Kindness to enemies is not to degenerate into sympathy with or indifference to ungodliness.
God is kind. God is terrible. When he riseth up against sin to punish it openly, whowho can stand? The repeated injunctions in this book, of kindness to enemies, the prohibitions against private revenge, etc; should effectually guard any against attributing to Moses any incitement of the people to revengeful retaliation. He utters a prophecy, as a prophet. In Exo 17:16, the LXX. read, , …% “by an unseen hand the Lord will war against Amalek.” In Num 24:20, Balaam foretells Amalek’s doom. In 1Sa 15:1-35; the execution of judgment on Amalek is recorded; and thus is the meaning of our present paragraph explained.
Note:
1. It is a very dangerous thing for a nation to harass or injure the people of God.
2. Such a nation may seem to prosper a while, but judgment is “laid up in store.”
3. The retribution will come sooner or later in God’s wonder-working providence. “Their fees shall slide in due time.”
4. Whatever sympathy we may rightly feel for individual sufferers, the fact that God will ultimately avenge his people’s wrongs may fill us with grateful joy.
HOMILIES BY J. ORR
Deu 25:1-3
The bastinado.
Professor W. R. Smith regards this law of stripes as indicating a late date for Deuteronomy. He argues from the customs of the free Bedouins. But it is perilous to reason from the customs of the Bedouins to the punishments in vogue among a people who had lived some centuries in Egypt, where, as is well-known, the bastinado was in constant use. The sculptures at Beni-Hassan represent the very scene here described. We learn
I. THAT IT IS THE FUNCTION OF CIVIL MAGISTRATES TO PUNISH CRIME. (Verses 1, 2.) They bear the sword for this purpose (Rom 14:4; 1Pe 2:14). The modern humanitarian spirit tends to exalt the reformatory and preventive ends of punishment, at the expense of the retributive. That every effort should be put forth for the reformation of the criminal which the case admits of, we cordially allow. But the danger is, in these matters, that sentiment degenerate into sentimentalism. Crime deserves punishment, and on that ground alone, were there no other, ought to receive it. No theory can be satisfactory which loses sight of retribution, and makes reformation and prevention the all in all.
II. THAT PENALTIES OUGHT TO BE SUFFICIENTLY SEVERE. (Verse 2.) To be effective in early stages of civilization, penalties must be severe, prompt, and specific enough to be vividly conceived (cf. H. Spencer’s ‘Essays:’ ‘Prison Ethics’). The progress of society admits of the substitution of punishments appealing to a higher class of sensibilities. But even these ought adequately to express the measure of the criminal’s desert. If Mr. Spencer were right, the slightest restraint compatible with the safety of the community, combined with compulsory self-support, would be punishment sufficient for the greatest crimes. The sense of justice in mankind rejects such ideas. Carlyle’s teaching in ‘Model Prisons’ is healthier than this.
III. THAT PENALTIES OUGHT TO BE MEASURED. (Verse 3.) It is difficult to believe that in our own country, at the beginning of this century, the theft of five shillings from the person was a crime punishable by death. Yet the statute-book bristled with enactments, of which, unhappily, this was not the worst. Such outrageous disproportion between crime and punishment must have robbed the law’s sentences of most of their moral effect. Anomalies exist still, which it would be to any statesman’s credit to endeavor to remove.
IV. THAT PENALTIES SHOULD NOT BE UNDULY DEGRADING, (Vet, 3.) Lest “thy brother should seem vile unto thee.” The effect of excessive severity is to harden, degrade, dehumanize. It often drives the criminal to desperation. As a victim of the older criminal code expressed it, “A man’s heart is taken from him, and there is given to him the heart of a beast.” The tendency in modern feeling is toward the abolition of corporal punishments entirely, as degrading alike to him who administers them, and to those by whom they are endured.
Observe:
1. The profound idea on which the law rested. The body, part of human nature, and sharing its dignity as made in God’s image.
2. The best laws may be unjustly and cruelly administered (2Co 11:24, 2Co 11:25).J.O.
Deu 25:4
The oxen.
The apostle draws from this passage the general principle that the laborer is entitled to eat of the fruits of his labor (1Co 9:9, 1Co 9:10). His application teaches us to look for similar general principles wrapped up in other precepts of the Law. We learn
I. ANIMALS ARE ENTITLED TO GENEROUS TREATMENT. The ox that trod out the corn was not to be muzzled. He was to be permitted to eat of the fruits of his work. Kindness to animals is a duty:
1. Which man owes to the creatures. Severe moralists, arguing that animals, being destitute of reason, are also destitute of rights, would bring all man’s duties towards them under the head of duties to himself (e.g. Kant). Alford thinks this to be implied in Paul’s language. But Paul’s argument, if it is to be pressed in this connection, rather implies the contrary. It recognizes in the ox, on the ground of its being a laborer, a kind of right to be provided for. All that the apostle affirms is that the precept had an end beyond the reference to oxen, that the “care for oxen” was subordinate to the inculcation of a principle of general application. Our duty to the creatures rests on the ground that they are sentient beings, capable of pain and pleasure, and on the law of love, which requires us to diffuse happiness, and avoid inflicting needless suffering.
2. Which man owes to himself. For this view, while not the whole of the truth, is an important part of it. Leibnitz, in a small treatise written for the education of a prince, advised that, during youth, he should not be permitted to torment or give pain to any living thing, lest, by indulging the spirit of cruelty, he should contract a want of feeling for his fellow-men. Alford says, “The good done to a man’s immortal spirit by acts of humanity and justice infinitely outweighs the mere physical comfort of a brute which perishes.”
II. THE HUMAN LABORER IS ENTITLED TO SHARE IN THE PROFITS OF HIS LABORS. Theoretically, he does so every time he is paid wages. In the distribution of the fruits of production, the part which the laborer gets, we are told, is wages, the share of the landowner is rent, that of the capitalist is interest, and the Government takes taxes. Practically, however, wages are settled, not by abstract rules of fairness, but by competition, which may press so hard upon the laborer as (till things right themselves) to deprive him of his fair proportion of industrial profits. The wage system is far from working satisfactorily. As society advances, it appears to be leading to an increasing amount of bitterness and friction. Masters and men represent opposing interests, and stand, as it were, at daggers drawn. It is easier to see the evil than to devise a cure. Economists (Mill, Jevons, etc.) seem to look mainly in the direction of some form of co-operation. Their schemes are principally two;
1. Industrial co-operation.
2. Industrial partnershipsthe system according to which a fixed proportion of profits is assigned for division amongst the workmen engaged in production.
III. MINISTERS OF THE GOSPEL ARE ENTITLED TO BE SUPPORTED BY THEIR FLOCKS. This is the application made by Paul (1Co 9:1-27.; cf. Mat 10:10-12; Gal 6:6). Christian ministers, laboring in spiritual things, and by that work withdrawn from ordinary avocations, are to be cheerfully supported. The text applies to this case more strictly than to the case of workmen claiming to participate in profits. The workman claims but his own. The right of the minister to support is of a different kind. He labors in things spiritual, but, it is to be hoped, with a higher end than the mere obtaining of a livelihood. While, therefore, his support is a duty, it is, like duties of benevolence generally, not one that can be enforced by positive law. The right to support is a moral, not a legal one. It creates an obligation, but, as moralists say, an indeterminate obligation. It is an obligation to be freely accepted, and as freely discharged.J.O.
Deu 25:5-10
The levitate law.
At the root of this law, which obtained widely in the East, we find ideas and feelings such as these
I. RESPECT FOR THE HONOR OF THE FAMILY. In the East, as is well known, childlessness is reckoned a calamity, almost a disgrace. Hence, as well as for other reasons, the severity of the law in Deu 25:11. Hence also this custom of marrying a brother’s widow, in order to raise up seed to the brother. The motive is plainly to avert disgrace from a brother’s house, to wipe out his reproach, to hand down his name in honor. We may respect the feeling while repudiating the form in which it embodied itself. What touches the credit of our families ought to be felt to concern ourselves. Not in the sense, certainly, of leading us to uphold that credit at the expense of truth and of justice to others; but in the sense of doing everything we can with a good conscience to maintain or redeem it.
II. DESIRE FOR A PERPETUATED NAME. The men of the old dispensation, as Matthew Henry says, not having so clear and certain a prospect of living themselves on the other side death as we have now, were the more anxious to live in their posterity. The principle is the same at bottom as that which leads us to wish for personal immortality. What man desires is perpetuated existence, of which existence in one’s posterity is a kind of shadow, affording, in contemplation, a like “shadow of satisfaction” to the mind. Positivism, in falling back from a personal to a corporate immortality, is thus a movement in the wrong direction. The exchange it proposes is the substance for the shadow. The desire to exist in the remembrance of posterity, and to be well thought of by them, is, however, a legitimate principle of action. It should operate in leading us to live good and useful lives, which is the secret of the only lasting honor.
“Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet and blossom in the dust.”
III. THE DISGRACE ATTACHING TO REFUSAL OF THE DUTIES IMPOSED ON US BY RELATIONSHIP TO THE DEAD. The disgrace in this case was emphatically marked (verses 9, 10). The wishes of the dead should be very sacred to us. The duties which spring from the bond of relationship, or from express request, should, if possible, be faithfully discharged. Aiding in the settlement of affairs, seeing provision made for a widow and children, accepting and fulfilling trusts, etc.J.O.
Deu 25:13-16
Morality in trade.
The Hebrew lawgiver lays just stress on honesty in weights and measures. The general principle is that of honesty in trade. Weights and measures connect themselves intimately with the ideas of justice, rectitude, impartiality. Justice is represented by a figure with scales and weights. Falsification of weights and measures is thus a representative sin, one which corrupts integrity in man with peculiar and fatal rapidity.
I. AN INJUNCTION MUCH NEEDED. Trade morality is at present at a low ebb. Mixed up with the thousands of honest transactions which no doubt take place every day, there must be admitted to be an enormous number which are more or less fraudulent. “On the average,” says Mr. Spencer, “men who deal in bales and tons differ but little in morality from men who deal in yards and pounds. Illicit practices of every form and shade, from venial deception up to all but direct theft, may be brought home to the higher grades of the commercial world. Tricks innumerable, lies acted or uttered, elaborately devised frauds, are prevalentmany of them established as ‘customs of the trade;’ nay, not only established, but defended” (‘Essays,’ vol. 2; ‘Morals of Trade;’ cf. Smiles on ‘Duty,’ Deu 3:1-29.). The saddest feature in the outlook is the apparent prevalence of the feeling that trickery of this kind is absolutely essential to successthat a man can’t get on without it.
II. AN INJUNCTION WHICH OUGHT TO BE ENFORCED. But how? By a fearless exposure of dishonesties, and by a loud and firm demand on the part of every upright member of society for honest and truthful dealing. Only if the dishonest are a majority in societya majority of overwhelming numberscan they ultimately prevail against the honest. A determined combination on the part of persons of integrity would suffice to put them down. The man known to be honest should be supported, even at some pecuniary sacrifice. Custom should be unflinchingly withdrawn from men detected in tricks, and the stamp of public reprobation placed on such men and their doings. Means should be taken to diffuse information as to the arts and frauds by which dishonesty sustains itself. The causes of these dishonesties need also to be looked intochiefly, according to Spencer, the indiscriminate respect paid to wealth. Love of the honor and position which wealth givesthe certainty of being looked up to, courted in society, applauded for success, with few questions asked,this is the tap-root of the evil, and it is to be cured by distinguishing between wealth and character, and by honoring the former only when in alliance with the latter.
III. AN INJUNCTION WHICH IT IS EVERY ONE‘S INTEREST TO ENFORCE. Trade dishonesty should, if possible, be checked:
1. In view of its inherent immorality. Nothing can be more despicable, more mean and disgraceful, than the lies, frauds, briberies, malpractices, adulterations, which, if the witnesses are to be trusted, abound in all branches of trade. These things are a blot on our country, the shame of which touches all.
2. In view of its corrupting effect on morals generally. Its influence spreads beyond itself. It saps principle, eats out faith in virtue, unfits the individual for every moral task.
3. In view of its effects on national prosperity. These are ruinous. God’s displeasure rests on the nation, and he is certain to chastise it. But the sorest whip he uses to chastise it is the scourge of its own follies. Our dishonesties lose us (are actually losing us) our markets; lower us in the eyes of foreign nations; destroy credit; engender a spirit of general distrust; still worse, by undermining principle, they destroy the power of steady application to work, and increasingly substitute the motives of the gambler for those of the merchant content with lawful gains. The inevitable end is impoverishment and disgrace.
4. As a measure of self-protection. Each individual suffers as part of the whole. He is frequently cheated, sometimes incurs serious losses. Hard-earned money finds its way into the pockets of clever but unscrupulous scoundrels, who as rapidly squander it in reckless living.J.O.
Deu 25:17-19
Amalek.
Moses, in calling the sin of Amalek to remembrance, and enjoining destruction of that people, was not speaking “of himself.” He but declared the will of God, long before announced, and solemnly recorded in a book (Exo 17:14). It was not “after the spirit or mission of the Law,” as has been well remarked, “to and at overcoming inveterate opposition by love and by attempts at conversion. The Law taught God’s hatred of sin and of rebellion against him by enjoining the extinction of the obstinate sinner” (‘Speaker’s Commentary’). The lessons from the command are these
I. GOD KEEPS IN REMEMBRANCE INJURIES DONE TO HIS CHURCH AND PEOPLE. (Deu 25:17.)
II. GOD SPECIALLY REMEMBERS INJURIES TO THE FEEBLE AND AFFLICTED. (Deu 25:18.) The “fear of God,” if nothing else, ought to restrain inhumanities. “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” (Act 9:4).
III. WRONGS TO THE CHURCH OF GOD WILL NOT PASS UNAVENGED. (Deu 25:19.) Repentance, as in Paul’s case, may reverse the sentence. If the sinner is obstinate, the doom will fall as certainly as in the case of Amalek (2Th2Th 1:9).J.O.
HOMILIES BY D. DAVIES
Deu 25:1-3
Earthly magistracy an argument for the heavenly.
It is not conceivable that God should have taken such pains, through Moses, to secure pure administration of justice in earthly courts, unless he had established a like court of judicature in heaven. So far as the will of God is embodied in the judicial procedure on earth, it is copied from the pattern of heavenly things.
I. A JUDICIAL COURT IS CREATED FOR THE DISCRIMINATION OF HUMAN CHARACTER. The purpose of all examination and testimony is to separate the evil from the goodto bring to light the righteousness and the wickedness of men. Justice delights more in vindicating and commending the righteous than in censuring and condemning the wicked. Justice found a nobler occupation in marshalling Mordecai through the city, and proclaiming his innocence, than in erecting the gallows for the execution of Haman. Human judges, however, can discern only what is palpable and conspicuous. They have not an organ of insight delicate enough to detect the lesser excellences and blemishes; nor can they penetrate into the interior nature of man. These institutions are only the shadows of heavenly things. But every man stands before the tribunal of a higher Judge, where not only actions, but motives, intentions, and feelings, are examined and weighed. Here, without the possibility of mistake, the righteous are justified, the wicked are condemned. Discrimination is perfect: separation will be complete.
II. A JUDICIAL COURT IS ORDAINED FOR THE PUNISHMENT OF EVIL DEEDS.
1. The true punishment is measured by the scale of demerit. It is enjoined to be “according to his fault.” In God’s sagacious judgment, every degree of blameworthiness is noted. Nothing appertaining to moral conduct is beneath the notice of God’s eye. We value far too little moral qualities. As we grow like God, we shall gain in that penetrative power which discerns the beauty of goodness and the blackness of iniquity.
2. Punishment is a loss of manliness. “The judge shall cause him to lie down.” His dignity shall be prostrate. Sin robs us of manliness, but the loss does not come into public view until punishment follows. To be righteous throughout is to be a man.
3. Punishment is to be public. The culprit is “to be beaten before the judge’s face.” This publicity is part of the penalty. It is summaryto be inflicted at once. And publicity is also a safeguard against cruelty and against excess. So God invites public recognition and public approval of his doings. The ransomed universe shall unite in the testimony, “Just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints.”
III. A JUDICIAL COURT REVEALS THE VALUE OF A HUMAN LIFE. The penalties were to be moderate, “lest thy brother should seem vile unto thee.” The first ends of punishment are the reformation and improvement of the offender. If it is possible to teach the culprit the value of himself, and inspire him with a hatred of sin, we have done him unspeakable good. We do not spend so much in cutting and polishing a common stone as we do a ruby or a sapphire. Let our treatment of men be as if we esteemed them the jewels of God.D.
Deu 25:4
Doing good inseparable from getting good.
Active exercise of our powers is a primary condition of getting good. Real service for others is destined to gain reward.
I. SERVICE CAN BE RENDERED TO MAN BY VERY INFERIOR NATURES. The whole animate creation waits upon man. Every living thing upon the earth is a servant and a lackey for men. He is a king here; and, if he have sufficient wisdom, he can rule all for his own advantage. Yet, in a higher sphere, man is only a servant. He who is served by all inferior beings is called to serve the Highest Being. The disparity between God and man is a disparity immeasurable; and yet God permits, yea, encourages, our intelligent and willing service. Inferior as we are to him, we can render efficient service to his kingdom and glory. This is man’s truest honor.
II. SERVICE CONTRIBUTES TO PROVIDE AN ABUNDANT BANQUET. The labor of the oxen prepared the corn for men. So gross is our ignorance of the lower creation, that we do not perceive our indebtedness to the birds and insects, which play so useful a part in the preparation of our food. All well-directed service contributes something to the substantial advantage of man. There is a banquet of intellectual food, or a banquet for the aesthetic taste, or a banquet for the soul, resulting. Active labor serves both to create an appetite and to furnish a table.
III. SERVICE HAS CLAIMS UPON OUR GENEROUS RECOMPENSE. It would be nothing else than selfish cruelty to deny to the oxen a share in the result of their labor. Thus God cares for the oxen. Thus he cares for all the works of his hands. And does his kindly care for the inferior beasts diminish his tender regard for men? It immeasurably enhances it! Whoever or whatever does us useful service brings us under obligation. To the extent of our power we are bound to recompense such. This sense of indebtedness is a channel of blessing to the soul. The richest man is he who is the most generous. A muzzle is a shackle forged by wanton selfishness.D.
Deu 25:13-16
Religion inspires commercial life.
It is certain that God displays the liveliest interest in every department of human life. He is not only the God of the hills; he is God of the valleys also. He takes cognizance, not only of great things, but also of small. Can any man tell us what are small things? Not only on the portal of every church, but on the forefront of every shopay, on the beam of every balance, we ought to see the inscription, “To the glory of God alone!”
I. RELIGION CLAIMS A THRONE IN EVERY SHOP. True religion is the sunny smile from God’s eye, and, as the common light of day penetrates into every nook and cranny of nature, so the light of God’s love pierces into every interest of human life. It is not a romantic something which has merely to do with the region of existence beyond the grave; it is the life of cur present lifethe secret spring of every duty. Ordinary trade is a splendid field for the practical exercise of religious virtues, because the commercial activities of the age afford large facilities either for fidelity or for fraud. In every office and warehouse religion claims to set up her throne. In the smallest act of buying and selling she insists on having a voice.
II. RELIGION GOES TO THE ROOT OF THINGSDETERMINES THE STANDARDS OF HUMAN ACTION. If the weight or measure be false, then every transaction will be false. Ingenious wickedness had invented two sets of standardsan over-large one for the man as buyer, an under-size for the same man as seller. This course of vile procedure carried the villainy into every item of the man’s mercantile life. It is of the first importance that we set up fight standards. The Pharisee in the temple was a perfect man, according to his standard. The rich young man who came to Jesus Christ for counsel was blameless, according to his standard. Men are prone to set up conventional standards, and measure themselves and every one else according to their rule. Take heed that your standard is God‘s standard, “a perfect and just measure.”
III. RELIGION IS BOTH DESTRUCTIVE AND CONSTRUCTIVE. “Thou shalt not have this; thou shalt have that.” It first pulls down, then builds up. It first uproots, then plants. “Mortify your members, then add to your virtues.” The old must be destroyed; the new must be sown and nursed. In our self-culture and in our training of others, it is not enough that we are repressive and prohibitive; the new growths will often cast off effete and injurious matter. Prune away barren boughs; encourage the development of the fruitful wood.
IV. RELIGION BRINGS COLLATERAL GAINS IN THIS LIFE. Her main reward is in the future, viz. possession of the Divine image; nevertheless, she confers many solid favors here and now. Real pleasure is her daily gift, and “length of days” is her special prize. “The wicked shall not live out half their days”they die prematurely. Nor is long life on earth to be despised. There are, doubtless, moral advantages and gains obtainable in this life, which are not obtainable in the life to come. Many of the means of discipline and pruning and reformation will end with this life. We are placed here for probation; and (if well-used) long school-life is an advantage unspeakable. To be esteemed by God as “the apple of his eye” is better than an earthly coronet. To be regarded by him as “abomination” is “concentrated curse.”D.
Deu 25:17-19
Cowardice and cruelty avenged.
The feeling of resentment must be classed “low” among the moral sentiments. But this command to remember and to avenge the conduct of Amalek is not resentment. Abundant time was allowed the Amalekites to abandon evil ways and to cultivate friendly relations with Israel. But they continued, century after century, godless and hostile: hence their extinction.
I. ATHEISM BREEDS IS MEN BOTH CRUELTY AND COWARDICE. Against Amalek the gravest charge is, “he feared not God.” This is the root of all his wickednessthe source of his base hostility to Israel. Practical atheism is the prolific parent of hateful vices. There was not a trait of nobleness in Amalek’s conduct. It was cowardly and cruel. He attacked Israel in the rear”smote the hindmost” stragglersfell upon those already half-dead from fatigue. For a moment he gloried in the inglorious massacre, but only for a moment. The prayer of one man was more than a match for Amalek. In every age it is found that he “who fears not God” has no “regard for man.” The influence of a bad man is perilously contagious. The whole tribe is embraced under the character of one man.
II. CRUEL TREATMENT LEAVES AN INDELIBLE IMPRESSION UPON THE MIND. Human nature is so constituted that a wrong done to us or to our fathers is held tenaciously in the memory, and provokes all the feelings to avenge the deed. Herein the Word of God is in accord with our mental nature. Human nature says, “Remember!” The Scripture says, “Remember!” “Thou shalt not forget it.” Incidentally, we have here a proof that the Creator of the human mind is also the Author of Scripture. Injustice rouses up all the moral forces in the universe to inflict a fitting retribution; and very often God employs as his ministers of vengeance the victims of former oppression. The increase, the strength, the organization of Israel were to be employed early upon this end, viz. to extinguish Amalek.
III. INHERITANCE FROM GOD CARRIES WITH IT AN OBLIGATION TO DO HIS WILL. Rest is given to prepare for more difficult service. “When the Lord thy God hath given thee rest thou shalt blot out Amalek.” God never gives to men any inheritance for exclusive selfish enjoyment. If we are not disposed for service, and even for warfare, the only consistent course is to decline God’s gifts. He has plainly made known to men the conditions of his bequests. Before Israel possessed the Promised Land it was clearly revealed what was expected from the occupants of that inheritance. Nor is the inheritance of heaven a state of indolent repose. The voice that says, “Enter into joy,” says also, “Be thou ruler.” We read of disputes between Michael and the adversary. Who shall say that God will not employ his ransomed ones to put down rebellion in some outlying province?D.
HOMILIES BY R.M. EDGAR
Deu 25:1-3
Corporal punishment.
We have here directions given for the punishment of criminals. As the Hebrews had no gaol system, a properly graduated corporal punishment supplied most effectively its place. Moses here directs the judges to look carefully into the case, and to assign a certain number of stripes, which are never to exceed forty, the chastisement being given in the presence of the judge. Thus the largest measure of equity was introduced into their penal system.
I. RETRIBUTION OF SOME KIND IS CONSONANT WITH OUR IDEAS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS. To be allowed to sin with impunity would be, we all feel, an immoral regulation under any government, and especially immoral under a theocracy. Punishment for sin is demanded by the human conscience. All quarrel with retribution as such argues a want of conscientiousness.
II. BUT RETRIBUTION SHOULD BE PROPORTIONAL TO SIN. This is what the law before us secured. The stripes were to be few or many, according to the crime, but never to exceed forty. The judgment was to be righteous and equitable all through.
III. WE LOOK INSTINCTIVELY FOR THE SAME EQUITY UNDER THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD. And this is exactly what we have. And here let us observe
1. Sin is not allowed to go unpunished under God‘s government. It has been very confidently asserted that, if people are penitent, no atonement is needed to secure pardon. But, supposing penitence a possible experience apart from the spectacle of a pierced and atoning Savior (Zec 12:10), should we not have “sin with impunity” under the reputedly just government of God? Those who glibly talk of penitence being all that is required, have formed no broad or consistent notion of the necessities of government. Now, the Divine arrangement has been to lay the “stripes” we deserve upon his willing Son. “With his stripes we are healed” (Isa 53:5). The sin is punished in the person of a sinless and most willing Substitute, and the demands of justice met. We may be sure that, as the Father presided at the punishment, no more was laid on Jesus than the demands of simple justice and the exigencies of the government required. And
2. Unpardoned because impenitent sinners shall have their punishment graduated according to the strictest justice. It has been asserted that punishment without end would be excessive for the sins of a short life on earth. But it is forgotten that “everlasting punishment” is the shadow simply of “everlasting sin.” The latter, alas! is possible through the freedom of the creature; and as sin continues, so must punishment. At the same time, the graduation of punishment in the other world will be as accurate and as careful as the corporal punishment under the Law of Moses. In fact, it is this idea of stripes our Lord employs to express the truth. “And that servant which knew his lord’s will, and made not ready, nor did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes; but he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. And to whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required; and to whom they commit much, of him will they ask the more” (Luk 12:47, Luk 12:48, Revised Version). It is thus clearly seen that the utmost care will be taken to graduate the penalties in the hereafter, so that no one shall have the least ground of complaint. The vulgar revolt against the everlasting punishment revealed in Scripture is due to the idea that the criminals are thrown pell-mell together and punished in the lump. With far greater care, however, shall each impenitent one have his penalties meted out to him than prisoners have under the most conscientious judges.
IV. INSTEAD OF BANDYING ABOUT ARGUMENTS IN FAVOR OF RELIEF UNDER PUNISHMENT, IT WOULD BE KINDER FOR CONTROVERSIALISTS TO INDUCE MEN THROUGH FAITH IN JESUS CHRIST TO ACCEPT OF PARDON AND SO ESCAPE PENALTY. The spectacle at present is a sad one. Writers are pursuing the phantom of remission of sins and of punishment in the other life, as a new gospel for sinners, instead of urging their fellows to flee at once to Jesus, the only Refuge. This much is certain, “Him that cometh unto me,” says Christ, “I will in no wise cast out.” Upon such a promise any soul may repose. But the uncertainty of speculation is proverbial, and can never be the sheet-anchor of any sane soul. Let men come to Jesus, and the question of punishment, so far as they are concerned, is settled forever.
Punishment gives way to pardon; while at the same time, it is felt that the sin has not gone unpunished.R.M.E.
Deu 25:4
The rights of labor.
The threshing in the East is done by oxen in many cases still, though horses, where procurable, are found more serviceable. While the animals were engaged in their weary round, they were never muzzled, but allowed to eat of the corn they were treading out. It would appear, indeed, that it was the straw simply that they were to receive, and the corn was to be reserved for the men, their masters. But the idea manifestly was the right of the patient animal to a share of the corn he was helping to thresh. It suggests the large subject of the rights of labor. Into this, of course, we cannot enter at any length. But we may observe
I. THAT CO–OPERATION IN WORK HAS A RIGHT TO A SHARE IN ITS WAGES. This is recognized in the Mosaic Law regarding the lower animals, and the argument is cumulative with regard to man. “The laborer is worthy of his hire,” said our Lord. “The workman is worthy of his meat” (Luk 10:7; Mat 10:10).
II. THE SHARE SHOULD BE SUFFICIENT TO SUSTAIN LIFE. The ox was expected to pick up on his rounds as much as would keep up his strength for labor. And in the same way, the wages of a laborer should be sufficient to sustain him in the position he occupies in society. The economic laws about the “wages’ fund” are not so inexorable as to prevent such a plain principle being evermore kept in view. There is a heartlessness attributed to the laws of wealth that belongs to the capitalists themselves.
III. THERE SHOULD BE SYMPATHY BETWEEN EMPLOYER AND EMPLOYED. The very oxen occupy a position where sympathy must obtain between them and their keepers, if the work is to be properly performed. How much more must this obtain when the workers are our fellow-men! The late Sir Arthur Helps, in one of his early and anonymous volumes entitled, ‘The Claims of Labor,’ refers frequently to this. “You must not be surprised,” he says to the employer, “at the ingratitude of those to whom you have given nothing but money.” “Fortunately,” he says in another place, “the proneness of men to regard with favor those put in authority over them is very strong; and I have little fear of finding any large body of thoughtful and kind masters suffering from permanent indifference or ingratitude on the part of their dependents.” Sympathy between masters and men is more important even than adequate wages.
IV. BOTH JESUS AND PAUL APPLY THE PRINCIPLE TO MINISTERIAL SUPPORT. In the passage already noticed our Lord does so (Mat 10:9-11; Luk 10:7). Paul also, in 1Ti 5:17, 1Ti 5:18, makes use of it, referring both to the passage before us in Deuteronomy and also to our Lord’s deliverance. In placing the ministry upon the same ground as other workers, it is clear that it is to be no exception to the rule of proportional reward. Of course, it is not supported as other and meaner occupations are. Every other occupation is beneath it in dignity, but every other almost is above it in reward. Its rights must be advocated; its claims are valid, and men deny them at their peril.R.M.E.
Deu 25:5-10
The rights of the firstborn.
We have already observed that the firstborn had a right to a double share of the family inheritance (Deu 21:17). We have before us another of his rightsa seed was to be raised up unto him by his younger brothers, that his name should not be put out in Israel. In a peasant proprietary such as existed in Palestine, we can easily understand the importance of such a regulation. It was, moreover, esteemed a most disgraceful act to refuse to raise up seed unto a dead brother, and the man guilty of it had to suffer the indignity of being spat upon, and of having his shoe contemptuously loosed.
Now, there can be no question that Jesus Christ occupies the position of Eldest Brother in the family of God. Not only was it declared prophetically, “I will make him my Firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth” (Psa 89:27), but he is expressly called “the Firstborn from the dead,” “the Firstborn among many brethren,” and “the Firstborn of every creature” (Col 1:18; Rom 8:29; Col 1:15). Undoubtedly, then, the rights guaranteed by Jewish Law to the firstborn were intended to illustrate the rights of Jesus Christ.
I. JESUS CHRIST, LIKE THE DEAD FIRSTBORN, HAS TO DEPEND ON OTHERS FOR A SPIRITUAL SEED. For in the nature of things it would have been incongruous for Incarnate God to have entered into marriage with any daughter of Adam, and to have become physically a father. His condescension was surely great enough in becoming man at all, and it could not be expected that he would enter into still closer relations to the race. None ever stood in the relation to physical children of Jesus Christ; it would have made a confusion in the contemplated spiritual relationship. Hence our Lord bad to look to others to raise him up a seed.
II. IT LIFTS THE FAMILY RELATION INTO THE HOLIEST LIGHT TO THINK THAT WE MAY BE RAISING UP A SPIRITUAL SEED FOR JESUS. How holy all marriage relations become when it is felt to be possible to be providing the Great Elder Brother with a spiritual seed! The children sent of God are then regarded as Christ’s; we dedicate them to him in prayer, and perhaps also in baptism; we handle them and rear them as consecrated things; we train them up in his nurture and admonition, and we feel honored in having any part in the formation of “the mighty family.”
III. IT LIFTS THE PASTORAL AS WELL AS PARENTAL RELATION INTO THE HOLIEST LIGHT. In Weemse’s book on the ‘Ceremonial Laws of Moses,’ where “the privileges of the firstborn” are so fully discussed, the application is made to preachers rather than to parents. But we think that parents should feel the elevation of spirit and life which the idea of raising up a seed for Jesus is fitted to impart. And if parents should feel it, much more should pastors. We are meant to be the “spiritual fathers” of men. We have exceptional advantages in prosecuting the holy work. Oh, how glorious it is to think of adding by our faithful labors to the great family of God! It is the Name and honor of Jesus which we should seek to perpetuate by our pastoral labors. And so our aim is to have men born again through the incorruptible seed, the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever (1Pe 1:23).
IV. ANY REFUSAL TO RAISE UP A SEED FOR JESUS WILL BE VISITED BY GOD IN DUE SEASON WITH DIRE DISGRACE. For the spitting in the face and the unloosing of the shoe are but symbols of the dire disgrace which shall overtake all who will not engage in this holy work. It is a work for Church members as well as for ministers. It lies as a responsibility upon every one that names the Name of Jesus, and is a younger brother or sister in the family of God. Woe be to the person who is indifferent to this!
And surely it should stimulate us to remember that the great ambition of Jesus is to have “many brethren.” The mightier the multitude of redeemed ones the better. The glory and honor of Immanuel shall thus be the more thoroughly secured. He has no desire to be the solitary and selfish heir; but the whole plan of redemption is to have as many as possible “joint-heirs” with him. As families and as Churches grow in numbers and in loyalty to Jesus, his rights as Firstborn are being regarded and secured (Rom 8:17).
We cannot picture the dire disgrace which the refusal to secure the rights of Jesus Christ will entail. But the selfish souls will be the off scouring of all things; angels will despise them as having highest honor within reach, and not having the heart to accept it. Oh, let every one that has a word to speak and a kindness to perform in the Name of Jesus, do it in the holy hope of increasing the spiritual seed of the great and loving Elder Brother!R.M.E.
Deu 25:11-16
Honesty the best policy.
We have first a law of purity, which needs no exposition, but in its holy severity (Deu 25:11, Deu 25:12) was fitted to check all tendency to lewd practices among the women of Israel. Then Moses passes on to speak of the crime of having divers weights and measures, and the effort to make money by dishonest practices. No blessing from God can rest upon such willfully dishonest ones; if his blessing is to be experienced, it must be by a policy of honesty all round.
I. IT IS APPARENTLY EASY TO MAKE MONEY BY LIGHT WEIGHTS AND SHORT MEASURES. It is not only securing the ordinary profits, but gaining by the deficiency palmed off for the perfect measure. It is a gain by quantity as well as by price. And plenty of people who look only at the surface imagine that they can easily enrich themselves by a little dishonesty, which will never be detected. Inspectors of weights and measures are the embodiment of the suspicions of society.
II. IT IS A SYSTEM OF BUSINESS UPON WHICH NO DIVINE BLESSING CAN BE ASKED. NO better test of the propriety of our procedure can be found than this. Will it stand the test of prayer? Can God, the All-holy One, be expected to bless it? Now, his whole Word shows that such practices are abominations to him. The stars of heaven will at length fight against such a policy.
III. NO TEMPORARY SUCCESS CAN COMPENSATE FOR AN UNEASY CONSCIENCE. Suppose that success waited on dishonesty invariably and proved lasting, life would be made miserable by the uneasy conscience. Stifled for a time, it rises like the furies at last, and makes life a lasting misery. No man ever trifled with conscience anal did not suffer for it. Success becomes in such a case but a whited sepulcher; the experience within is but the rottenness of the tomb.
IV. HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY FOR PERSONAL PEACE AND FOR DIVINE BLESSING. We say that no man should so far outrage his conscience as to be dishonest. Honesty is a policy to be pursued for its own sake, as the only condition of personal peace. Were there no Divine blessing in question at all, conscientious men would be as honest as they are now.
At the same time, it makes the honesty all the happier that it lies in the sunshine of the Infinite Presence, and that his radiant smile is on it. There is no danger of a mercenary spirit entering into such a relation with God. He so wraps us round that in his circle of love it would be most ungrateful and most dissonant to practice dishonesty.
With people under a theocracy, or reign of God, we should expect to find just weights and full measures. The visits of the inspectors should prove superfluous with all those whose life lies open as the day to the inspection of their King.R.M.E.
Deu 25:17-19
The extermination of the merciless.
The crime of the Amalekites was falling upon the hindmost, who were faint and weary. It was an act of judgment untempered by any mercy; and the decree of God is their extermination because they were merciless. Just as we see in another place that God won’t forgive the unforgiving, so here we see that he will blot out the merciless from under his merciful heaven. “For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath showed no mercy” (Jas 2:13).
I. THE MERCILESS DESERVE NO MERCY. In the case before us there was everything calculated to stir up mercy. The rearguard was feeble and faint and weary. Surely these Amalekites will pity the poor pilgrims, and show them some mercy. But no, they think they are all the better prey, and so they smite the people of God most mercilessly. In their heartless act they put themselves beyond the pale of God’s compassion, lie consigns them to extermination under the swords of Israel. Our conscience says, “Amen” to this decree. The Amalekites deserve destruction for their heartlessness.
What a word of warning to heartless people still! Let it be carried to a certain point, and God will hand them over to deserved destruction.
II. THE REARGUARD IS ALWAYS AVENGED. The tribe of Dan was directed to go “hindmost with their standards” (Num 2:31). And it must have seemed a trial to be always in the rear and never in the van. But they were here taught that they had in God a special Avenger. He espouses their cause, and will bring forth their righteousness as the light, and their judgment as the noonday (Psa 37:6).
III. LET US CONTENTEDLY TAKE THE HINDMOST PLACE IF GOD GIVES IT TO US. All cannot be in the van, and the faithfulness of the rearguard is as much a matter of Divine observation as is the dash and courage which characterize the van.R.M.E.
Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary
Israel at Home
Chaps. Deu 23:15 to Deu 25:19
15Thou shalt not deliver5 unto his master the servant which is escaped from his master unto thee: 16He shall dwell with thee, even among you in that place which he shall choose in one of thy gates where it liketh [good for him, so margin] him best: thou shalt not oppress him. 17There shall be no whore6 [consecrated, devoted one] of the daughters of Israel, nor a sodomite of the sons of Israel. 18Thou shalt not bring the hire of a whore, or the price of a dog into the house of the Lord thy God for any vow: for even both these are abomination unto the Lord thy God. 19Thou shalt not lend upon usury to thy brother [lay upon thy brother]: usury7 of money, usury of victuals, usury of anything that is lent [accustomed to be lent] upon usury: 20Unto a stranger thou mayest lend upon usury; but unto thy brother thou shalt not lend upon usury: that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all that thou settest thine hand to in the land whither thou goest to possess it. 21When thou shalt vow a vow unto the Lord thy God, thou shalt not slack to pay it: for the Lord thy God will surely require it of thee; and it would be [and it is] sin in thee. 22But if thou shalt forbear to vow, it shall be no sin in thee. 23That which is gone out of thy lips thou shalt keep and perform; even a free-will offering [freely, voluntarily] according as thou hast vowed unto the Lord thy God, which thou hast promised with thy mouth. 24When thou comest into thy neighbors vineyard, then thou mayest eat grapes thy fill at thine own pleasure [as thy desire (soul) is]; but thou shalt not put any in thy vessel. 25When thou comest into the standing-corn of thy neighbor, then thou mayest pluck the ears with thine hand: but thou shalt not move a sickle unto thy neighbors standing-corn.
Deu 24:1 to Deu 22:1 When [If] a man hath taken a wife, and married her, and it come to pass that [if] she find no favor in his eyes, because he hath found some uncleanness [nakedness of a thing] in her: then let him write her a bill of 2divorcement,8 and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house. And when 3she is departed out of his house, she may go and be another mans wife. And if the latter husband hate her, and write her a bill of divorcement [a separating writing], and giveth it in her hand, and sendeth her out of his house; or if the latter husband die, which took her to be his wife; 4Her former husband which sent her away, may not take her again [return to take her] to be his wife, after that she is defiled; for that is abomination before the Lord: and thou shalt not cause the land to sin [make it sinful] which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance. 5When a man hath taken a new wife, he shall not go out to war, neither shall he be charged with any business9: but he shall be free at home one year, and shall cheer up his wife which he hath taken. 6No man shall take the nether [the hand-mill] or the upper10 mill-stone to pledge: for he taketh a mans life to pledge. 7If a man be found stealing any of his [a soul (person) of his] brethren of the children of Israel, and maketh merchandise of him [constrain him violently] or selleth him; then that thief shall die; and thou shalt put evil away from among you. 8Take heed in the plague of leprosy, that thou observe diligently, and do according to all that [as] the priests the Levites shall teach you: as I commanded them, so ye shall observe to do. 9Remember what the Lord thy God did unto Miriam by the way, after that ye were come [in your coming] forth out of Egypt. 10When thou dost lend11 thy brother anything, thou shalt not go into his house to fetch12 his pledge: 11Thou shalt stand abroad, and the man to whom thou dost lend shall bring out the pledge abroad unto thee: 12And if the man be poor [a bound, oppressed man], thou shalt not sleep with his pledge: 13In any case thou shalt deliver him the pledge again when the sun goeth down, that he may sleep in his own raiment [over-cloak, mantle], and bless thee; and it shall be righteousness unto thee before the Lord thy God. 14Thou shalt not oppress an hired servant that is poor and needy, whether he be of thy brethren, or of thy strangers that are in thy land within thy gates: 15At his day thou shalt give him his hire, neither shall the sun go down upon it, for he is poor, and setteth his heart upon it [lifteth his soul unto it]: lest he cry [and he shall not cry] against thee unto the Lord, and it be sin unto thee. 16The fathers shall not be put to death for [with, on account of] the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for [in] his own sin. 17Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the fatherless, nor take a widows raiment to pledge: 18But thou shalt remember that [And remember, for] thou wast a bond-man in Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence: therefore I command thee to do this thing [word]. When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a sheaf in the field, 19thou shalt not go again to fetch it: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow: that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands. 20When thou beatest thine olive-tree, thou shalt not go over the boughs again13 [search the boughs after thee]: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow. 21When thou gatherest [cuttest off] the grapes of thy vineyard, thou shalt not glean it afterward [after this]: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow. 22And thou shalt remember that thou wast a bond-man in the land of Egypt: therefore I command thee to do this thing.
Deu 25:1 to Deu 19:1 If there be a controversy between men, and they come [near (hither)] unto judgment, that [and] the judges may [omit may] judge them; 2then [and] they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked. Ana [Then] it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten [a son of stripes], that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his fault [what his fault requires] by a certain number. 3Forty stripes he may give him, and not exceed: lest if he should exceed, and beat him above these with many stripes, then thy brother should seem vile unto thee. 4Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out [lit. and marg.: in his threshing] the corn. 5If brethren dwell together, and one of them die and have no child [son], the wife of the dead shall not marry without unto a stranger: her husbands14 brother shall go in unto her, and take her to him to wife, and perform the duty of an husbands brother unto her. 6And it shall be, that the first-born which she beareth, shall succeed in the name of his brother which is dead, that his name be not put out of Israel. 7And if the man like not to take his brothers15 wife, then let his brothers wife go up to the gate unto the elders, and say, My husbands brother refuseth to raise up unto his brother a name in Israel, he will not perform the duty of my husbands 8brother. Then [And] the elders of his city shall[om. shall] call him, and speak unto him: and if [om. if] he stand to it, and say, I like not to take her, 9Then shall his brothers wife come unto him in the presence of the elders, and loose his shoe from off his foot, and spit in his face, and shall answer [reply], and say, So shall it be done unto that man that will not build up his brothers house. 10And his name shall be called in Israel, The house of him that hath his shoe loosed [the bare-footed]. 11When men strive together one with another [together a man and his brother], and the wife of the one draweth near for to deliver her husband out of the hand of him that smiteth him, and putteth forth her hand, and taketh him by the secrets: 12Then thou shalt cut off her hand, thine eye shall not pity her. 13Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights [stone and a stone. So the marg.], a great and a small: 14Thou shalt not have in thine house divers measures [an ephah and an ephah, marg.], 15a great and a small: But thou shalt have a perfect and just weight, a perfect and just16 measure shalt thou have; that thy days may be 16lengthened in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. For all [every one] that do such things, and all [every one] that do unrighteously, are an abomination unto the Lord thy God. 17Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way, 18when ye were come forth out of Egypt; How he [who] met thee by the way, and smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee, when thou wast faint and weary: and he feared not God. Therefore [And] it shall be, when the Lord thy God hath given thee rest from all thine enemies round about, in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance to possess it, that thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; 19thou shalt not forget it.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. Deu 23:15-18. The previous directions for war, offer the point of union here, since in the time of war servants might easily escape from the enemy. It occurs, however, when Israel was abroad in the field; but now he is at home, Deu 23:16; hence there is a return so far to Deu 23:1-8, as (Deu 23:15) the dwelling of a heathen servant might be hazardous as to the sacred character of the people of God. But the escaped (who will rescue himself) to Israel desires the very same thing which Israel himself had experienced at the hand of God (Deu 23:15, ); without considering, that the individual ownership, the right of possession, even according to Egyptian ideas, ceases when that of the whole people comes to an end. (Schultz). If Jehovah delivers the enemy before Israel, Israel should not deliver any one, even a slave, into hostile, and at the same time arbitrary power. Hiphil delivered to be shut up, in order to be held more securely, perhaps even at first to be cruelly punished. Deu 23:16. But even in Israel itself such a fugitive should not be made to feel his position by oppression, fraud, defamation, etc., (Exo 22:21; Lev 19:33), but should be permitted to do as he likes, as a fellow-dweller in the good land of Jehovah. Comp. upon Deu 1:16; Deu 10:18 sq.; Deu 14:29 (Deu 14:21). No active efforts for the conversion of the heathen were enjoined. Baumgarten. Such a reception of one escaping from the heathen meets however, Deu 23:17, immediately its limitations. This consecrated (prostitute) belonged to the Phnician, Syrian goddess of love (Astarte, Mylitta). Prostitution might awaken in Israel a like religious service with that existing of old in Canaan (Gen 38:21) so that the designation (Kedeshah) becomes an honorable title for a prostitute, (Lev 19:29). There were Sodomites also, Lev 18:22; Job 36:14 (1Ki 14:24; 2Ki 23:7). Still less should they deliver to Jehovah (Deu 23:18) the gift or hire. from to depart from the true form of the sexual life, marriage; to digress, to commit excesses. Such gifts were a reward for religious iniquity, a present in which the God of Israel was treated as a lust idol. The special gift was a kid of the goats, Gen 38:17 sq., but also money, hence the price of a dog, not the money received for a dog sold, but the reward of gain of Kadesh () a Sodomite, one who endured, what one dog suffers from another. Knobel. Used here figuratively, because it had grown into a terminus technicus (Rev 22:15; Rev 21:8). Upon house of the Lord. Comp. Intro., 4, I. 23. For any vow, as Phnician lewdness, dedicated especially these fruits of the body to idols. Even both these, the gift and the giver.
2. Deu 23:19-20. The discourse passes from God to our neighbor, as in Deu 23:20, at the close, back again to God, in a genuine deuteronomic way, showing the profound understanding of the law, of the connection between the two tables. Deu 23:19. (from to bite) literally something biting, oppressive, the Hiphil is not to give interest, but to take, as Exo 22:25; Lev 25:36 sq.; for if the taking was forbidden, the obligation not to give is of course evident, especially since only the necessity of a brother could bring him to borrow, in the simple relations of Israel, and unselfish love should have arranged for this. We are not to think here of the speculations of trade. Deu 23:20. Comp. Deu 15:3; Deu 15:6; Deu 14:21; for the rest Deu 12:7. The stranger is perhaps one passing through Israel for purposes of trade, not one () remaining or dwelling for a time among Israel. The Phnicians, Arabians certainly, took interest from Israel. [The permission to take usury (interest) from the stranger carries with it of course the principal. And it is probable that the loaning of money at fair and easy rates, to aid or accommodate a brother, is not here prohibited. And even if prohibited here, it is only for the special cases, and in the peculiar circumstances of the ancient people of God.A. G.].
3. Deu 23:21-23. , kindred with to set apart, in Niphal: to abstain from anything, to consecrate oneself to anything, hence a devoted thing. The fulfilling must follow. Comp. Deu 15:9. If sin, then of course the demand with penalty. On the other hand the vow, even when near at hand, and customary, may be discontinued. For it is, Deu 23:23, voluntary, or a free-will offering; but the freedom before it is uttered, makes the obligation still stronger afterwards. as always to preserve. voluntariness, here without the (Hos 14:5), merely voluntary, from to move, to give freely, intrans. movable, to be willing, generous, generally what was vowed, especially the utterance, or vow. Comp. moreover Leviticus 27; Num 6:30.
4. Deu 23:24-25. The freedom over against God (with respect to that belonging to Him) leads now again to a corresponding freedom in regard to the property of our neighbor: the more comprehensible as Jehovah is the literal and permanent owner of the promised land. These verses relate to the thirsting and hungry, the former standing first here as the deepest and most painful necessity. The needy one therefore is not the laborer, but rather the traveller, the passer by. It is expressly forbidden that any one should make out of this freedom a means of support. The literal poverty in Israel is not in view here. Comp. further Deu 12:15; Deu 12:20 sq.; Deu 14:26. Fill thy desire. , full, be satisfied, satisfaction. Accusative of the closer limitation. Deu 23:25. Comp. upon Deu 16:9. the ears as standing out. [Ges.: as cut off], (Mat 12:1; Luk 6:1). Usually roasted, Lev 23:14. Thus take no store along with them.
5. Deu 24:1-5. This chapter leads us into the home of the Israelite, into his domestic life. Deu 24:1-4. Of divorce. Deu 24:1. Comp. Deu 22:13; Deu 21:13. To marry a wife, according to this, is to take property into possession, hence to become her lord. The divorce was thus as a mater of fact supposed, and indeed in the case which Moses, in this view of the wife, must leave as it iswhen in the closer and daily intercourse of life she was not pleasing to the husbandand thus entirely as in subjection to him who had power over her. Her not finding favor with him must truly rest upon a previous finding on his side with regard to her, and through this has its ground and motives. While the latter finding is always put into the husbands hands alone, it must still be something that is nakedness (uncleanness) and not might be nakedness (Deu 23:14). Thus a physical or moral occasion for divorce. The school of Hillel at the time of Christ interpreted it as (Mat 19:3), i.e., any thing which may not be pleasing to the husbandpurely subjective. The stricter school of Schammai confined it to some immodesty, shamelessness, lewdness, adultery. But this latter was a capital crime. Knobel holds correctly, no doubt, to some physical defect. Upon the writing see Hengstenb. Auth. I. 460. In connection with the supposed spread of the art of writing among Israel, this divorce does not appear to have been directly made more difficult by the (letter, writing) of divorcement, although this may have been the case when the learned priest or Levite must be brought, who would seek to reconcile the husband. Herxheimer. Such a form of divorce, gave only into the hand of the divorced wife that which would show, that she was legitimately dismissed, and so free, both generally and before other men, and over against her husband hitherto (Deu 24:4). Deu 24:2. Is a description of her freedom. Deu 24:3. In direct continuance of the preceding, Deu 24:1-2, this verse now utters more fully the case, which is literally in view here. Comp. Deu 21:15; Deu 22:13. A decided hatred alternates with what is said, Deu 24:1, which as to the rest is repeated, except that the case of a wife freed again by the event of death is further supposed here. The apodosis now follows with the condition or limitation of the divorce. [See textual notes. The sentence should be read as one, Deu 24:1-4. The pointing in the original makes it clear that Moses does not institute or command divorce. The pointing in our version implies that he does so. He is merely prescribing limitations or regulations to a prevailing custom, which was not in accordance with the institution of marriage, and was only permitted there in this limited sense, and under these restrictions, for the hardness of their hearts. At the same time all these directions tend evidently to prevent any hasty or passionate rupture of the marriage bond, and to guard the interests of the wife as the party most needing protection. For while it seems probable that the wife might initiate the divorce, it was very seldom done.A. G.]. It is worthy of notice, that the original husband is designated , while the second is always called merely But although the idea of marriage according to its institution (Gen 2:23 sq.) may not be brought out in this connection, yet still the prohibition, this legal impossibility to take her again, would serve without doubt to check, a hasty divorce, the degradation of the woman, and especially the bestializing of the sexual relation of man and wife. Reconciliation is possible, indeed may be silently read between the lines (comp. 2Sa 3:14), but not the taking her again to wife, after that ( referring to the , Deu 24:2), she is defiled. Hothpaal: Suffered herself to be defiled. Polluta est alius concubitu. J. H. Michaelis. [Thus it is clear even in these verses. As the Bib. Com. remarks that divorce whilst tolerated for the time contravenes the order of nature and of God. The divorced woman who marries again is defiled. This of course is subject to the interpretation of our Lord, who Himself makes divorce valid, and the innocent party free, on the ground of adultery. Our Lords teaching on this subject is found in Mat 5:31-32; Mat 19:3-9; Luk 16:18; and Mar 10:2-12. It seems to be clear that we are here taught that while marriage is an indissoluble compact between one man and one woman, which cannot be dissolved at the mere arbitrary will of either party, or indeed of both parties, it may be dissolved by the sin of fornication on the part of either. If a man puts away his wife for any other cause, he commits adultery; if upon this ground he is not guilty of any offence. Where divorce takes place upon this ground there is no sin, even if the man marries again. He is free; as the bond has been annulled by the sin of the other party, and so vice versa.A. G.]. See Lev 18:20; Num 5:13 sq., of adultery. Man and wife are one flesh, Gen 2:24. To become the same with a third party is not barely a levitical (Lev 15:18) but a moral desecration of the marriage union. So fundamentally and essentially, Mat 5:32; Mat 19:9. As the second marriage of the divorced was defilement, so here remarriage with her first husband is abomination before (in the face of) Jehovah; expressively said in every case as Deu 7:25; Deu 12:31; Deu 22:5. Comp. further Lev 18:25; Jer 3:1. sq.
Deu 24:5. The newly formed marriage. A new wife, in distinction from the old, just forbidden him, from whom he had divorced himself; a first or a second wife, perhaps even a divorced or a widow. a concentration of the soldierly or warlike manhood, Deu 20:7. While the betrothed must present himself, and then be dismissed, the newly-married is naturally not first marched out for a like release. To the previous prohibition limiting and making more difficult the marriage separation, now we have a positive relaxation in the interest of the marriage union, showing at the same time liberal indulgence to the fresh marriage band. to break in upon, to pass over any one. Job 13:13. Here generally no public burden. as in Deu 23:18. At home, for the good of his just established domestic life. And cheer up his wife instead of causing her sorrow through the exposure of his life, or burdening her with care of any kind.
6. Deu 24:6-7. The founding of a home leads naturally to its preservation. Deu 24:6 to bind, by the taking of a pledge, to pledge. the handmill, the dual, to indicate the millstones, literally the grinder, from to rub, crush. Neither the whole was to be so taken, nor the in the sense of fixingthe lower stationaryor in the sense of moving [or as the rider] the upper movable stone. The daily preparation of the daily bread depended upon this, and consequently the life (soul) of the poor who had only the most necessary utensils. F. Bovet, in a description of a house at the village of Bireh, says: the furniture consists of a handmill and a large earthen vessel containing the grain. The mill is a stone mortar, in which they turn a millstone by means of a handle, as in our corn-mills. [See Thomson, The Land and the Book, pp. 294296, for the structure and mode of using the mill.A. G.]. Deu 24:7. The house should not only be preserved for the Israelite, but the Israelite at his home. introduces the transition. Comp. further Deu 21:14. The harsh, violent treatment, is, as a true deuteronomic and real explanation, inserted between and Exo 21:16; (1Ti 1:10; Rev 18:13). Comp. still Deu 13:6. [Wordsworth: St. Paul transcribes 1Co 5:13, the words of the Sept. here, and thus teaches us to apply these Levitical laws to spiritual things.A. G.].
7. Deu 24:8-9. The case, when an Israelite must leave his home, is: in the time (upon the skin as from a blow) of (from to break forth) i.e., of the eruption, thus at the first appearance; as more precisely explained, Leviticus 13. sq. Schultz and Keil understand the needlessly as if: take heed because (of the cost) of the plague of leprosy (as a punishment, i.e., do nothing to incur it). Luther, as the Vulg., takes for , from before. They should exactly and strictly observe () hold fast, what Moses had commanded the priests and Levites (Intro., 4, I. 22). They thus direct only (Deu 17:10) according to the law, when they in case of the leprosy remove any one from his home and separate him from the people (Lev 13:45-46). The strictness of the admonition is followed by an equally stringent command to obedience, and this, Deu 24:9, is enforced by a reference to Miriam, Num 12:10 sq. In the case of Miriam the leprosy was the punishment for her rebellion against Moses; but it is not the leprosy, but what Jehovah had done to her (Num 12:14), her separation beyond the camp, which is here in view. The onward march of the people was at that time restrained by her course, Num 12:15. Neither the rank nor the person could be regarded.
8. 1013. For the rest, the home of a fellow-Israelite must be respected. Deu 24:10. Comp. Deu 15:2; Deu 15:6. Johlson: In order to take his pledge. Herxheimer: To seize from him a pledge or security. The lender should not invade or disturb the home of the debtor, he is not to act as a landlord. It presupposes better relations than Deu 24:6. According to Deu 24:11 the borrower defines what the pledge shall be; that he can do without it, is also presupposed according to Deu 24:6. For if it is something which he can spare, indeed, but only for the day, so it may be taken from him only for the day. Deu 24:12 sq.; Comp. Exo 22:25-26. Deu 24:13. Comp. upon Deu 6:25. [The directions here given are to guard the poor and unfortunate from oppression. Their homes could not be violated. The creditor must stand without and wait for the pledge to be brought. But the right to the pledge is recognized. It must be brought. And doubtless the law or custom would regulate what pledge was sufficient. Within these limits the creditor would have the right to judge.A. G.].
9. Deu 24:14-22. The mention of the debtor leads, Deu 24:14-15, to the similarly placed laborer, but with this to the still wider and varied methods how Israel must deport itself at home. Deu 24:16-22. For , Deu 24:14, as Deu 24:12 (comp. Deu 15:11), and upon the added (comp. Deu 15:4). , to cut, to defraud, comp. upon Lev 19:13. collectively. Deu 24:15. He was usually a day-laborer (Mat 20:8).Upon it, i.e. the wages which are still deferred (Eph 4:26). So also upon it, i.e. he raises, lifts up his desire upon that, which to each day is its fitting reward. Comp. further Deu 15:9 (Jam 5:4). The condition and expectation of the poor should Israel consider at home, and hence, Deu 24:16 does not confound the justice of God (Deu 5:9) with that of men, nor visit the death-penalty upon the closest kindred of the guilty, as the physical connection carried with it the punishment among the Persians and other heathen nations. (Deu 22:6), upon, i.e., on account of. In such wretched cases Israel must regard and spare the family band, which might impel to like heathen practices (2Ki 14:6; 2Ch 25:4; Jer 31:30; Eze 18:20). Deu 24:17 regards the condition of the poor in its wider relation; comp. Deu 16:19; Deu 10:18-19; Deu 27:19. Upon the whole passage, comp. Exo 22:21 sq.; Deu 23:9; Lev 19:33 sq. The righteousness, Deu 24:13, leads at first in Deu 24:14-15, to that which is privately right and reasonable, but then, Deu 24:16, to the public justice; so we pass in Deu 24:17 from right generally in the private relations, to the right as connected with security or pledges (Deu 24:6). In Israel right should be maintained publicly and privately, and indeed according to righteousness as it is love, or better still, grace and mercy, as man becomes acquainted with it in God (Deu 24:13, ), as Israel especially had already grown acquainted with it in his God. The widow, the womanly, is noticed with peculiar tenderness; her raiment may be viewed as a whole history of poverty (Deu 24:12). Upon Deu 24:18, comp. Deu 15:15; Deu 5:15; Deu 7:8. Deu 24:19-22. These verses respect the state and even expectation of the poor which they are justified in cherishing, from their position under Jehovah, the landlord of Canaan. Comp. Lev 19:9 sq.; Deu 23:22; Deu 14:29. The olives, when they were not entirely ripe, were beaten off with poles, and then yielded finer oil (Isa 17:6). Deu 24:22 as Deu 24:18. [The three-fold repetition, 19, 20, 21, of these classes who were thus partly provided for, is calculated surely to impress the care and tenderness of God over the poor, and the humanity of the laws of Moses.A. G.]
10. Chap. 25, Deu 25:1-3. To the wretched, not habitually, but for the time, in the ideal connection of this paragraph with the foregoing, belongs also the case of one exposed to punishment. But Deu 25:1 brings out first of all the prevailing righteousness for Israel. The poor or wretched even in this reference could only be treated righteously. Comp. Exo 23:7. , to be firm, straight. Opposed to , to separate, to turn aside. Whoever in any given case is righteous, the opponent is unrighteous, i.e. guilty, not however in the moral sense, but sensu forensi. Deu 25:2. , i.e. before the judge, who should observe the number and the kind of stripes, and perhaps also limit the dishonor in the case, through such a form of proceeding. Bovet, who regards the tabernacle as the tent of justice standing in the centre of the people, before which the Lord of Israel cites His people, describes the mode in which justice is pronounced and executed in Egypt to-day; the whole scene now aptly illustrating that which we may suppose to have occurred here. (comp. Deu 15:8), according to the measure, with reference to the number, i.e. as many as the crime demands according to the jus talionis, Deu 25:3. Forty, i.e. 4 10. thus according to all the world, on all sides, a perfect measure. (From Gen 7:12 it is the full measure of the development of judgment. Keil.)Not exceed, i.e., not more than forty. Anxious not to overstep this extreme limit, the later Jews fixed the number of stripes at thirty-nine (2Co 11:24).[And yet they did not hesitate to use the whip or scourge, instead of the stick or rod.A. G.]Any excess over these would be too many stripesnot so much in reference to what a man can endure, as with respect to its spiritual, humane side or aspect. In such a case there would be no limit to the arbitrary will; the sufferer, as to why he was still punished, would not be under the law, but barely under the rod; he would not be even under the protection of the law. Moreover, he would suffer loss in the eyes of his brethren, if it was not retribution nor even dishonor, but the stripes merely which were in view here. , from , to rub open, sweep away [Ges.: roast], e.g. by fire, hence light, to make small, despicable, so that it is not necessary to render the Niphal with Meier to be ruined.[Bib. Com.: The son of Israel was not to be lashed like a slave at the mercy of another. The judge was to see that the law was not over-passed.A. G.]
11. Deu 25:4. The treatment of a man as a brute, if we can think of such in an unlimited scourging, gives occasion for the mention of the brutes even, according to righteousness, Deu 25:4. If his wages are to be given to the hired laborer daily, so also the laboring animal should be permitted to eat of the grain which it treads out, or over which it draws the threshing-cart (Winer, Lex. I., p. 276). Comp. upon this the present usage in the East; Hengst., Moses and Egypt (1Co 9:9; 1Ti 5:18). Such a reference to animals makes the reference to the dead brother in the following paragraph to appear more appropriate.[Wordsworth dwells upon the use which the Apostle makes of this passage, not only as showing that the Levitical law has a spiritual sense, in which it is still binding upon all, but as giving us the key by which we may unlock the casket and take out of its treasures. But this opens wide the door to a very loose and fanciful exposition. It would need great sobriety and judgment to keep at all within bounds on the principle here stated. We cannot safely argue from what the apostle did, and justify ourselves in a like course. And the Apostle seems to use the words rather as illustrative of the truth he was teaching than as assigning to them a figurative and spiritual sense.A. G.]
12. Deu 25:5-10. The Levirate marriages. It is not the dead brother alone, but the widow also, who with him claims special notice here. In the following primitive institution there is no allusion to the taking possession of the landed property, Knobel, and hence, Deu 25:5, the dwelling together cannot be placed as a condition to the obligation, with Knobel, Keil [Bib. Com.], but only brings to bear from the beginning, the actual position, the local nearness of the brother-in-law as giving rise to it. It was customary to dwell together, if not in the same house, yet upon the same paternal inheritance. , according to Jewish tradition, without child or grandchild, Mat 22:24; Mar 12:19; Luk 20:28. That a son was alluded to here, and expressly in Deu 25:6, is only natural. But if the dead left behind him even a daughter, it was, according to Num 27:4; Num 36:8, sufficient. The widow was not free to marry any one belonging to a family beyond the tribe or kindred (Num 36:3). Comp. Gen 19:31. , literally, allied, related by marriage, levir (), in the Jewish interpretation: the own brother on the fathers side, if unmarried? , Piel, act the part of the brother-in-law. Deu 25:6. Shall succeed [Schroeder: stand up], not to the name of his own father, but to that of his dead uncle, and so be registered in the genealogical table, i.e. as is self-evident, be enrolled as his heir. Others hold that he should not only thus perpetuate the name of the dead, but that he should be literally named after him. But comp. Rth 4:10; Rth 4:17, for the refutation of this view., from , to wipe off, namely, from the genealogical tables. As e.g. Ohad (Gen 46:10; Exo 6:15; comp. with Num 26:12; 1Ch 4:24). Thus also it was not so much the marriage of the widow which was in question, as much more the preservation in this way of the name, and therewith the person of the dead. But while the law makes valid this custom, coming down from the time of the patriarchs (Gen 38:8), it is still only in its prevalent form a custom, and therefore without constraint. It leaves the inclination free, permits the refusal. Deu 25:7 delivers it from pure arbitrariness, regulates its expression (comp. Deu 21:19; Num 16:12-14), in the way of notice, accusation, public hearing and treatment by the magistrate, Deu 25:8, at which the marriage of the brother-in-law, as also the loss to his own inheritance (Rth 4:6), and even the perpetuation of his own name (Gen 38:9), may find public utterance, and ordains, in case the disinclination continues, no strictly legal punishment, but permits a temporary disgrace through the act of the sister-in-law, Deu 25:9, and a permanent disgrace in the community, Deu 25:10, both of which, however, could be maintained with the custom itself, or grow feeble, if they did not fall away with it.In the presence of the elders, i.e. publicly, and because he must submit to what follows. The loosing of the shoe from his foot by the sister-in-lawin distinction from Rth 4:7-8, in which case it was not the own natural brother, and in which also the redemption of the inheritance was especially in view, and thus the kinsman himself could loose his own shoedivested the unwilling brother-in-law of his rights with respect to the widow. Hupfeld: Psa 60:8 says correctly, it was the symbol of renunciation. The reproach put upon her is compensated by the spitting in his face (Lev 15:8; Num 12:14; Job 30:10); she now contemns him on her side. The Talmud weakens it into: spit before him on the ground. Upon , comp. upon Deu 21:7; Deu 19:16, and also Gen 16:2; Gen 30:3; Rth 4:11. The founding and establishment of the family! Hence the reproachful title extends even to his house, and thus the occurrence becomes a lasting remembrance and reproach. But still not as Knobel, Keil, a bare-footed abject, since it is not as bare-footed, as without possessions, that he is infamous, but as one from whom his sister-in-law has loosed his shoe.
Deu 25:11-12, limit the interference of a woman permitted in the above custom (comp. with , Deu 25:9); upon the other side, morality required such a limitation. Freedom, but not shamelessness, especially in regard to what the sister-in-law had precisely claimed (comp. Exo 21:22). The attack was, moreover, dangerous to life. Hence the severe and strict penalty which the Rabbins change into a penalty corresponding to the worth of the hand. Comp. Deu 19:21; Deu 7:16.[It is of course to be understood that the act was wilful, and that the penalty was inflicted by the sentence of the Judges. This is the only mutilation prescribed by the law of Moses, unless we accept the retaliation prescribed as a punishment for the infliction on another of bodily injuries, Lev 24:19 sq. Bib. Com.A. G.]
13. Deu 25:13-19. How Israel should proceed according to righteousness in trade, Deu 25:13-16, and in their intercourse with others, Deu 25:17-19. Deu 25:13. . As they usually had a purse at the girdle for this purpose, Mic 6:11. The repetition: stone and stone [divers weights], (Deu 25:14 : Ephah and Ephah [divers measures]), as is immediately explained, designates the diverse, the two kinds of weights, the large used in the purchase, and the small in selling (Psa 12:2; Amo 8:5). As with the weights, so it should be also with the grain-measures (from , to collect, gather, hold, whence: vessel). As in the purse, so in the house, i.e. neither to use, nor even to have. Deu 25:15. is unhurt, complete, whole, both all together, and each one by itself, must be just. For it concerns righteousness. Comp. Lev 19:36. The promise the same as in Deu 5:16 at the close of the first table. The more solemn conclusion follows in Deu 25:16; comp. Deu 28:12; Deu 22:5. The injunction passes from the particular trade, to every transaction of the kind generally. , to contract, distort, Arabia: to overstep the right measure. With this Deu 25:17 joins the exception, which is still however only according to the righteousness of God, and thus also forms the conclusion to this whole section. The case befel the Israelites on the way. Comp. Exo 17:8 sq. Deu 25:18 gives the closer description of the iniquitous conduct of Amalek from the recollection of an eye-witness, who had experienced it. , to extend, to swerve, in the Piel: to bend aside, injure, destroy the tail, the rear. This inhumanity shows already that there is no fear of God with Amalek. Comp. on the other hand Exo 15:14; Exo 18:1. Deu 25:19. Comp. Deu 12:10; Exo 17:14; Deu 9:7. The execution follows in 1 Samuel 15.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. Israel itself rescued from bondage, realizes in Deu 23:15-16, a command to humanity (Knobel), but a humanity which appears to be stamped with the highest ideas of human nature. As according to its original destination, it was to be a blessing to all the families of the earth, so it is in Christ the asylum of enslaved humanity.
2. From the Old Testament stand-point, the conversion of the Gentiles rests in the depths of hope and desire. Baumgarten.
3. The element of lust in the heathen religions still in Mohammedanism. The dangerous character of religious fanaticism in this aspect. The sobriety of the religion of Israel.
4. Interest must be distinguished from usury; but also the persons, whether it is the poor borrowing from necessity, or others borrowing for gain.
5. Compare L. Wiese, upon the Vow in the evangelical sense, Berlin, 1861. Mosheim [Ethics VI., p. 177) distinguishes: either to omit things which otherwise could be done innocently, or to perform something which (or binding to some kind and manner of observance) the law does not require. The purpose: gratitude, desire to devote ourselves to God, zeal in sanctification. Vows should be maturely considered beforehand. Ben. Pictet, Morale Chret. I. Book III., Chap. 16.: The vow is a solemn promise to God to do some special thing in His service, and to His honor. Thus not as to the general life, as in baptism and in prayer.
6. When Moses comes to speak of divorce, the bill of divorcement is a , a record literally of the cleaving apart, cutting away, namely, one from the other, of those who together were one flesh. Thus throughout according to the idea of marriage, which is its ethical spirit and end. The writing of divorcement is likewise also something more than the mere utterance or declaration of the husband; thou art dismissed, repudiated, as occurs among other Oriental nations. It is here treated especially in the interest of the ideality of marriage, see the Exegetical Notes. The law-giver, Knobel remarks, appears to have regarded divorce unfavorably (Deu 23:4), and therein to have agreed with the prophets, Mal 2:16. Israel is therein considered in its perfection, although the ordinance of Moses must imply the hardness of their hearts, as is truly the case (comp. Lange, Matthew 5 and Matthew 19). The negative character of the divine law has, in like manner as its pre supposition, what we are ever prone, to in our evil nature. Israel according to its nature separates the kind of his wives, but that he does so in opposition to the nature of true marriage, that appears manifoldly; and therewith the rays of the full divine truth and revelation break through the dark veil, under which the actual life of Israel is permitted provisional room and scope. Baumgarten.
7. As a militant church Israel must not however interfere with or prevent the inward peace and joy, Deu 24:5.
8. Generally in the last discourses of Moses love is presented clearly as the innermost spirit of the law (Baumgarten). A parallel: the last discourse of Jesus in the gospel by John.
9. How has the Mosaic law-giving obviated from the very first the violent measures which in Greece and Rome, from time to time, were found necessary to correct the hard and intolerable relations of the poor debtor!
10. When Moses, who so strongly, and before all things, urges purity and holiness of heart, does not hesitate to consider the somewhat hard treatment of an animal (Deu 25:4) in the midst of the most important laws, he stands at the divine central point of the world, from which straight lines lead to all creatures. (Baumgarten).
11. The Levirate marriage has indeed no connection with the general human needs and desires of immortality (Keil), although a similar custom is found among the Mongolians, Circassians, Druses, Abyssinians, and others. This necessity was not indeed distinctly felt by Israel, (hence the Sadduceean pretence, Mat 22:24 sq.), but it is truly from Abraham on entirely included in the promise, as Christ asserts, Matthew 22, and indeed the promise of this life, for the Word must become flesh. Thus the custom lying at the basis of the legal regulation is an old and honored one in the chosen family. Indeed the main line of the tribe of Judah, the peculiar line of promise, Mat 1:3 sq., springs from that forced or surreptitious marriage of Thamar (Genesis 38). Leyrer, Herz. Encycl., VIII. 358. Compare beside the Levirate marriage of Ruth. In Israel all is directed with reference to the name and the house, and not so much generally to a continuous life in posterity (Schultz). Hence beyond the law, and even those more distant than the brother are allowed to act. The Goel appears as the husbands brother, Ruth 4. Hence even against the law (Lev 18:16), incest [Blutschande] is blood-honor; love as the fulfilling of the law. [It should be rather, that in this case and for the ends in view, to preserve the name, the house, the ordinary rules as to inter-marriage were set aside. Such a marriage was not incest.A. G.].
12. For Amalek comp. Doct. and Eth. upon i. 6 sq. 6. What was said as to Israel at home, closes significantly with a recollection of the Edomite Amalek; for thus it is said that a mans enemies will be those of his own house, and that Israel as the people of Jehovah must remain in the camp. Israels perfection is not merely secured through the promise in the future, but in the way of duty made dependent upon its development in obedience.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
Deu 23:15-16. The letter of Paul to Philemon. Deu 23:18. Luther: Thus all gains by sin are unacceptable to God; He will be honored with reverence. Berl. Bib.: Even everything devoted in some measure to the Lord, on account of currish quarrels and bitterness among each other is also an abomination to the Lord. Deu 23:19-20. Osiander: If we decline a gain to please God He will in turn restore it to us in another place and way. Deu 23:21-23. God loves a free-will service. Promises create obligation, and our acts should correspond with our words. Deu 23:24-25. Wurth. Bib.: God gives the blessing upon our fields not for ourselves alone, but for our neighbors also. Berl. Bib.: See the community of goods! It is all yours. But if thou takest for thyself unreasonably, with a false freedom, it applies not to thee.
Deu 24:1. Berl. Bib.: The tying together of Samsons foxes sets all in a flame. Wurth. Bib.: God often suffers that to happen in which He has no pleasure, in order to avoid greater evil and distress, Mat 13:30. Berl. Bib.: Christ wills that among believers, whose disposition is not so harsh, there should be obedience to the first institution, that all opposition should be obviated by love and reasonable endurance, all crosses and sickness should be patiently borne, and the marriage state preserved in faithfulness to the end of life. Schultz: Lycurgus, Solon, and Numa, permit according to Plutarch a change of wives. Comp. Isa 1:1. God receives back again, Jer 3:1. [Wordsworth: Here was Gods love made manifest. He invites the people generally of spiritual adultery to return to him.A. G.]. Deu 24:5. Osiander: Woe to those who forbid to marry, 1Ti 4:3. Berl. Bib.: God spares young Christians heavy tests, and gives them some sweet foretastes of knowledge and consolation. Deu 24:7. Starke: Judas took his own life, Act 1:18. Berl. Bib.: The slave trade. Osiander: We should learn prudence from the loss of others, rather than by our own misfortune. Berl. Bib.: That the whole lump may not be leavened. 1Co 5:2; 1Co 5:6; 1Co 5:13. [Wordsworth: Deu 24:13. He who injures the poor does violence to God.A. G.]. Deu 24:15. Baumgarten: Thus was the master put in the place of his laborers. But such feeling is possible only through love, which alone knows how to feel for others, to feel as they feel. Comp. Jam 5:4. Osiander: He is a thief in the sight of God. Deu 24:16. Baumgarten: If only strict righteousness rules then no child of Adam can hope for salvation or life; thus this iron link of the natural connection must be broken, which occurs only through divine grace. (Jer 31:29-30; Eze 18:20). Deu 24:17 sq. Strangers, fatherless, widows; these three classes are here four times recommended. Deu 24:19. The forgotten sheaf the sheaf of the Lord. In this point they should not have a good remembrance, but a good conscience. Osiander: Pious generosity brings no loss. Deu 24:22. Lange: God reveals the grounds of His will, to convince us so much more fully of its reasonableness; thus man should not require a blind obedience.
Deu 25:1. Richter: An image of the righteousness of God, 1Ki 8:32. Berl. Bib.: The judicial office, a characteristic of God, is often made to be a characteristic of the devil. Starke: One may thus come before the judgment with a good conscience in case of need. Deu 25:2, Herxheimer: Every one was equal before the law in Israel. Schultz: This punishment fails in the modern idea of dignity, but not with respect to the knowledge of that worth or dignity, even in the body, grounded in the inward relation to Jehovah. The divine law requires that when a man has put off his own worth the delusive appearance of it shall be taken away also. Corporeal punishment, because of the moral earnestness and sense of truth. Deu 25:3. The offender still a man. Schultz: The guilt of the individual should bring to mind the guilt of all. The number forty characterizes the humiliation, the temptation, and the wandering as ordained by divine power. Comp. Gen 7:12; the forty years in the wilderness; Deu 9:9; Deu 9:18; Lev 12:1 sq.; Jon 3:4; Eze 4:6; 1Ki 19:8; Mat 4:2. Comp. Bahr II. 490. Deu 25:5 sq. Baumgarten: In the duty of mutual love and aid, the external communion first reaches its real truth and significance. The levirate marriage has ceased among the Jews. Wurtb. Bib.: Blood relatives should truly receive the widows and fatherless left behind, and aid them in word and deed. Deu 25:9-10. Berl. Bib.: Each family should be preserved by this law, that we may better recognize the Messiah, who should be born from the entirely humbled or sunken family of David. Deu 25:11 sq. Starke: Every immodest touch is sin. Deu 25:13 sq. Schultz: The most customary and daily transactions are the most important; where there is the most sin there will be the most sighs. Mammon is always a mammon of unrighteousness. [It is noteworthy that John the Baptist puts the like duties in the fore-front of his preaching, Luk 3:12 sq.; and that the prophets, Eze 45:10-12; Amo 8:8; Mic 6:10-11, and the Psalms, insist upon these duties; Bib. Com.A. G.]. Richter: 1 Thess. Deu 4:6. The curse of God is the righteous penalty for such secret sins. Israel must have just balances as God in His sanctuary. Berl. Bib.: Not two kinds of words in thy mouth. Baumgarten: These manifold directions of love and indulgence, end in this sharp point, that love and indulgence may never blunt in Israel the sense for the opposition to all evil. Schultz: As the development of the world cannot end but in the dualism of heaven and hell, so neither the development of the law, without this dualism of love and hatred.
Footnotes:
[5][Deu 23:15. Literally: Thou shalt not shut.A. G.].
[6][Deu 23:17. Margin: Sodomites. Literally: sanctified, or a holy one. Words expressive of consecration were applied by the heathen to designate those sunken in peculiar sins.A. G.].
[7][Deu 23:19. The Hebrew word is expressive from the root, to bite, as if any interest was biting or oppressive.A. G.].
[8][Deu 24:1. Literally: and he shall give unto her a roll, writing, of cutting off. The accents in the original do not justify the colon in this verse; and the construction requires that the periods at the end of Deu 23:1-2 should be removed. A. G.].
[9][Deu 24:5. Margin: more literally: not any thing shall paes upon him.A. G.].
[10][Deu 24:6. Hebrew: the chariot or rider.A. G.].
[11][Deu 24:10. Margin: lend the loan of anything.A. G.].
[12][Deu 24:10. To pledge his pledge. Schroeder: that he may pledge his pledge.A. G.].
[13][Deu 24:20. Margin: Thou shalt not bough it after thee.A. G.].
[14][Deu 25:5. The margin: next kinsman is not so literal as the text. It is rather an interpretation than a reading.A. G.].
[15][Deu 25:7. The text is to be preferred to the margin.A. G.].
[16][Deu 25:15. Literally: a full stone and righteousness shall be to thee, a fall ephah and righteousness shall be to thee. So Schroeder.A. G.].
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
CONTENTS
The subject in this Chapter is similar to the former. Here are laws of direction, for the punishment of evil-doers: respecting the ox in his labour: the disgrace of him that refuseth to build up his brother’s name: the punishment of the immodest woman: laws respecting weights and measures: a precept for the blotting out the memory of Amalek.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
No doubt in all instances, strict examination took place before punishment. The limitation of the number of stripes prevented the effects of rigour. The Jews have a tradition, that while the stripes were laying on, the judge of the court read those words of scripture; Deu 28:58-59 , and Deu 29:9 . And in after ages, Psa 78:38 . The apostle Paul tells us, that he suffered this punishment to the extreme point five times. 2Co 11:24 . But what saith another apostle on the subject; 1Pe 4:13-14 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
(See the Deuteronomy Book Comments for Introductory content and Homiletic suggestions).
XIII
SECOND GREAT ORATION, PART 2
Deuteronomy 12-26
This section is on the second part of the second great oration of Moses, as embodied in Deuteronomy 12-26 inclusive, of the book of Deuteronomy. If you have carefully read all this section, it will be easier for me to emphasize in the brief limits of this chapter the most salient points and easier for you to grasp and retain them. By the grouping of correlated matters under specific heads, the important distinction between many statutes and the constitutional principle from which they are logically derived will become manifest. A constitution is a relatively brief document of great principles, but legislative enactments developing and enlarging them become a library, which continually enlarges, as new conditions require new statement and application.
Yet again you must note that while one discussion arranges in order many statutes, it necessarily leaves out much of the homiletical value of each special statute. Each one of them may be made a text for a profitable sermon. Indeed these fifteen chapters constitute a gold mine of texts for the attentive preacher.
First of all, it should be noted that Moses is speaking here to the whole people as a national unit and concerning the future national life in the Promised Land which they are about to occupy. He carefully puts before them the national ideal of a people belonging to Jehovah separated from other nations and devoted to a special mission. Because addressing the whole people he recalls the history and law in Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers much more particularly than the special legislation of Leviticus relating mainly to the official duties of a single tribe.
Secondly, when he touches the tribe of Levi in Deuteronomy, it is as a part of the nation rather than about their specific duties as priests and Levites. On this account Deuteronomy is called the people’s code and Leviticus the priest’s code. This fact will help us much to understand tithing in Deuteronomy when compared with tithing in the preceding books. Note carefully this point.
While it is difficult to classify satisfactorily such a multitude of topics and laws, we may profitably group the whole section under the following heads:
I. Unity in the Place of National Worship, Deu 12:5
In their pilgrimage history the cloud and the ark, shifting from place to place according to the exigency of travel, designated day by day the central place of worship. But the people are here admonished that when they conquer the land and become a settled people, God himself will designate one fixed locality as the center of national unity and one permanent place of national worship. In Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and I Samuel, when we get to those books, we shall find only a temporary central place, and occasionally, more than one at the same time, the land not yet all conquered, the people not yet all settled, but in David’s time everything prescribed about the central place of worship is fulfilled, Jerusalem is the place thenceforward throughout their history until Jesus, that prophet like unto Moses, comes and says to the woman of Samaria, “Believe me, the hour cometh when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem shall ye worship the Father. Ye worship that which ye know not; we worship that which we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and Truth.”
To this place, that is, the central place of worship, three times a year must the tribes come in national assembly to keep the great festivals of the Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles, and as a nation they must observe the great day of atonement. In this connection observe particularly that the tithing in Deuteronomy, to which we have before referred, is not the first tithe of the other books, which was the Lord’s inheritance and devoted to the general support of the great festivals, in which indeed the Levites share as a part of the people. Hence the Levites’ share of this tithe does not correspond to their title to the whole of the first tithe, and hence the third year’s provision in Deuteronomy for the poor is unlike any provision of the first tithe. If you have that point fixed in your minds, you are able to answer one of the gravest objections ever brought against Deuteronomy, that is, that it contradicts, on the question of tithes, what had been previously said in other books.
The marvelous effect of this one fixed place of national worship, and of these great festivals, on national unity, on the preservation of a pure worship, appears in all their subsequent history and becomes the theme of psalm, song, and elegy. When we get over into the Psalms and the Lamentations of Jeremiah, we will see backward references to this central place of worship. It is in the light of this law that we discover the sin in the later migration of the Danites and their setting up a new place of worship (Jdg 18 , particularly verses Jdg 18:27-31 ); the sin of Jeroboam (1Ki 12:26-33 ); the sin of the Samaritans later, and the sin of a temple in Egypt. That is the first thought, the unity in national worship. For an account of the Samaritan Temple see Josephus, “Antiquities,” Book XI, chapter 8, and for the Egyptian Temple see “Antiquities,” Book XIII, chapter 3.
2. Unity in the Object of Worship
The second thought in this oration is unity in the object of worship, the exclusive worship of Jehovah. Under this head the section prescribes the death penalty on the following:
(1) The false prophet, who however attested by signs and wonders, shall seek to divert the people to the worship of some other god.
(2) Any member of a family, however near and dear the tie of kindred, who sought to induce the rest of the family to turn away from the worship of Jehovah to worship another god, that member of the family had to die.
(3) Any city that turned aside as a municipality to other worship, that city must be placed under the ban and blotted out. If you have been much of a student of classic literature, you must have noticed how each city stresses the worship of some particular patron divinity, as Minerva at Athens, Diana in the City of Ephesus and Venus at Corinth. Now, this law teaches that any city, in its municipal life, turning aside from the worship of Jehovah to worship a false god for local advantage shall be blotted off the face of the map. The underlying principle here is of immense importance in our times. Cities are tempted continually to sacrifice the paramount spiritual and moral interests of the community in order to promote material interests. So in their annual fairs which bring local advantage in commercial affairs, they lose sight of God and handicap what is commendable in these enterprises by overloading them with poisonous and corrupting attachments, and count any man an enemy to his home place, however much he may approve the good, if he protest against the bad. See the striking examples and illustrations in the cases at Philippi and Ephesus (Act 16:19 ).
(4) To show more emphatically that Jehovah alone is God and must be worshiped, the death penalty was assessed on any necromancer, soothsayer or wizard who sought by illicit ways to understand and interpret the future. To Jehovah alone must the people come to know secret things. What he chose to reveal was for them and their children. What he withheld must remain hidden. All prurient curiosity into Jehovah’s domain of revelation must be rebuked; all seeking unto the dead, all fortunetelling and divinations were mortal sins and punishable by death in every case.
(5) All persons guilty of crimes against nature; the nature of the subject forbids me to specify. They were such outrageous violations of the dignity of man made in God’s image, and indicated such disregard for Jehovah that capital punishment alone would meet the requirements of the case.
(6) Every breaker of the covenant must be put to death. If any had knowledge that another had violated the covenant, it became his duty to investigate the case and bring the attention of the magistrates to it. There is a reference to that in the letter to the Hebrews, where it is said, “He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses: of how much sorer punishment, think ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God [offense against the Father], and hath counted the blood of the everlasting covenant an unholy thing [sin against the Son], and hath done despite unto the Spirit of Grace [sin against the Holy Spirit, and an unpardonable sin]?” (Heb 10:28-29 ).
(7) To impress still more this thought of the exclusive worship of Jehovah: There must be no borrowing from other religions in bewailing the dead; Jehovah’s law alone was the one exclusive standard. The custom of cutting themselves, and disfiguring themselves in the days of their mourning as practiced in other religions, finds here a positive prohibition. I stop to say, Oh, what a pity that so soon after apostolic times, in the great apostasy which Paul predicted and which took place in the Roman Catholic development, there was borrowing old robes of every religion in the world.
3. All Administrations of Law Subject to Jehovah
Whether ceremonial law, moral or civil and criminal law, all administration of law was subject to Jehovah. The government was a theocracy pure and simple, no matter whether it remained a republic or became a kingdom, as it did in the days of Saul, it was a theocracy, God was the only real King and governed all officers himself, whether executive, judicial, or religious.
(1) They were representatives of Jehovah and must first of all consider his honor, justice, and mercy. This fact determined the prescribed character and qualifications of every prince, ruler, elder, judge, sheriff and scribe. These officers must be God-fearing men, hating covetousness, impartial and fearing not the face of any man.
(2) They must in judging hear all evidence fairly.
(3) They must not convict except upon adequate testimony.
(4) It took two good witnesses to prove any point.
(5) They must justify the innocent and condemn the guilty without any regard for age, sex, social position, or financial position. Even and exact justice must be administered to all.
(6) Decision when given must be enforced speedily.
(7) If the case was too hard for them, they must appeal to Jehovah and no other for light. A provision was made by which Jehovah would give the right answer in every such case of appeal. What a pity we have not that kind of a supreme court!
(8) The conduct of all their wars must be under the laws prescribed by Jehovah. War must not be declared against any nation except upon his direction. Their later history furnishes many examples of referring the declaration of war to Jehovah, and it furnishes many examples of disaster befalling them when they went to war in their own wisdom and strength. The regulations touching war covered all material points, such as sanitary measures in camp, treatment of prisoners, conducting sieges, and sparing fruit trees when besieging a city. The boasted progress of modern civilization falls far short of the Mosaic code in ameliorating the sufferings and horrors of war. A great Federal general of the War Between the States well said, in view of his own practice in conducting it, “War is hell!”
(9) On account of this subordination to Jehovah, note the remarkable paragraph Deu 21:1-9 , touching civic responsibility in a case of murder where the offender is unknown. In my prohibition speech in the last prohibition contest in Waco, I used that paragraph as a principle upon which prohibition is based. If you will look at the passage in your Bible and mark it, you will notice that the case is this: A man is found murdered and it is not known who killed him; the nearest city thereto is determined by measurement and must purge itself of responsibility for the crime. The municipal officers in that city must come in the presence of that dead body, hold up their hands before God and swear that they are innocent of the blood.
In my speech I recalled the case of the County Attorney of Tarrant County who was shot down on the streets of Fort Worth, his murderer also being killed; nobody could be held directly responsible for the murder. I said, “Suppose the mayor, the city council, and all the other city officers had been required to place their hands on that dead body and swear that no negligence on their part was resposnible for that murder. They could not have taken the oath. Every one would have been convicted, because they were responsible for the conditions that not only made that particular murder possible, but made murder in some cases certain.”
(10) The numerous statutes concerning charities, mercy, and humanity constrain the people to imitate Jehovah himself in dealing with the poor and with the unfortunate. Indeed some of the most beautiful and pathetic of these laws relating to treatment of the lower creatures embody principles capable of application in a wider range of higher things. They reprobate all cruelty and the infliction of all unnecessary suffering as hateful to Jehovah, for example: “Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn”; and “Thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother’s milk.”
Once in Waco a young man whom I had known when he was a little fellow came to me bringing a letter purporting to be from his father, commending this young man to me and asking me to help him in any way I could. When he next came and asked me to endorse a paper for thirty dollars, I endorsed it. When it matured, I had to pay it. I wrote to the father about it and he replied that his son had forged that letter, and that is was only one case out of many. That son had broken him up. The boy was arrested on a similar case at Corsicana and sent to the penitentiary. When it was suggested that I testify against him, I would not, because of this scripture, “Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother’s milk.” The only way I could help to convict that boy would be to submit his father’s testimony to prove that he was a forger.
(11) In like manner all laws regulating business, such as weights and measures. Once I called upon a man whose name I will not give, and asked him why, when he bought goods, he weighed on one scale and when he sold goods he sold by another. He said. “They are all right.” I said, “No, sir, you have loaded the one you sell by and whoever buys from you does not get full weight.” All laws touching business, such as weights and measures, the restraints on exacting pledges for debt, the withholding of wages for day laborers which they have fairly earned, the limitations on usury and the like are but expressions of divine mercy and justice and tended to build up an honest and righteous people, not forgetful of mercy.
(12) The social laws concerning marriage, slavery, parental power over children, while far from the highest expression of God’s will, do yet in every particular prohibit many current evils freely practiced in other nations. Our Lord himself explains that on account of their hardness of heart and low order of development imperfect laws were suffered. “The people but recently were a nation of slaves, with much more of the slave spirit remaining. It cannot be denied that even the civil and criminal codes on these points were far superior to the codes of other nations. The sanctity of human life, the sanctity of the home, and the sanctity of the family are marvelously safeguarded in these laws. And wherever this code touched an evil custom, it never approved the evil but limited the power and scope of the evil, as far as the unprepared people were able to bear it.
(13) Restrictions on entering the covenant, Deu 23:1-7 , constitute a paragraph very few people understand. This applied to proselytes from other nations. The body politic must not be corrupted by alien additions that could not be easily assimilated. On that line our own nation is gravely troubled by loose naturalization laws that permit the scum and offscourings of other nations to be absorbed into our national life and so fearfully endanger the perpetuity of free institutions and make our great cities cesspools of iniquity. An orator once prayed, “O that an ocean of fire rolled between us and Europe!” The Pacific Slope seems also praying ,”O that an ocean of fire rolled between us and the Orient!”
(14) The governing Jehovah idea appears in an emphatic way in the paragraph Deu 24:1-11 , where by an offering of a basket of firstfruits the Israelite must confess Jehovah’s absolute ownership over his products and his own unworthy derivation. The oration concludes with his general result: “Thou hast avouched Jehovah this day to be thy God, and that thou wouldest walk in his ways and keep his statutes, and his commandments, and his ordinances, and hearken unto his voice: and Jehovah hath avouched thee this day to be a people for his own possession, as he hath promised thee, and that thou shouldest keep all his commandments, etc.”
QUESTIONS
1. What the importance of grouping correlated matters under specific needs and what is a constitution?
2. What the homiletic value of these fifteen chapters?
3. What two things especially noted concerning the second part of Oration Two?
4. Under what three heads does the author group all the material of these fifteen chapters?
5. Under the first head, when was the central place of worship to be established; when, where and by whom actually established; how long continued?
6. How often and at what festivals must the nation assemble at this central place of worship?
7. What bearing has this fact on the tithing question of Deuteronomy?
8. What the marvelous effects of this one fixed place of national worship?
9. Give examples of the violation of this law, and what their particular sin?
10. Under the second head, what cases of violation called for capital punishment?
11. What underlying principle governing the cities is of great importance in our times? Illustrate.
12. What reference to the covenant breaker in the New Testament, and what the threefold sin therein described?
13. Which of these prohibitions are Romanists most guilty of violating?
14. Under the third head (1) What must be the qualifications of all officers? (2) What their several duties? (3) If the case was too hard for them what were they to do? What the provision for Jehovah’s answer? (4) What prescriptions concerning war? (5) How determine civic responsibility in the case of murder where the murderer was unknown? Present day application and illustrate. (6) What laws relating to the poor and to lower animals? (7) What laws regulating business? (8) What social laws? (9) What the restrictions on entering the covenant and the present day application? (10) How does the governing Jehovah idea appear emphatically
15. How does the oration conclude?
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
Deu 25:1 If there be a controversy between men, and they come unto judgment, that [the judges] may judge them; then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked.
Ver. 1. If there be a controversy. ] Among the Mohammedans there are very few law suits, and the reason is given, Quod temere litigantes publice flagellis caeduntur, because they that sue others without just cause are whipped publicly. Once it was counted ominous to commence actions and follow suits. Of our common barristers we may well say, as the historian doth of mathematicians, Genus hominum quod in rep. nostra et vetabitur semper et retinebitur. a
a Caesar. Com. Tac., lib. i. cap. 7.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Deu 25:1-3
1If there is a dispute between men and they go to court, and the judges decide their case, and they justify the righteous and condemn the wicked, 2then it shall be if the wicked man deserves to be beaten, the judge shall then make him lie down and be beaten in his presence with the number of stripes according to his guilt. 3He may beat him forty times but no more, so that he does not beat him with many more stripes than these and your brother is not degraded in your eyes.
Deu 25:1 If there is a dispute This refers to a legal case between covenant brothers (BDB 936, cf. Deu 17:8-13; Deu 19:17; Deu 21:5). Legal cases are meant to stop personal revenge.
justify the righteous The court decides fairly and accurately (cf. Deu 1:16-17). The VERB (BDB 842, KB 1003, Hiphil PERFECT) and the ADJECTIVE (BDB 843) are from the same root. See Special Topic: Righteousness .
condemn the wicked Like the previous pair, this involves the VERB (BDB 957, KB 1294, Hiphil PERFECT and the ADJECTIVE (BDB 957) from the same root.
Deu 25:2 the judge This is either (1) the observing Levite or (2) the striking Levite. Later Judaism required three witnesses to a beating. The beater, the counter, and the reader of the Scriptural requirement.
in his presence This is literally, before his face, which means the judge must watch to assure the carrying out of the sentence. This phrase was interpreted by later Judaism to refer to the position of the one to be punished, beat on chest one third of the strokes and on the back two thirds of strokes.
the number of stripes according to his guilt The punishment needs to fit the crime. The number of strokes varied (cf. Neh 13:25).
Deu 25:3 forty times This was the maximum number of strokes with either a rod (cf. Exo 21:20; Middle Assyrian Laws, A18) or a whip made of leather. By NT times thirty-nine stripes were the maximum (cf. Mishnah Makkoth, III, 13-14; 2Co 11:24).
stripes This term (BDB 912 I) means lash marks. It has a wide semantic field and can refer to (1) a wound (cf. Isa 1:6) or (2) a disease (cf. Deu 28:61).
your brother is not degraded in your eyes Even in punishment a humanitarian spirit prevails. Restoration and changed character are always the goal.
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
men. Hebrew, plural of ‘ish, or ‘enosh. App-14.
shall justify. Compare Deu 16:18; Deu 17:8. Exo 23:7. Pro 17:15.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Chapter 25
Now in Chapter twenty-five, he continues these interesting kinds of regulations.
If two men have a controversy between themselves, then they come to the judges; and let the judges justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked. And if it comes to pass, that the wicked man is worthy to be beaten, then you are to lay upon him not more than forty stripes, [forty stripes is the limit] ( Deu 25:1-3 ):
Now forty is the number of judgment and they weren’t to lay upon them more than forty stripes. Usually they would lay upon them thirty-nine, because you couldn’t exceed forty and you wanted to have mercy tempered with your justice so the sentence was so often thirty-nine stripes. That was the sentence that was laid upon Jesus, thirty-nine stripes.
Now, thou shalt not muzzle the ox while it is treading out the corn ( Deu 25:4 ).
As long as the ox is working treading out the corn then he gets to eat all the corn he wants, don’t put a muzzle on him, let him eat.
If your brothers dwell together, and one of them dies, and have no child, the wife of the dead shall not marry outside the family to a stranger: her husband’s brother shall go in unto her, and take her to him to wife, and perform the duty of an husband’s brother unto her. And the first child which she bears shall be named after the brother that is dead, that his name be not put out of Israel ( Deu 25:5-6 ).
So it was a neat little provision so your name wouldn’t die in Israel. You married a gal and you died, then your brother would have to marry her. And the first son would be named after you so that your name would go on in Israel. Now if your brother didn’t want to marry her. Imagine the dog, look at all the problems she gave to my brother, I don’t want that woman. Then he should come before the elders of the city. And he could say, “I don’t want to marry her.” So he would have to take off his shoe and hand it to her. And then she in turn would spit in his face.
Verse nine; I’m not joshing you, it’s here.
Then shall his brother’s wife come unto him in the presence of the elders, and loose his shoe from off his foot, and spit in his face, and shall say to him, So shall it be done unto that man that will not build up his brother’s house. And his name shall be called in Israel, The house of him that hath his shoe loosed ( Deu 25:9-10 ).
So you became sort of a villain kind of guy in Israel after that. You were the dirty guy, you know, who wouldn’t fulfill a thing of raising up your brother’s name or keeping alive your brother’s name. You would be called “the house from whom the shoe was loosed.” Quite a title that you would have to bear.
Now in verse eleven,
If men are striving together and the wives intervene ( Deu 25:11 ):
Then so forth then it all depends upon how they intervene. They could be in big trouble.
You’re not to have in your bag different weights, great and small ( Deu 25:12 ).
Now this is a common practice. You know they did everything with balances. The only scales they had were balanced scales. But fellows would often have two weights for the balances, one when they were buying and one for when they were selling, diverse weights. And so, here is the national standard of weights and measures that God established in Israel. You’re not to have different weights in your bag, but you are to use the standard weights when you’re buying or selling, you know, instead of having the heavier ones when you’re selling and the lighter ones when you are buying. Diverse weights are an abomination unto the Lord. There is a proverb to that effect and it was something that people were guilty of doing.
Thou shalt not have in thine house different measures, great and small. But thou shalt have a perfect and a just weight, a perfect and a just measure ( Deu 25:14-15 ):
In other words, God wants you to deal honestly in your dealings with each other. No deceit, no cheating of one another.
For all of those that do such things, are unrighteous, and they’re an abomination unto the LORD ( Deu 25:16 ).
Now in verse seventeen, God goes back and He says,
Now, you remember [that guy] Amalek what he did unto you… And in time to come you’re not to forget what Amalek did ( Deu 25:17 , Deu 25:19 ).
He was dirty. What he did is he attacked them from the rear and killed off those people who were lame or sick and not able to keep up with the group, the stragglers. And he was attacking from the rear and wiping out the stragglers. It was a dirty tactic that Amalek did. And so you’re to remember what Amalek did and one day you’re going to get revenge and when you do you, you’re going to wipe out Amalek completely.
Now the time came when Amalek was to be wiped out in their history and you remember that Samuel ordered Saul to go down and wipe out Amalek utterly. “Don’t leave anything or anyone alive. Don’t even leave their cattle or their sheep alive. Destroy them utterly.”
Now as we get into Biblical typology it is interesting because Amalek is a type of the flesh. And God’s edict for our flesh is, wipe it out utterly, don’t leave any remnants. And any place you leave a remnant in the flesh you’re going to be in trouble.
So Saul went down and he saw some of the cattle were really healthy and good-looking, you know, stock and all, so he kept those alive. But the sickly ones, man, he really just hacked them to pieces and the same with the sheep. Some of the good, healthy looking sheep they kept alive but the sickly ones, man, they just really cut them to pieces. And they also saved alive Agag, the king.
And so as he was returning from this battle and aged Samuel came out to meet him, he said unto Samuel, “As the Lord lives I have done all that God has commanded me”. And Samuel said if you have done all that God has commanded how come I hear the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the cattle? And, he, Saul, said they were such nice stock and all, we decided to bring them back so we could use them as sacrifices. We are going to offer them as sacrifices to God. And Samuel answered, “Thou has done foolishly, it is better to obey than to sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. In that you have done foolishly and not obeyed the voice of God in utterly wiping them out, God has now rejected you from being king over Israel. ( 1Sa 15:1-35 )
For now here back under the law God had declared that the Amaleks were to be utterly wiped out. When the time came Saul failed to do it.
Now do you know who the last Amalek is in the Scripture that is recorded? He comes up in the book of Esther, and his name was Hammon. And you remember that he conspired to wipe out all of the Jews. You see that if you don’t obey God and utterly get rid of the flesh then one day the flesh will raise up and seek to destroy you. And so here in your typology that is why God ordered the utter destruction of Amalek. Hear unto the law and don’t forget what Amalek did.
Therefore it shall be, [verse nineteen] when the LORD thy God hath given thee rest from all thine enemies round about, in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance to possess it, you shall blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; don’t forget it ( Deu 25:19 ).
But Saul failed in that and his failure almost cost the Jews their national existence. Hammon had the day set for the extermination of all the Jews and it was only because God divinely intervened through Esther that the Jews were spared. Interesting story of Amalek if you want to follow it through in a Biblical typology it’s very fascinating indeed.
Shall we stand? May God’s hand be upon your life in a special way this week. We’re entering into the time of frenzy as people are preparing to observe the birthday of our Lord. Or are they? May the Lord keep you from the frenzy of this time of year, from the season. May it be for you a real time of reflection upon the Lord, upon what the coming of Christ has meant to you personally. Upon the gift that God has given unto you, His only begotten Son, eternal life, His Holy Spirit. And thus, may this be a very beautiful, rich time of the year as we remember again how much God cares. For God cares for you and God loves you more than you’ll ever know. He just wants you to know that love and experience that. So, may this be a week of experiencing God’s overflowing love. Just let it flow, let it happen. In Jesus’ name. “
Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary
This chapter is a continuation of the two previous ones in giving varied instructions.
Punishments were to be righteously administered and were never to be excessive. It is interesting to notice what excessive punishment is to the mind of God. It is anything which makes our brother appear vile in our sight. Perhaps no word of these varied instructions reveals more clearly than this the divine sense of the rights of personality.
The next word was concerned with the wrong of muzzling the ox that treadeth out the corn. It would seem that whereas undoubtedly this was applicable first to animals, it also had a spiritual significance. At least it was so referred to by Paul (see 1Co 9:810).
The law of the kinsman redeemer, which provided for the perpetuation of the line of descent in Israel of one dying without issue was enunciated at this time. Just measures were insisted upon and the people were solemnly warned to maintain their antagonism to Amalek.
Moses’ very lack of system or order in setting forth these sundry laws is in itself suggestive. It would seem to say to us that we may approach life in any of its activities or relationships, knowing that God is always interested; and, more, that He has a purpose and a method which it is our business to discover and obey.
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
21. Various Laws and Responsibilities
CHAPTER 25
1. Corporal punishment (Deu 25:1-3)
2. Thou shalt not muzzle the ox (Deu 25:4)
3. The brother-in-laws marriage (Deu 25:5-10)
4. Concerning a sinful freedom (Deu 25:11-12)
5. Concerning divers weights and measures (Deu 25:13-16)
6. Concerning the conquest of Amalek (Deu 25:17-19)
Corporal punishment is mentioned in the first paragraph of this chapter. But this also was tempered with mercy. Not more than forty stripes were to be administered in the presence of the judge. The rabbinical instructions put the limit at thirty-nine–forty save one. Five times our blessed apostle Paul was punished in this manner, for we read, Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes, save one (2Co 11:24).
In comparison with the cruel beatings and tortures so universally found among the Gentile races the law concerning corporal punishment appears very merciful. The chastisement was not to be severer than it could be endured. It speaks typically also of the chastisement His people have to undergo.
The ox was not to be muzzled when he treaded out the corn.
Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? Or saith He it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope (1Co 9:7-10).
For the Scripture saith, Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn. And, the laborer is worthy of his reward (1Ti 5:18). These are most blessed comments on this verse, which otherwise would be rather obscure. The toiling ox is the type of the servant and his ministry. And this has its rewards.
The commandment given by Moses, that a surviving brother is to marry his brothers widow is seen in its working in the story of Ruth and the kinsman-redeemer. The law itself was founded upon an old traditional custom, which we find already in Gen 38:8-11. Moses here recognized this custom was not to be considered compulsory.2
And Amalek was to be remembered, Amalek, who feared not God. When Israel had rest in the land and all the other enemies were conquered, then the remembrance of Amalek was to be completely blotted out. As we saw from our annotations in Exodus Amalek typifies the flesh, while Egypt is the type of the world. The complete perishing of Amalek is seen in Balaams parables. When the sceptre rises out of Israel (the second coming of Christ), when He comes that shall have dominion, then Amalek shall perish forever (Num 24:20). When we are indeed in the land and possess our inheritance, when all our enemies are gone, then the remembrance of Amalek, the old flesh, will be blotted out forever.
Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)
Deu 16:18-20, Deu 17:8, Deu 17:9, Deu 19:17-19, Exo 23:6, Exo 23:7, 2Sa 23:3, 2Ch 19:6-10, Job 29:7-17, Psa 58:1, Psa 58:2, Psa 82:2-4, Pro 17:15, Pro 31:8, Pro 31:9, Isa 1:17, Isa 1:23, Isa 5:23, Isa 11:4, Isa 32:1, Isa 32:2, Jer 21:12, Eze 44:24, Mic 3:1, Mic 3:2, Hab 1:4, Hab 1:13, Mal 3:18, Mat 3:10
Reciprocal: Gen 44:16 – What shall we say Exo 22:9 – the cause of both parties 1Sa 2:25 – sin against 1Ki 8:32 – condemning 2Ch 6:23 – justifying 2Ch 19:8 – the judgment Job 27:5 – justify Jer 22:3 – Execute Act 23:3 – smitten Rom 13:3 – rulers
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Deu 25:1. If there be a controversy between men Having made provision for the security of private right in some such remarkable cases as might be sufficient standards whereby to regulate all others, and having fixed punishments to the breach of the most capital laws, Moses now comes to such criminal matters as deserved only corporal penalties, and directs the inferior courts to be just and impartial in their proceedings upon all such complaints. They shall justify the righteous Acquit him from guilt and false accusations, and free him from punishment. Condemn the wicked Declare him guilty, and pass sentence of condemnation upon him to suitable punishment.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Deu 25:5. If brethren dwell together. Not in the same house, but near each other on the ancient lot of land which the family possessed; for Moses often speaks as though the people were already fixed in the promised land.
Deu 25:7. If a man like not to take his brothers wife. With regard to loosing the shoe, the Turks in divorce, allow a woman to turn up her slipper in presence of the court, a silent intimation that her husband has separated himself from her society. The loss of the shoe was a loss of moral rank; it classed a man with the poor, who often walked barefoot.
Deu 25:11. When two men strive, having first immodestly stripped themselves naked to fight.
REFLECTIONS.
The summary way of punishing crimes not capital was wise and salutary. The offender received his punishment in presence of the magistrate. The soreness of his back would not detain him long from labour, nor would he be corrupted and made worse by long imprisonment. He usually received thirteen strokes from a leathern thong slit into three; hence the public shame would be a greater punishment than the pain of the stripes.
Compassion must extend to animals as well as men. The ox that trod a machine to thrash the corn, must not be muzzled: this would have been a crime against nature. Hence, according to St. Paul, when ministers labour hard in private studies and exercises to give food to the people, they are not to be denied the supply of their wants. If a laborious beast has claims on his master for food, ministers are not less entitled to a remuneration from the people.
We have next the injunction for a younger brother, or the next of kin, who are often called brothers in the scriptures, to marry the widow of his brother who had died without issue. This was an ancient law of the patriarchs, as appears from the case of Tamar. Gen 38:8. It kept alive the name of his brother; it kept the families together; and preserved the lot of land entire to the same family. These were marriages of prudence, but not enforced against affection; and if God did not claim the right of doing this, no parent should assume more than God. Parents have a right to a negative; they may hinder an imprudent marriage; but to compel a child to marry against inclination, may be productive of serious consequences.
The cutting off the hand of the cruel and immodest woman, is a remarkable case in the Hebrew administration of justice. Here the judges could not follow the law of an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth; but immodesty is hateful in the sight of God and man. And it surely should be the first object of female education to inspire them with delicacy, bashfulness, and all those retiring graces which are the first ornaments of the fair sex: and these are ornaments not only of inestimable value in themselves, but which every poor man may leave as a best legacy to his children.
The law of a just weight and measure is here enforced anew: a man who has recourse to those mean and sordid tricks, chiefly robs the poor, and renders his name odious to the public.
Immediately after the law of weights and measures, follows a repetition of the sentence against Amalek: the murder of the sick and feeble Israelites still cried to heaven. Exodus 17. God put that nation in his balances, and they were still found wanting. They had no repentance, no reformation, nor did they make any overtures of peace to diminish the consequences of their guilt. God had long beheld the declining balance, he had long suspended the blow; but vengeance came at last; and though slow in its approach, it was sudden and tremendous in the execution. 1 Samuel 15.
Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Deuteronomy 22 – 25
The portion of our book on which we now enter, though not calling for elaborate exposition, yet teaches us two very important practical lessons In the first place, many of the institutions and ordinances here set forth prove and illustrate, in a most striking way, the terrible depravity of the human heart. They show us, with unmistakable distinctness, what man is capable of doing, if left to himself. We must ever remember, as we read some of the paragraphs of this section of Deuteronomy, that God the Holy Ghost has indicted them. We, in our fancied wisdom, may feel disposed to ask why such passages were ever penned? Can it be possible that they are actually inspired by the Holy Ghost? and of what possible value can they be to us? If they were written for our learning, then what are we to learn from them?
Our reply to all these questions is, at once, simple and direct; and it is this, the very passages which we might least expect to and on the page of inspiration teach us, in their own peculiar way, the moral material of which we are made, and the moral depths into which we are capable of plunging. And is not this of great moment? Is it not well to have a faithful mirror held up before our eyes in which we may see every moral trait, feature and lineament perfectly reflected? Unquestionably. We hear a great deal about the dignity of human nature, and very many find it exceedingly hard to admit that they are really capable of committing some of the sins prohibited in the section before us, and in other portions of the divine Volume. But we may rest assured that when God commands us not to commit this or that particular sin, we are verily capable of committing it. This is beyond all question. Divine wisdom would never erect a dam if there was not a current to be resisted. There would be no necessity to tell an angel not to steal; but man has theft in his nature, and hence the command applies to him. And just so in reference to every other prohibited thing; the prohibition proves the tendency – proves it beyond all question. We must either admit this or imply the positive blasphemy that God has spoken in vain.
But then it may be said; and is said by many, that while some very terrible samples of fallen humanity are capable of committing some of the abominable sins prohibited in scripture, yet all are not so. This is a most thorough mistake. Hear what the Holy Ghost says, in the seventeenth chapter of the prophet Jeremiah. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.” Whose heart is he speaking of? Is it the heart of some atrocious criminal, or of some untutored savage? Nay; it is the human heart, the heart of the writer and of the reader of these lines.
Hear also what our Lord Jesus Christ says on this subject. “Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.” Out of what heart? Is it the heart of some hideously depraved and abominable wretch wholly unfit to appear in decent society? Nay; it is out of the human heart the heart of the writer and of the reader of these lines.
Let us never forget this; it is a wholesome truth for every one of us. We all need to bear in mind that if God were to withdraw His sustaining grace, for one moment, there is no depth of iniquity into which we are not capable of plunging; indeed, we may add – and we do it with deep thankfulness it is His own gracious hand that preserves us, each moment, from becoming a complete wreck, in every way, physically, mentally, morally, spiritually, and in our circumstances. May we keep this ever in the remembrance of the thoughts of our hearts, so that we may walk humbly and watchfully, and lean upon that arm which alone can sustain and preserve us!
But, we have said, there is another valuable lesson furnished by this section of our book which now lies open before us. It teaches us, in a manner peculiar to itself, the marvellous way in which God provided for everything connected with His people. Nothing escaped His gracious notice; nothing was too trivial for His tender care. No mother could be more careful of the habits and manners of her little child, than the Almighty Creator and moral Governor of the universe was of the most minute details connected with the daily history of His people. By day and by night, waking and sleeping at home and abroad, He looked after them. Their clothing, their food, their manners and ways toward one another, how they were to build their houses, how they were to plough and sow their ground, how they were to carry themselves in the deepest privacy of their personal life – all was attended to and provided for in a manner that fills us with wonder, love and praise. We may here see, in a most striking way, that there is nothing too small for our God to take notice of when His people are concerned. He takes a loving, tender, fatherly interest in their most minute concerns. We are amazed to find the Most High God, the Creator of the ends of the earth, the Sustainer of the vast universe, condescending to legislate about the matter of a bird’s nest; and yet why should we be amazed when we know that it is just the same to Him to provide for a sparrow as to feed a thousand millions of people daily?
But there was one grand fact which was ever to be kept prominently before each member of the congregation of Israel, namely, the divine presence in their midst. This fact was to govern their most private habits, and give character to all their ways. “The Lord thy God walketh in the midst of thy camp, to deliver thee, and to give up, thine enemies before thee; therefore shall thy camp be holy; that he see no unclean thing in thee, and turn away from thee.” (Deut. 23: 14.)
What a precious privilege to have Jehovah walking in their midst! What a motive for purity of conduct, and refined delicacy in their persons and domestic habits! If He was in their midst to secure victory over their enemies, He was also there to demand holiness of life. They were never, for one moment, to forget the august Person who walked up and down in their midst. Would the thought of this be irksome to any? Only to such as did not love holiness, purity and moral order. Every true Israelite would delight in the thought of having One dwelling in their midst who could not endure ought that was unholy, unseemly or impure.
The Christian reader will be at no loss to seize the moral force and application of this holy principle. It is our privilege to have God the Spirit dwelling in us, individually and collectively. Thus we read, in 1 Corinthians 6: 19, “What! know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” This is individual. Each believer is a temple of the Holy Ghost, and this most glorious and precious truth is the ground of the exhortation given in Ephesians 4: 30, “Grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.”
How very important to keep this ever in the remembrance of the thoughts of our hearts! What a mighty moral motive for the diligent cultivation of purity of heart, and holiness of life! When tempted to indulge in any wrong current of thought or feeling, any unworthy manner of speech, any unseemly line of conduct, what a powerful corrective would be found in the realisation of the blessed fact that the Holy Spirit dwells in our body as in His temple! If only we could keep this ever before us it would preserve us from many a wandering thought, many an unguarded and foolish utterance, many an unbecoming act.
But, not only does the Holy Spirit dwell in each individual believer, He also dwells in the church collectively. “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Cor. 3: 16.) It is upon this fact that the apostle grounds his exhortation in 1 Thess 5: 19 “Quench not the Spirit.” How divinely perfect is scripture! How blessedly it hangs together! The Holy Ghost dwells in us individually; hence we are not to grieve Him. He dwells in the assembly, hence we are not to quench Him, but give Him His right place, and allow full scope for His blessed operations. May these great practical truths find a deep place in our hearts, and exerts more powerful influence over our ways both in private life and in the public assembly!
We shall now proceed to quote a few passages from the section of our book which now lies open before us strikingly illustrative of the wisdom, goodness, tenderness, holiness and righteousness which marked all the dealings of God with His people of old. Take, for example, the very opening paragraph. “Thou shalt not see thy brother’s ox or his sheep go astray, and hide thyself from them; thou shalt in any case bring them again unto thy brother. And if thy brother be not nigh unto thee, or if thou know him not, then thou shalt bring it unto thine own house, and it shall be with thee until thy brother seek after it, and thou shalt restore it to him again. In like manner shalt thou do with his ass; and so shalt thou do with his raiment; and with all lost thing of thy brother’s, which he hath lost, and thou hast found shalt thou do likewise; thou mayest not hide thyself. Thou shalt not see thy brother’s ass or his ox fall down by the way, and hide thyself from them; thou shalt surely help him to lift them up again” (Deut. 22: 1-4)
Here the two lessons of which we have spoken are, very distinctly, presented. What a deeply humbling picture of the human heart have we in that one sentence, “Thou mayest not hide thyself!” We are capable of the base and detestable selfishness of hiding ourselves from our brother’s claims upon our sympathy and succour – of shirking the holy duty of looking after his interests – of pretending not to see his real need of our aid. Such is man! Such is the writer!
But oh! how blessedly the character of our God shines out in this passage! The brother’s ox, or his sheep, or his ass was not – to use a modern phrase – to be thrust into pound, for trespass; it was to be brought home, cared for, and restored, safe and sound, to the owner without charge for damage. And so with the raiment. How lovely is all this! How it breathes upon us the very air of the divine presence, the fragrant atmosphere of divine goodness, tenderness and thoughtful love! What a high and holy privilege for any people to have their conduct governed and their character formed by such exquisite statutes and judgements!
Again, take the following passage so beautifully illustrative of divine thoughtfulness: “When thou buildest a new house, then thou shalt make a battlement for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thine house, if any man fall from thence.” The Lord would have His people thoughtful and considerate of others; and hence, in building their houses, they were not merely to think of themselves, and their convenience, but also of others and their safety.
Cannot Christians learn something from this? How prone we are to think only of ourselves, our own interests, our own comfort and convenience! How rarely it happens that, in the building or furnishing of our houses, we bestow a thought upon other people! We build and furnish for ourselves; alas! self is too much our object and motive spring in all our undertakings; nor can it be otherwise unless the heart be kept under the governing power of those motives and objects which belong to Christianity. We must live in the pure and heavenly atmosphere of the new creation, in order to get above and beyond the base selfishness which characterizes fallen humanity. Every unconverted man woman and child on the face of the earth is governed simply by self, in some shape or another. Self is the centre, the object, the motive-spring of every action.
True, some are more amiable, more affectionate, more benevolent, more unselfish, more disinterested, more agreeable than others; but it is utterly impossible that “the natural man” can be governed by spiritual motives, or an earthly man be animated by heavenly objects. Alas! We have to confess, with shame and sorrow, that we who profess to be heavenly and spiritual are so prone to live for ourselves, to seek our own things, to maintain our own interests, to consult our own ease and convenience. We are all alive and on the alert when self, in any shape or form, is concerned.
All this is most sad and deeply humbling. It really ought not to be, and it would not be if we were looking more simply and earnestly to Christ as our great Exemplar and model in all things. Earnest and constant occupation of heart with Christ is the true secret of all practical Christianity. It is not rules and regulations that will ever make us Christ-like in our spirit, manner and ways. We must drink into His spirit, walk in His footsteps, dwell more profoundly upon His moral glories, and then we shall, of blessed necessity, be conformed to His image. “We all with open face beholding as in a glass [or mirror katoptrizomenoi.] the glory, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the, Spirit of the Lord.” (2 Cor. 3.)
We must now ask the reader to turn, for a moment, to the following very important practical instructions – full of suggestive power for all Christian workers “Thou shalt not sow thy vineyard with divers seeds, lest the fruit of thy seed which thou hast sown, and the fruit of thy vineyard be defiled.” (Deut. 22: 9.)
What a weighty principle is here! Do we really understand it? Do we see its true spiritual application? It is to be feared there is a terrible amount of “mingled seed” used in the so-called spiritual husbandry of the present day. How much of “philosophy and vain deceit.,” how much of “science falsely so called,” how much of “the rudiments of the world” do we find mixed up in the teaching and preaching throughout the length and breadth of the professing church! How little of the pure, unadulterated seed of the word of God, the “incorruptible seed” of the precious gospel of Christ, is scattered broadcast over the field of Christendom, in this our day! How few, comparatively, are content to confine themselves within the covers of the Bible for the material of their ministry! Those who are, by the grace of God faithful enough to do so, are looked upon as men of one idea, men of the old school, narrow and behind the times.
Well, we can only say, with a full and glowing heart, God bless the men of one idea, men of the precious old school of apostolic preaching! Most heartily do we congratulate them on their blessed narrowness, and their being behind these dark and infidel times. We are fully aware of what we expose ourselves to in thus writing; but this does not move us. We are persuaded that every true servant of Christ must be a man of one idea, and that idea is Christ; he must belong to the very oldest school, the school of Christ; he must be as narrow as the truth of God; and he must, with stern decision, refuse to move one hair’s breadth in the direction of this infidel age. We cannot shake off the conviction that the effort on the part of the preachers and teachers of Christendom to keep abreast of the literature of the day must, to a very large extent, account for the rapid advance of rationalism and infidelity. They have got away from the holy scriptures, and sought to adorn their ministry by the resources of philosophy, science and literature. They have catered more for the intellect than for the heart and conscience. The pure and precious doctrines of holy scripture, the sincere milk of the word, the gospel of the grace of God and of the glory of Christ, were found insufficient to attract and keep together large congregations. As Israel of old despised the manna, got tired of it, and pronounced it light food, so the professing church grew weary of the pure doctrines of that glorious Christianity unfolded in the pages of the New Testament, and sighed for something to gratify the intellect, and feed the imagination. The doctrines of the cross, in which the blessed apostle gloried, have lost their charm for the professing church, and any who would be faithful enough to adhere and confine themselves in their ministry to those doctrines might abandon all thought of popularity.
But let all the true and faithful ministers of Christ, all true workers in His vineyard apply their hearts to the spiritual principle set forth in Deuteronomy 22: 9; let them, with unflinching decision, refuse to make use of “divers seeds” in their spiritual husbandry; let them confine themselves in their ministry to “the form of sound words,” and ever seek “rightly to divide the word of truth,” that so: they may not be ashamed of their work, but receive a full reward in that day when every man’s work shall be tried of what sort it is. We may depend upon it, the word of God – the pure seed – is the only proper material for the spiritual workman to use. We do not despise learning; far from it, we consider it most valuable in its right place. The facts of science, too, and the resources of sound philosophy may all be turned to profitable account in unfolding and illustrating the truth of holy scripture. We find the blessed Master Himself and His inspired apostles making use of the facts of history and of nature in their public teaching; and who in his sober senses, would think of calling in question the value and importance of a competent knowledge of the original languages of Hebrew and Greek, in the private study and public exposition of the word of God?
But admitting all this, as we most fully do, it leaves wholly untouched the great practical principle before us-a principle to which all the Lord’s people and His servants are bound to adhere, namely, that the Holy Ghost is the only power, and holy scripture the only material for all true ministry in the gospel and the church of God. If this were more fully understood and faithfully acted upon, we should witness a very different condition of things throughout the length and breadth of the vineyard of Christ.
Here, however, we must close this section. We have elsewhere sought to handle the subject of “The Unequal Yoke,” and shall not therefore dwell upon it here.* The Israelite was not to plow with an ox and an ass together; neither was he to wear a, garment of divers sorts, as of woollen and linen. The spiritual application of both these things is as simple as it is important. The Christian is not to link himself with an unbeliever, for any object whatsoever, be it domestic, religious, philanthropic, or commercial, neither must he allow himself to be governed by mixed principles. His character must be formed and his conduct ruled by the pure and lofty principles of the word of God. Thus may it be with all who profess and call themselves Christians.
{*See a pamphlet entitled, “The Unequal Yoke.”}
Fuente: Mackintosh’s Notes on the Pentateuch
Deu 25:1-3. Another of Dt.s humanitarian laws. Punishment by the bastinado among the ancient Hebrews and Egyptians was common (see Wilkinson- Birch, Ancient Egyptians, i. pp. 305, 308). The present writer saw it in Egypt in 1888; see Exo 21:20 (showing that a slave was sometimes beaten to death), Pro 10:13; Pro 19:29.
Deu 25:3. The forty stripes became thirty- nine (2Co 11:24) in later times to prevent the proper number from being exceeded.
Deu 25:4. God cares even for oxen (1Co 9:9 f.* misapplies this verse) and other dumb animals (Deu 15:12-18, cf. Jon 4:11). Oxen should be allowed to partake of the corn on which in threshing they tread.
Deu 25:5-10. Levirate (Lat. levir, husbands brother) marriage (p. 109) prevailed widely in ancient times; McLennan traces it to polyandry. Here the motives are to secure succession on the male side and to prevent the family estate from being alienated (Deu 25:9).
Deu 25:9. loose his shoe: a sign of transference (Rth 4:7*), here of the mans honour.spit: Num 12:14, Job 30:10, Isa 50:6.
Deu 25:10. His family shares his disgrace (Deu 21:1-9*).
Deu 25:11 f. Cf. CH, 195: If a man has struck his father his hands shall be cut off (often wrongly translated and then compared with Deu 25:11 f.).
Deu 25:13-16. Lev 19:35 f.* (H). That this prohibition was needed is shown by Amo 8:5, Mic 6:10 f.; cf. Eze 45:10. The great weight was used for buying, the small for selling.
Deu 25:17-19. Repeats Exo 17:8-13* (H). Since the Amalekites had been exterminated under Saul (1Sa 14:48; 1Sa 14:15; 1Sa 27:8) and by David (1Sa 30:17, 2Sa 8:12; cf. Numbers 20) how could a command go forth in the seventh century B.C. to destroy them? D writes from the point of view of Moses time.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
JUSTICE TEMPERED WITH MERCY
(vs.1-3)
In the law courts the judges must mete out proper justice, yet not to exceed the limits of justice. If one was guilty of serious crime, it was right to have him beaten, lying down. But never was he to receive more than forty strokes. Paul writes in 2Co 11:24, “From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one.” The Jews at least respected this particular law, for they lessened the number to 39 in case they had miscounted. But they treated Paul as they would the worst criminal.
It may seem strange that at this place verse 4 is inserted, “You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads the corn.” But this illustrates the fact that only the spiritual application can explain it. This is supplied in 1Co 9:9-10, when Paul tells us this verse is written for our sakes. The ox speaks of one who labors for the Lord, who therefore is entitled to the consideration of being allowed to be supported by his labors. Though one guilty of serious crime was to be punished (vs.1-3), one who labored for the Lord was to be rewarded.
IN CASE OF A HUSBAND’S DEATH
(vs.5-10)
This law had application only in cases of brothers living together. If one of them was married, yet died having no son, his brother was not to marry an outsider, but was to take his deceased brother’s widow as his wife (v.5). (Of course this was only in cases where the living brother had not married before.) But if a son was born of the newly married couple, he was to be the successor of the first husband, so that his name would remain in Israel (v.6). After that any sons born would be those of the second husband.
It might be, however, that the man would not want his brother’s wife. In this case the wife was allowed to bring the matter to the court (in the gate of the city) and the elders could call the man and seek to persuade him to marry the widow (vs.7-8). If he should firmly refuse to marry her, then the widow would be permitted to remove the sandal from the man’s foot and spit in his face saying at the same time, “So shall it be done to the man who will not build up his brother’s house” (v.9). This is why, in Rth 4:1-8, a closer relative than Boaz had his sandal taken off when he could not take the place of husband to Ruth. This relative represents the law, which was in close relationship to Israel, but was helpless to redeem that nation. Boaz pictures the Lord Jesus, the only One who can redeem, to build up the house of one whose hope was gone, taking off the sandal had become a custom in Israel, but spitting in the face is not mentioned. Spitting speaks of the contempt of the one for the other, while the sandal removed signified the confessed weakness of the one in the presence of a superior, just as the law must confess its weakness in contrast to Christ, the Man of strength and of infinite grace.
FURTHER MISCELLANEOUS LAWS
(vs.11-16)
The judgment for a woman in verses 11 and 12 is extremely severe, but it was for an action totally unbecoming to a woman In fact, even a man would hesitate to act in this way. But to have a hand cut off would be a traumatic reminder of her guilty action for the rest of her life.
Having differing weights is forbidden, one weight being large, the other small, one for selling, the other for buying, so that the user might be able to cheat the other party (v.14). Spiritually too, we should be careful not to have one measure of judgment for a certain case and another measure for another case. Weights and measures must be perfect and just. One pound is to be precisely one pound, one yard precisely one yard. Strict honesty in such things would lengthen the days of an Israelite in the land (v.15). More than this, those who violate such principles of honesty are called by God “an abomination to the Lord your God.” God takes full account.
AMALEK TO BE DESTROYED
(vs.17-19)
This section is closely connected with the previous verses. Amalek had attacked Israel as they came out of Egypt, striking all the stragglers whom they knew would be the weakest, the most tired and weary (Exo 17:8-16). Israel was not to forget this hateful animosity, but when settled in their land they were to “blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven” (v.19).
Why was such a total judgment necessary? Because Amalek pictures “the lusts of the flesh” which war against our souls. God will not allow such things to be spared, and it is important that we take sides with God against the lustful desires that both dishonor God and harm our own souls. When King Saul was told by God through Samuel to attack and utterly destroy Amalek (1Sa 15:2-3), he gained the victory over them, but spared their king, Agag (v.8) and the best of the livestock (v.9). He was not only solemnly reproved for this, but told, “Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He also has rejected you from being king” (1Sa 15:22-23). If we spare our own sinful lusts, we are in no condition to lead others.
Fuente: Grant’s Commentary on the Bible
25:1 If there be a controversy between men, and they come unto judgment, {a} that [the judges] may judge them; then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked.
(a) Whether there is a plaintiff or not, the magistrates should try our faults, and punish according to the crime.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Criminals 25:1-3
Beating was a form of punishment used in Israel for various offenses. However the safety and personal dignity of the person being beaten was important to God even though he or she deserved the beating. These things were also to be important to God’s people.
"This was the Egyptian mode of whipping, as we may see depicted upon the monuments, when the culprits lie flat upon the ground, and being held fast by the hands and feet, receive their strokes in the presence of the judge. . . . The number forty was not to be exceeded, because a larger number of strokes with a stick would not only endanger health and life, but disgrace the man. . . . If he had deserved a severer punishment, he was to be executed. . . . The number, forty, was probably chosen with reference to its symbolical significance, which it had derived from Gen. vii. 12 onwards, as the full measure of judgment. The Rabbins fixed the number at forty save one (vid. 2 Cor. xi. 24), from a scrupulous fear of transgressing the letter of the law, in case a mistake should be made in the counting; yet they felt no conscientious scruples about using a whip of twisted thongs instead of a stick." [Note: Ibid., 3:421.]
Deu 25:1 points out very clearly that "justify" means to declare righteous, not to make righteous. This distinction is very important to a correct understanding of the doctrine of justification as God has revealed it in Scripture. Generally speaking the Protestant Reformers failed to express this distinction clearly. To combat the Roman Catholic charge that justification by faith alone leads to antinomianism, some of them went beyond the proper definition of justification and taught that the justified believer will inevitably persevere in faith and good works. [Note: See Dillow, pp. 14, 25-41.]
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
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LAWS OF KINDNESS
WITH the commands we now have to consider, we leave altogether the region of strict law, and enter entirely upon that of aspiration and of feeling. Kindness, by its very nature, eludes the rude compulsion of law, properly so called. It ceases to be kindness when it loses spontaneity and freedom. Precept, therefore, not law, is the utmost that any lawgiver can give in respect to it; and this is precisely what we have in Deuteronomy, so far as it endeavors to incite men to gentleness, goodness, and courtesy to one another. The author gives his people an ideal of what they ought to be in these respects, and presses it home upon them with the heartfelt earnestness which distinguishes him. That is all; but yet, if we are to do justice to him as a lawgiver, we must consider and estimate the moral value of these precepts; for, properly speaking, they are the flower of his legal principles, and they reveal in detail, and therefore, for the average man, most impressively, the spirit in which his whole legislation was conceived. In the abstract no doubt he had told us that love-love to Yahweh-was to he the fundamental thing, and we have seen how deep and wide-reaching that announcement was. But a review of the precepts which indicate how he conceived that love to God should affect mens relations with men, will give that general principle a definiteness and a concreteness more impressive than a thousand homilies. For the conception that a relation of love is the only fit relation between man and God, could not, if it were sincerely taken up, fail to throw light upon mens true relations to each other. Consequently the great declaration of the sixth chapter was bound to re-echo in the precepts to guide conduct, giving new sanctity and breadth to all mans duty to his fellows.
Of course the risk of great failure was nigh at hand: for men may be intellectually convinced that love is the element in which life ought to be lived, and may proclaim it, who are far from being actually penetrated and filled with love, tested and increased by communion with God. As a result, much talk about love and kindly human duty has fallen with but little impulsive power upon the hearts of men. When, however, it is felt to be the expression of a present experience, such exhortation has power to move men as no other words can do. And the author of Deuteronomy was one of those who had this divinely given secret. In all parts of his book you find his words becoming winged with power, wherever love to God and man is even remotely touched upon. If our hypothesis as to the age in which he lived and wrote be correct, his must have been one of those high and rare natures which are not embittered by persecution or contemptuous neglect. Long before our Lord had spoken His decisive words on our duty to our neighbor, or St. Paul had written his great hymn to love, this man of God had been chosen to feel the truth, and had suffused his book with it, so that the only principle which can be recognized as binding together all his precepts is the central principle of the New Testament. Of course that made his ideal too high for present realization; but he gained more than he lost; for, from Jeremiah and Josiah downwards through the years, all the noblest of his people responded to him. The splendor of his thought cast reflections upon their minds, and these glowed and shone amid the meaner lights which Pharisaism kindled and cherished, till He came whose right it was to reign. Then Deuteronomys true rank was seen; for from it Christ took the answers by which He repelled Satan in the temptation, and from it, too, He took that commandment which He called the first and greatest. Of course the humanity of the book had not, in expression at least, the imperial sweep of Christian brotherhood which makes all men equal, so that for it there is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither wise nor unwise, neither male nor female, neither bond nor free. But all the chosen people are included in its sympathy; and in this field, without undue interference with private life, the author sets forth by specimen cases how the fraternal feeling should manifest itself in loving, neighborly kindness.
As these laws or precepts of kindness are not systematically arranged, it will be necessary to group them, and we shall take first those in which it is prescribed that injury to others should be avoided. Of course criminal wrongs are not dealt with here. They have already been forbidden in the strictly legal portions of the book, and penalties have been attached to them. But in the region beyond law, there are many acts in which the difference between a good, and kindly, and sympathetic man, and a morose, and sullen, and unkindly one, can be even more clearly seen. In that region Deuteronomy is unmistakably on the side of sympathy. The poor, the slave, the helpless should, it teaches, be objects of special care to the true son of Israel. They should be treated, it shows, with a generous perception of the peculiar difficulties of their lot; and pressure upon them at these special points where their lot is hard should be abhorrent to every Israelite.
The first in order of the precepts which we are considering {Deu 22:8}-“When thou buildest a new house, then thou shalt make a railing for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thine house, if any man fall from thence”-reveals the fatherly and loving temper which it is the authors delight to attribute to Yahweh. As earthly parents guard their children from accidents and dangers, so Yahweh thinks of possible danger to the lives of His people, and calls for even minute precautions. The habit of sitting and sleeping upon the flat roofs of the houses has always been, and is now, prevalent in the East. Many accidents take place through this habit. In recent years Emin Pasha, who ruled so long at Wadelai, nearly lost his life by one; and here the house-owner is required in Yahwehs name to minimize that danger, “that he bring not blood upon his house.” The life of each one of Yahwehs people is precious to Him; therefore it is that He will have them to guard one another. This is the principle which runs through all these precepts. In the sphere of ritual and religion the Deuteronomist does not transcend Old Testament conditions. For him as for others it is the nation which is the unit. But in the region now before us he virtually goes beyond that limitation, and emphasizes the care of Yahweh for the individual, just as in the demand for love to God he had already made Israels relation to their God depend upon each mans personal attitude. The thought that the Divine care was exerted over even “such a set of paltry ill-given animalcules as himself and his nation were,” according to Carlyles phrase, does not stagger him as it staggered Frederick the Great.
In matters like these, the unsophisticated religion, of the Old Testament is most helpful to us today. We have analyzed, and refined, and dimmed all things into abstractions, God and man among the rest. The fearless simplicity of the Old Testament restores us to ourselves, and pours fresh blood into the veins of our religion. No faith in God as the living orderer of all the circumstances of our lives can be too strong or too detailed. The stronger and more definite it becomes, the nearer will it approach the truth. Only one danger can threaten us on that line, the danger of taking all our own plans and desires for the Divinely appointed path for us. But most men will by natural humility be saved from that presumption; and the glad assurance that they are wrapped about with the love of God is perhaps the greatest need of Gods people in their many skeptical and unspiritual hours.
We cannot, therefore, be surprised that, in connection with debts and pledges for payment, the same kindness in the Divine commands should be observable. As usury was forbidden in Israel, and precautions against excessive indebtedness were exceedingly elaborate, the possibilities of oppression in connection with debt in Israel were much more limited than in most ancient communities. Nevertheless there was here a region of life in which great wrongs could still be done by a harsh and unscrupulous creditor. In order that the creditor might have some security for what he had lent, it was permitted to receive and give pledges. The precepts regarding these are contained in Deu 24:6; Deu 24:10 ff; Deu 24:17, and express a considerate brotherly spirit, for which it would be hard to find a parallel either in ancient or modern times. The creditor who has taken a poor mans upper garment as a pledge is commanded, both in the Book of the Covenant and in Deuteronomy., to restore the garment to its owner in the evening, that he may sleep in it. In Palestine for much of the year the nights are cold enough, and the poor man has no covering save his ordinary clothes. To deprive him of these, therefore, is to inflict punishment upon him, whereas all that should be aimed at is the creditors security. This was peculiarly offensive to Israelite feeling, as we see from the mention in Amo 2:8 of the breach of this prescription as one of the sins for which Yahweh would not turn away Israels punishment. Further, in no case was a widows garment to be taken in pledge, nor the hand-mill used for preparing the daily flour, for that is taking “life” in pledge, as the Deuteronomist says with the feeling for the conditions of the poor mans life which he always shows.
But the crown of all this kindness is found in the beautiful tenth verse: “When thou dost lend thy neighbor any manner of loan, thou shalt not go into his house to fetch his pledge; thou shalt stand without, and the man to whom thou dost lend shall bring forth the pledge without unto thee.” Not only does Yahweh care for external and physical pain, He sympathizes with those deeper wrongs and pains which may hurt a mans feelings. If a pledge to satisfy the lender had to be given, scruples of delicacy on-the part of the borrower would appear to the “practical” man, as he would call himself, contemptibly misplaced. If the mans feelings were so very superfine, why did he borrow? But the author of Deuteronomy knew the heart of God better. With the fine tact of a man of God, he knew how even the well-meaning rich mans amused contempt for the poor mans few household treasures would cut like a whip, and he knew that Yahweh, who was “very pitiful and of tender mercy,” would desire no son of Israel to be exposed to it. He knew, too, how human greed might dispose the lender to seize upon the thing of greatest value in the poor house, whether its price was in excess of the loan or not. Finally, he knew how it deteriorates the poor to be dealt with in an unceremonious, tactless way even by the benevolent. And in the name and with the authority of God he forbids it. The poor mans home, the home of the man whom we desire to help especially, is to be sacred. In our dealing with him of all men the finest courtesy is to be brought into play. Just because he needs our help, we are to stand on points of ceremony with him, which we might dispense with in dealing with friends and equals. “Thou shalt stand without,” unless he asks thee to enter; and thou shalt show thereby, in a deeper way than any gifts or loans can show, that the fraternal tie is acknowledged and reverenced.
In two other precepts the same delicate regard for the finer feelings finds expression. In the fifth verse it is commanded that “When a man taketh a new wife, he shall not go out in the host, neither shall he be charged with any business: he shall be free at home one year, and shall cheer his wife that he hath taken.” The strangeness and loneliness which everywhere make themselves felt as a formidable drawback to a young wifes joy, and which in a polygamous family, where jealousies are bitter, must often have reached the point of being intolerable, are provided for. In Deu 25:1-3 again, which deals with the punishment of criminals by beating, it is provided that in no case shall the number of blows exceed forty, and that they shall be given in the presence of the judge. This in itself was a measure of humanity, but the reason given for the direction is greatly more humane. “Forty stripes he may give him,” says Deu 25:3; “he shall not exceed; lest, if he should exceed, and beat him above these with many stripes, then thy brother should seem vile unto thee.” Even in the case of the criminal care is to be taken that he be not made an object of contempt. Punishment has gone beyond its true aim when it makes a man seem vile unto his neighbors by attacking his dignity as a man; for that should be inalienable even in a criminal. A man may have all his material wants satisfied, and yet be sorely vexed and injured. God sympathizes with these hurts of the soul, and defends His people against them.
After the loving kindness of these commands, it seems almost needless to say that the smaller social wrongs which men may inflict upon each other are sternly forbidden. Often, the rich from want of thought about the life of the poor carelessly do them wrong. Such a case is that dealt with in Deu 24:14 f.: “Thou shalt not oppress a hired servant that is poor and needy, whether he be of thy brethren, or of thy strangers (gerim) that are in thy land within thy gates: in his day thou shalt give him his hire, neither shall the sun go down upon it; for he is poor, and setteth his heart upon it: lest he cry against thee unto Yahweh, and it be sin unto thee.” The same command is given in Lev 19:13, and Dillmann is probably right in regarding this as a Deuteronomic repetition of that, since there the precept forms part of a pentad of commands dealing with similar things, while here it stands alone. From early times, therefore, Yahweh had revealed Himself as considering the poor and the necessities of their position. Further, the poor man or the wayfarer was permitted to satisfy his hunger by taking fruit or grain in his hands as he passed through the fields. No one was to die of starvation if the fields were “yielding meat.” Last of all, estrangement between brethren, i.e., all Israelites, was not to free them from duties of neighborly love. If a man find a stray ox or sheep or ass, or a garment or any other lost thing, he is not to leave it where he finds it. He is to restore it to the owner; and if the owner is unknown or too far off, the finder is to keep that which he has found till it is inquired after. Then if he see his brothers, i.e., his neighbors, ass or ox fallen by the way, he must not pass by, but must help the owner to set it on its feet again. That an estranged “brother” was especially in view is shown by the fact that in the parallel passage {Exo 23:4} “thine enemys ox” and “the ass of him that hateth thee” are mentioned.
Now, we have called these precepts and provisions the flower and blossom of the Deuteronomic legislation, because they reveal in their greatest perfection that sympathy with the commonest and the innermost cares of men which is the moving impulse of it all. But they reveal more than that. They show that already in those far-off days the secret of Gods love to man had been made known. Its universality so far as Israel was concerned, its penetrative sympathy, its quality of regarding no human interest as outside its scope, its superhuman impartiality-all are here. They are not of course present in their full sweep and power, as Christ made them known. Outside of Israel there were the Gentiles, who had a share only in the “uncovenanted mercies” of God; and even among the chosen people there were the slaves and the strangers, who had a comparatively insecure relation to Him. Further, the thought of the self-sacrifice of God, though soon to have its dawning in the later chapters of Isaiah, was not as yet an appreciable element in the Israelite theology. Nevertheless the passages we have been considering throw a light upon social duty, as seen by this inspired servant of God, which puts to shame the state of the Christian mind on these subjects even now.
The great principles underlying right relations between men of different social status are, according to these precepts, courtesy and consideration. Now it is precisely the want of these which lies at the root of the bitterness which is so alarming a symptom of our social state at present. There is not, we are willing to believe, much of intentional, deliberate oppression exercised by the strong upon the weak. The injustice that is done is probably inherent in the present social system, for the character of which no one living is responsible. But one reason why reform comes so slowly, and why patience till it can come dies out among the masses of men, is that the employing classes, and those who have inherited privileges, often convey to those they employ the impression that they are beyond the pale of the courtesies which are recognized as binding between men of the same class. Often without intending it, their manner when they are approached by those they employ, their short and half-aggrieved replies, reveal to the latter that they are regarded much more as parts of the machinery, than as men who might naturally be expected to claim, and who have a right to, the recognition of their rights as men.
Of course there are excuses. There is the long tradition of subordination to arbitrary power, from which none in earlier ages of the world have been free. There is the impatience with which a governing and organizing mind listens to grievances which it sees either to be inevitable under the circumstances, or to be compensated by some corresponding privilege, which stands or falls with the thing complained of. And then there is the absence of outlook, which is the foible of the directing mind. It is set to rule and make successful a large and intricate business under given circumstances. The more effective such a mind is for practical purposes, the more thoroughly will it limit itself to working out the problem committed to it. When grievances have to be dealt with which have their root in the present circumstances, and which imply changes more or less radical in his fixed point if they are to be redressed, it is hard for the employer to persuade himself that his employees are not merely crying for the moon. If he think so, he will probably say so; and working men go away from such interviews with the feeling that it is vain to expect from employers any sympathy for their aspirations towards a better social state, which yet they cannot give up without a slur upon their manhood.
But though these are excuses for the attitude we have been describing, there can be no question that the fine and delicate courtesy which Deuteronomy prescribes is indispensable in order to avert class hostility. Courtesy cannot, of course, change our social state, and where it works badly evils that produce friction will remain. But the first condition of a successful solution of our difficulties is, that evil tempers should as far as possible be banished, and for that purpose courtesy even under provocation is the one sovereign remedy. For it means that you convey to your neighbor that you consider him in all essentials your equal. It means, too, that you are willing to recognize his rights and to respect them. Though power may be on your side, and weakness on his, that will only make it more incumbent upon you to show that mere external circumstances cannot impair your reverence for him as man. If that be sincerely felt, it opens a way, otherwise absolutely closed, to mutual confidence and mutual understanding. These once established, light on all parts of the social problem (which, be it remembered, employers and employed must solve together if it is to be solved at all) will break in upon the minds of both classes. In spite of the diversity of their immediate interests, the ultimate interest of all is the same. If contempt and suspicion were excluded, eyes which are now holden would be opened, and a common effort to reach a social state in which all men shall have the opportunity of living lives worthy of men would become possible. If all would learn to treat those of other classes with the courtesy which they constantly show to those of their own, a great step in the right direction would be taken. Men overlook much and forgive much to their fellows when these recognize their equality, and show that they attach importance to having good relations with them.
But much more is to be aimed at than that. The esteem for man as man has great conquests yet to make before even the Deuteronomic courtesy becomes common. But if these nobler manners are to come in, then the motives suggested by Deuteronomy will have to be made effective for our day. What these were it is not difficult to see. They all had their source in the authors own relations and the relations of his people to God. Each of his brethren of the chosen people was a friend of Yahweh. There was no difference between Israelite men before Him. He had brought them all, the poor and the weak, as well as the rich and the strong, out of the house of bondage; He had guided them all through the wilderness, and had appointed each household a place in His land where full communion with Him was to be had. He had thought many thoughts about them, had given them laws and statutes dictated by loving insight, so as to fill their life with the consciousness that Yahweh loved them, condescended to them, and even allowed Himself to be made to serve by their sins. Whatever else they might be, they were friends of God, and had a right to respect on that ground. And for us who are Christians all these motives have been intensified and raised to a higher power. It is not lawful for us to call any man common or unclean. It is not lawful to overwhelm and bear down the minds of others by sheer energy and power. Those “for whom Christ died” are not to be dealt with save on the worthy plane of moral and spiritual conviction. That is the law of Christ; and so long as it is broken in our labor troubles by contemptuous refusal of conference when it can be granted without compromising principle, or by slighting references to labor leaders and a refusal to meet them, when leaders of another class would be courteously met, so long will the bitterness which inevitably springs up trouble us.
It is not, however, to be supposed that only the rich can sin in this respect. The labor organizations are becoming in many places, the stronger, and so far they have learned the law of courtesy no better than their opponents. Opprobrious epithets and injurious suspicions and accusations are the stock-in-trade of some who lead the labor cause. That is as unworthy in them as it would be in others; it is not only a crime, but a blunder.
But the practice of courtesy does not end with itself. It opens the way for that consideration of the circumstances of the poor which we have found so conspicuous in Deuteronomy. As we have seen, Yahwehs precepts contemplate with the nicest care the unavoidable necessities of the poor mans life. So He stirs us to endeavor to realize the conditions of our poorer brethren, and by doing so to avoid the blunders which well-meaning people make by assuming that the conditions of their own life are the norm. There are vast varieties of circumstance in the world; and from lack of consideration those more favorably situated excite envies and hatreds the bitterness of which they cannot conceive, by simply taking it for granted that every one has the same opportunities for recreation, the same possibilities of rest. To realize clearly what life and death mean to the toiling millions of men; to see that matters which are small to those who live the materially larger and freer life of the class above them are of vital moment to the poor; to consider and allow for all such things in their dealings with them, -this is the teaching of Deuteronomy. Hence the command to pay the laborer his wages in the same day. The heart of man responds when this note is struck. In nothing is the story of Gautama the Buddha more true to the best instincts of humanity than in this, that it represents him as making his great renunciation through coming into intimate contact with the pain and misery of ordinary life. That gave him insight, and insight wrought sympathy, and sympathy transformed him from being a petty prince of Northern India into the consoler and helper of millions in all Eastern lands. Even hopeless pessimism, when born of sympathy, has an immense consoling power. Much more should the inextinguishable hope given by Christ, combined as it is with the same sympathetic insight, console men and uplift them.
But the sixteenth verse of chapter 23, reminds us that in that ancient Deuteronomic world there were sad limitations to these lofty sympathies and hopes. If intensively Deuteronomy almost reaches the Gospel, extensively it shows the whole difference between Judaism at its best and Christianity. Below the world of free-born members of the Israelite community, to whom the precepts we have hitherto been considering alone apply, there was the class of slaves, who in many respects lay beyond the region of the finer charities. The origin of slavery we need not discuss. It was a quite universal feature in all ancient communities, and was doubtless a step upwards from the custom of destroying all prisoners taken in war. Among the Hebrews it had always been customary; but in historic times it was not among them the all-important matter it was in Greek and Roman polity. Had it been so, it world have been impossible to discuss the economic ideals of Israel without taking this social feature into consideration first. But slaves were comparatively few in Israel, and the slave trade can never have been extensive, since no slave markets are mentioned in the Old Testament. Moreover the social state of the country made owners of slaves share in the slaves work, and that of itself prevented the growth of the worst abuses. But the most powerful element in making the lot of the slave tolerable was undoubtedly the just and pitiful character of the Israelite religion.
The fundamental position with regard to him was, however, the common one: he was the property of his master. He could be sold, pledged, given away as a present, and inherited, and could even be sold to foreigners. But a female slave, if taken as a subordinate wife, could not be sold, but only freed if she ceased to occupy that position. Exclusive of the Canaanites, subject to forced labor, and the Nethinim, the servants of the Sanctuary, who occupied much the same place as the servi publici in Rome, there were two classes of slaves, non-Israelites and Israelites. The ways in which a non-Israelite slave could come into Israelite hands were just what they were elsewhere. They might be prisoners of war, they might be purchased from traveling merchants, they might voluntarily have sold themselves from poverty in a strange land, or might have been sold for debt, and finally they might be children born of slaves. Their lot was of course the hardest. Yet even they were not so entirely unprotected by the law as slaves were among Greeks and Romans. They were recognized as men, having certain general human rights. The master had no right to kill; and if he maimed his slave he had to give him his freedom, according to the oldest law. {Exo 16:20 f.} The law regarding the killing of a slave has often been quoted as singularly harsh, especially that clause which says that if a slave when fatally smitten lives for some days after the blow, his death shall not be avenged, “for he is his (the masters) money.” But it ought, notwithstanding the harshness of the expression, to be judged quite otherwise. The fact that death was not immediate was taken to indicate that death was not intended, and consequently the loss of the slave was thought a sufficient punishment. But the prohibition of the deliberate murder of a slave was a humane provision which could not be paralleled in the Graeco-Roman world. Moreover these laws would not seem to have been widely called into action. The humane spirit became so general in Israel that slaves were generally well treated. In Pro 29:21 overindulgence to a slave is deprecated, as if it were a common error; and during the whole history there is no mention of evils resulting from cruel treatment of slaves, much less any record of servile insurrection. Nor is there very frequent mention even of runaway slaves. On the other hand, we read of slaves who were stewards of their masters houses; others probably were entrusted with the charge of the education of children.
In Deuteronomy we find, as we should expect, that the movement towards humanity in dealing with slaves is greatly furthered. In Deu 21:10 ff. the hardship of a womans lot when she was taken captive in war is mitigated with sympathetic insight. To modern women of the Western world the lot of such a one seems so dreadful that no mitigation of it can make any difference. The current teaching among even religious men is that rather than submit to it a woman is justified in suicide. But in antiquity the personality of woman was undeveloped, the chances of life constantly passed her from one master to another, and things intolerable now were tolerable then. Making even these allowances, however, if we look at the law of the Old Testament as being in all its provisions and ab initio Divine, it seems impossible to praise it. A law which graciously permitted a captive woman to mourn for her people for a month, and only then allowed her captor to marry her, but if he wished afterwards to get rid of her provided that he should not sell her, but should let her go whither she would, cannot be said to be in itself compassionate. But, if the customary law of the Israelite tribes, restrained and purified by the higher spirit, be regarded as the basis of Old Testament legislation, then the leaven of religion and humanity can be seen working nobly, and in a manner worthy of revelation, even in such cases as these. Long after the Christian era we see what the ordinary fate of a captive woman was, in the conduct of Khalid the “sword of the Lord,” one of the first great Mohammedan soldiers. When he had captured Malik ibn Noweira, who had resisted Islam, along with his wife, he gave orders which led to Maliks death, and the same night he married his widow. Shortly afterwards, at the battle of Yemama, he demanded the daughter of his captive, Mojda, and married her, as the Caliph wrote in reproof, “whilst the ground beneath the nuptial couch was yet moistened with the blood of twelve hundred.” Horrors like these Deuteronomy forbids. The frenzied moments of a captives first grief are respected, and some tenderness is shown to woman in a world where her lot at its best had always in it possibilities which cannot now be even thought of with equanimity. The same steady pressure to a nobler form of life is likewise seen in the Deuteronomic law dealing with the case of a foreign slave who had taken refuge in Israel. {Deu 23:15 f.} In the words, “Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the slave which is escaped from his master unto thee; he shall dwell with thee, in the midst of thee, in the place which he shall choose within one of thy gates, where it liketh him best; thou shalt not oppress him,” we have, thus early, the same legislation which it is the peculiar boast of England to have introduced into the modern world. “Slaves cannot breathe in England,” and the moment they touch British soil in any part of the world they are free. This was the case with the land of Israel according to the Deuteronomic conception of what it ought to be.
But the highest points of privilege come to the non-Israelite slave in a way which disturbs the modern conscience, for they came by means of compulsion in religion. In contrast to the day laborer and the “Toshab” or sojourner, the slave must be of his masters religion. For a heathen, however, that was not a difficulty. His gods were gods of his land; and when he left his land and was carried into a foreign country, he had no scruple about worshipping the god of the new land. A typical case of this is found in the narrative 2Ki 17:1-41, where the immigrants whom the king of Assyria had settled in Samaria after Israel had been carried captive besought him to send some one to teach them how to worship Yahweh. This adoption of the masters religion secured equality of slave and free to a degree which could not otherwise have been attained, and brought the slaves fully within the humanity of the Hebrew law. It gave them the Sabbath. {Deu 5:14} It gave a full share in all the religions festivals and a part in the sacrificial feasts (Deu 12:12; Deu 16:2; Deu 16:14). Such slaves were, in fact, fully adopted into the family of God, and became brethren, poorer and more unfortunate, but still brethren, of their masters. They had indeed no claim to freedom, as Israelite slaves had; they were slaves in perpetuity. But their slavery was of a kind that did not degrade them beneath the condition of man.
With regard to Israelite slaves the beneficence of the law was naturally still greater. The fullest statement in regard to them is found, not in Deuteronomy, but in Lev 25:39-46; but in the main we may suppose that in its larger outlines the distinction between Israelite and non-Israelite slaves there insistent on was always acknowledged. They were not to be thrust down into the lowest depth of slavery, and they were not to be set to the lowest kinds of labor, rather to that which hired laborers were wont to do, because they were of the children of Israel, of the nation whom Yahweh had brought out of the house of bondage. Further, they had a right to emancipation every seventh year, that is to say, whenever they had served six full years they could claim freedom in the seventh. Their original property was meant to be restored to them in the Sabbatic year, and so their degradation could last only for a very limited time. In Exo 21:2 ff. we find the original provisions concerning the Israelite slave. Deuteronomy simply took these up, and modified them in certain respects. It extends all that Exodus says of the slave to the female slave also, and, in its care for and understanding of the difficulties of the poor, enacts that a slave when set free shall receive a fresh start in life from the cattle, the barn, and the winepress of the former owner. But this anticipation of discharged prisoners aid societies was too high a demand upon a faithless generation. Even Jeremiah could not get it carried out; and the probability is that none but the most spiritually minded of the Jews ever regarded it as binding law.
The leave which love of Yahweh inspired spread still more widely. It took in not only the poor and the slave, but it took account also of the lower animals. It has been often made a reproach to Christianity that it makes no such appeal on behalf of the lower creation as Buddhism does. But that reproach (like the kindred one brought by J. S. Mill, that in comparison with the Quran the New Testament is defective in not pressing civil duty) is tenable only if the New Testament be absolutely severed from the Old. Taken as the completion of the moral and religious development begun in Israel, Christianity takes up into itself all the experience, and all the teaching by example, which the Old Testament contains. It does not repeat it, because to the first Christians the Old Testament was the Divinely inspired guide. It was at first their whole Bible, and to take the New Testament by itself as an independent product is to mutilate both the Old and the New. When the Old Testament, therefore, enjoins kindness to animals we may set down all that it prescribes to the credit of Christianity. So much, at least, the latter must be held to teach; and if we consider the spirit as well as the letter of this law, there is no exaggeration in saying that it covers all the ground. Here, as in the case of slaves and the poor, the fundamental reason for kindness is relation to God. In the Yahwists narrative in Gen 2:1-25 all creatures are formed by God, and God Himself shows kindness to them. Indeed in passages like Psa 36:7, as Cheyne well remarks, there is an implication “that morally speaking there is no complete break of continuity in the scale of sentient life,” and that, as is seen by passages like Jer 21:6, and Isaiah 4:11, the mild domesticated animals “are in fact regarded as a part of the human community.” In the Decalogue the animals that labor with and for man have their share in the Sabbath rest, and the produce of the fields during the Sabbatic year {Exo 23:11 Lev 25:7} is to be for them as well as for the poor. That they were mere machines of flesh and blood, to be driven till they were worn out, and were then to be cast aside, seems never to have occurred to the Israelite mind. These helpful creatures had made a covenant with man, and had a share in the consideration which the sons of Israel were taught to have for one another. In reaching that attainment Israel had reached the only effective ground for dealing with animals, as Cheyne says, “without inhumanity and without sentimentalism.” The individual prescriptions of Deuteronomy emphasize and bring down these principles into the practical life. It is probable that the precept not to seethe a kid in its mothers milk {Deu 14:21} was, in part at least, a law of kindness, founded upon a reverential, feeling for the parental relationship even in this lower sphere. The command in Deu 22:6 is certainly so. We read there: “If a birds nest chance to be before thee in the way, in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs, and the dam sitting upon the young, or upon the eggs, thou shalt not take the dam with the young; thou shalt in any wise let the dam go, but the young thou mayest take unto thyself; that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest prolong thy days.” Evidently the ground of sympathy here is the existence and the sacredness of the parental relationship. The mother bird is sacred as a mother; and length of days is promised to those who regard the sanctity of motherhood in this sphere, as it is promised to those who observe the fifth commandment of the Decalogue. Thus intimately the lower creation is drawn into the human sphere.
The only other precepts under this head are that a fallen animal is always to be lifted, {Deu 22:4} and the ox is not to be muzzled when it is treading out the corn. {Deu 25:4} These were ordinary prescriptions of humanity, but they too rest upon the sympathetic identification of the sufferings and wants of all sentient beings with those of mankind. It may be objected, however, that St. Paul denies that the last precept really was due to pity for the oxen. In 1Co 9:9, referring to it, he says, “Is it for the oxen that God careth, or saith He it altogether for our sake? Yea, for our sake it was written.” But there is no real contradiction here. It is quite impossible that a devout Jew like St. Paul did not believe that Gods “tender mercies are over all His works.” {Psa 145:9} He would have been false to all his training had he not accepted that as a fundamental axiom. His apparent denial does not refer at all to the historic fact that the precept was given because of Gods care for oxen. It only signifies that, when taken in its highest sense, it was meant to form character in men. St. Paul argues, as Alford says, “that not the oxen, but those for whom the law was given, were its objects. Every duty of humanity has for its ultimate ground, not the mere welfare of the animal concerned, but its welfare in that system of which man is the head, and therefore mans welfare.” In fact St. Paul understood the Old Testament as we have seen it demands to be understood, and places the duty of kindness to animals in its right relation to man.
In all relations, therefore, Deuteronomy insists that lifes main principle shall be love illumined by sympathy. Beginning with God and giving mans unquiet heart a firm anchorage there, it commands that all creatures about us shall be embraced in the same sympathizing tenderness. It forbids us to look upon any of them as mere instruments for our use, for all of them have ends of their own in the loving thought of God. God is for it the great unifying, harmonizing power in the world, and from a right conception of Him all right living flows. If the New Testament asks with wonder how a man who loves not his brother whom he hath seen can love God whom he hath not seen, the Old Testament teaches with equal emphasis the complementary truth that he who loves not God whom he hath not seen will never love as he ought his brother whom he hath seen. For to it Yahweh is the first and last word; and all the growth in kindness, gentleness, consideration, and goodness which can be traced in the revelation given to Israel, has its source in a conception of the Divine character which from the first was spiritual, and was moreover unique in the world.