Chapter 21
Verses 1-23: Responsibility and Redemption in Community Life
1. “If a slain person is found lying in the field in the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess, and it is not known who has struck him,
2. then your elders and your judges shall go out and measure the distance to the cities which are around the slain person.
3. And it shall be that the city which is nearest to the slain man, the elders of that city shall take a heifer which has not been worked and which has not pulled in a yoke;
4. and the elders of that city shall bring the heifer down to a valley with flowing water, which is neither plowed nor sown, and shall break the heifer’s neck there in the valley.
5. Then the priests, the sons of Levi, shall come near, for the Lord your God has chosen them to minister to Him and to bless in the name of the Lord; and by their word every controversy and every assault shall be settled.
6. And all the elders of that city nearest to the slain man shall wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley,
7. and they shall declare, ‘Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it shed.
8. Accept atonement, O Lord, for Your people Israel, whom You have redeemed, and do not lay innocent blood to the charge of Your people Israel.’ And the blood shall be atoned for them.
9. So you shall put away the guilt of innocent blood from among you when you do what is right in the sight of the Lord.
10. “When you go out to war against your enemies, and the Lord your God delivers them into your hands and you take them captive,
11. and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and desire her and would take her for your wife,
12. then you shall bring her home to your house, and she shall shave her head and trim her nails.
13. And she shall remove the clothes of her captivity and shall remain in your house, and mourn her father and her mother a full month; after that, you may go in to her and be her husband, and she shall be your wife.
14. But it shall be, if you have no delight in her, then you shall let her go where she wishes; but you shall certainly not sell her for money, you shall not treat her brutally, because you have humbled her.
15. “If a man has two wives, one loved and the other unloved, and they have borne him children, both the loved and the unloved, and if the firstborn son is of her who is unloved,
16. then on the day he bequeaths his possessions to his sons, he must not treat the son of the loved wife as the firstborn in preference to the son of the unloved, who is the true firstborn.
17. But he shall acknowledge the son of the unloved wife as the firstborn by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the firstfruits of his strength; the right of the firstborn is his.
18. “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and when they have chastened him, will not heed them,
19. then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city, to the gate of his place,
20. and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’
21. Then all the men of his city shall stone him to death with stones; so you shall put away the evil from among you, and all Israel shall hear and fear.
22. “And if a man has committed a sin deserving of death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree,
23. his body shall not remain overnight on the tree, but you shall surely bury him that day, so that you do not defile the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance; for he who is hanged is accursed of God.
Interpretation:
Chapter 21 of Deuteronomy deals with various societal and ethical issues, beginning with the procedure for atoning for an unsolved murder. This ritual underscores the community’s collective responsibility for violence within its territory. The guidelines regarding marriage to a captive woman show an attempt to regulate warfare’s consequences and protect the rights of captives. The laws concerning inheritance and the rebellious son reflect the societal structure and family dynamics of the time. The stoning of a rebellious son, though harsh by modern standards, indicates the importance of family authority and societal order. The final verses about the treatment of a hanged body highlight the need to respect human dignity, even in the case of executed criminals, and to maintain the purity of the land.
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