Deuteronomy
Deuteronomy 22
1You shall not see your brother’s ox or his sheep go astray and hide yourself from them. You shall surely bring them again to your brother. 2If your brother isn’t near to you, or if you don’t know him, then you shall bring it home to your house, and it shall be with you until your brother comes looking for it, and you shall restore it to him. 3So you shall do with his donkey. So you shall do with his garment. So you shall do with every lost thing of your brother’s, which he has lost and you have found. You may not hide yourself. 4You shall not see your brother’s donkey or his ox fallen down by the way, and hide yourself from them. You shall surely help him to lift them up again.
5A woman shall not wear men’s clothing, neither shall a man put on women’s clothing; for whoever does these things is an abomination to Yahweh your God.
6If you come across a bird’s nest on the way, in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs, and the hen sitting on the young, or on the eggs, you shall not take the hen with the young. 7You shall surely let the hen go, but the young you may take for yourself, that it may be well with you, and that you may prolong your days.
8When you build a new house, then you shall make a railing around your roof, so that you don’t bring blood on your house if anyone falls from there.
9You shall not sow your vineyard with two kinds of seed, lest all the fruit be defiled, the seed which you have sown, and the increase of the vineyard. 10You shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together. 11You shall not wear clothes of wool and linen woven together.
12You shall make yourselves fringes on the four corners of your cloak with which you cover yourself.
13If any man takes a wife, and goes in to her, hates her, 14accuses her of shameful things, gives her a bad name, and says, “I took this woman, and when I came near to her, I didn’t find in her the tokens of virginity;” 15then the young lady’s father and mother shall take and bring the tokens of the young lady’s virginity to the elders of the city in the gate. 16The young lady’s father shall tell the elders, “I gave my daughter to this man as his wife, and he hates her. 17Behold, he has accused her of shameful things, saying, ‘I didn’t find in your daughter the tokens of virginity;’ and yet these are the tokens of my daughter’s virginity.” They shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. 18The elders of that city shall take the man and chastise him. 19They shall fine him one hundred shekels of silver, and give them to the father of the young lady, because he has given a bad name to a virgin of Israel. She shall be his wife. He may not put her away all his days.
20But if this thing is true, that the tokens of virginity were not found in the young lady, 21then they shall bring out the young lady to the door of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones, because she has done folly in Israel, to play the prostitute in her father’s house. So you shall remove the evil from among you.
22If a man is found lying with a woman married to a husband, then they shall both die, the man who lay with the woman and the woman. So you shall remove the evil from Israel. 23If there is a young lady who is a virgin pledged to be married to a husband, and a man finds her in the city, and lies with her, 24then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them to death with stones; the lady, because she didn’t cry, being in the city; and the man, because he has humbled his neighbor’s wife. So you shall remove the evil from among you. 25But if the man finds the lady who is pledged to be married in the field, and the man forces her and lies with her, then only the man who lay with her shall die; 26but to the lady you shall do nothing. There is in the lady no sin worthy of death; for as when a man rises against his neighbor and kills him, even so is this matter; 27for he found her in the field, the pledged to be married lady cried, and there was no one to save her. 28If a man finds a lady who is a virgin, who is not pledged to be married, grabs her and lies with her, and they are found, 29then the man who lay with her shall give to the lady’s father fifty shekels of silver. She shall be his wife, because he has humbled her. He may not put her away all his days. 30A man shall not take his father’s wife, and shall not uncover his father’s skirt.
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What others are saying
4 commentators · 49 notes on this chapter
Matthew Henry3
Writes as a pastor rather than a critic. Expect devotional and practical application over historical or linguistic analysis, read through a Reformed covenantal frame — and expect the Old Testament to be read forward toward Christ throughout.
Why this voice is here: The most widely read English commentary for three centuries. Included as a baseline: where Henry and a modern voice diverge, the divergence itself is usually the interesting part.
The kindness that was commanded to be shown in reference to an enemy (Exo 23:4, etc.) is here required to be much more done for a neighbour, though he were not an Israelite, for the law is consonant to natural equity. 1. That strayed cattle should be brought…
Here are several laws in these verses which seem to stoop very low, and to take cognizance of things mean and minute. Men's laws commonly do not so: De minimis non curat lex - The law takes no cognizance of little things; but because God's providence extends…
These laws relate to the seventh commandment, laying a restraint by laying a penalty upon those fleshly lusts which war against the soul. I. If a man, lusting after another woman, to get rid of his wife slander her and falsely accuse her, as not having the…
John Gill30
The most exhaustive and the most doctrinally committed here. Expect high — even supralapsarian — Calvinism applied consistently, and unusually heavy use of rabbinic and Talmudic sources for Jewish context. Where a passage bears on election or the will, Gill will read it in one direction, and knowing that in advance is the point.
Why this voice is here: The strongest Calvinist reading available in the public domain, and the best on Jewish background. Read alongside Clarke, not instead of him — between them you get both sides of the argument.
Thou shall not see thy brother's ox or his sheep go astray,.... Or "driven away" (r); frightened and starved away from the herd or from the flock by a wolf or dog; and the ox and sheep are put for every other creature a man has, as camels, asses, &c. which…
And if thy brother be not nigh unto thee,.... Does not live in the same neighbourhood, but at some considerable distance; so that he cannot soon and easily be informed of his cattle, or they be sent to him: or if thou know him not; the owner of them, what is…
In like manner shall thou do with his ass,.... As with his ox or sheep when astray, and found, keep it until it is owned, and then restore it; this is expressly mentioned in Exodus 23:4. and so shalt thou do with his raiment; if that is lost and found, it…
Keil & Delitzsch8
The technical one, and Old Testament only. Expect Hebrew grammar, textual argument, and direct engagement with nineteenth-century critical scholarship — closer to a scholarly apparatus than a devotional read. Where a modern critic claims a text is late or composite, this is where the conservative counter-argument was made.
Why this voice is here: Old Testament only, and heavy going — but the place to look when someone asserts a passage cannot mean what it appears to.
Going deeper and deeper into the manifold relations of the national life, Moses first of all explains in Deu 22:1-12 the attitude of an Israelite, on the one hand, towards a neighbour; and, on the other hand, towards the natural classification and arrangement…
Laws of Chastity and Marriage. - Higher and still holier than the order of nature stands the moral order of marriage, upon which the well-being not only of domestic life, but also of the civil commonwealth of nations, depends. Marriage must be founded upon…
In such a case the parents of the young woman (הנּער for הנּערה, as in Gen 24:14, Gen 24:28, according to the earliest usage of the books of Moses, a virgin, then also a young woman, e.g., Rut 2:6; Rut 4:12) were to bring the matter before the elders of the…
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown8
The concise option. Three authors split the canon, so the voice shifts between sections. Expect brief, sober, conservative notes that resolve difficulties rather than dwelling on them — useful for orientation, thinner than Gill or Clarke where a passage is genuinely contested.
Why this voice is here: The quickest way to see what the mainstream Reformed reading of a passage is. Start here, then go to Gill or Clarke when it matters.
THE SEX TO BE DISTINGUISHED BY APPAREL. (Deu 22:5-12) The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment--Though disguises were assumed at certain times in heathen temples, it is probable that a reference…
If a bird's nest chance to be before thee--This is a beautiful instance of the humanizing spirit of the Mosaic law, in checking a tendency to wanton destructiveness and encouraging a spirit of kind and compassionate tenderness to the tiniest creatures. But…
thou shalt make a battlement for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thine house, if any man fall from thence--The tops of houses in ancient Judea, as in the East still, were flat, being composed of branches or twigs laid across large beams, and covered…
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