Deuteronomy 22

Caring for Your Brother's Property

1 "If you see your brother's ox or sheep straying, you must not ignore it; make sure you return it to your brother.

2 If your brother does not live near you or you don't know him, you are to bring the animal to your home to remain with you until your brother comes looking for it; then you can return it to him.

3 Do the same for his donkey, his garment, or anything your brother has lost and you have found. You must not ignore [it].^[a]

4 If you see your brother's donkey or ox fallen down on the road, you must not ignore it; you must help him lift it up.

Preserving Natural Distinctions

5 "A woman is not to wear male clothing, and a man is not to put on a woman's garment, for everyone who does these things is detestable to the Lord your God.

6 "If you come across a bird's nest with chicks or eggs, either in a tree or on the ground along the road, and the mother is sitting on the chicks or eggs, you must not take the mother along with the young.

7 You may take the young for yourself, but be sure to let the mother go free, so that you may prosper and live long.

8 If you build a new house, make a railing around your roof, so that you don't bring bloodguilt on your house if someone falls from it.

9 Do not plant your vineyard with two types of seed; otherwise, the entire harvest, both the crop you plant and the produce of the vineyard, will be defiled.

10 Do not plow with an ox and a donkey together.

11 Do not wear clothes made of both wool and linen.^[b]

12 Make tassels on the four corners of the outer garment you wear.^[c]

Violations of Proper Sexual Conduct

13 "If a man marries a woman, has sexual relations with her, and comes to hate her,

14 and accuses [her] of shameful conduct, and gives her a bad name, saying, 'I married this woman and was intimate with her, but I didn't find [any] evidence of her virginity,'

15 the young woman's father and mother will take the evidence of her virginity and bring [it] to the city elders at the gate.^[d]

16 The young woman's father will say to the elders, 'I gave my daughter to this man as a wife, but he hates her.

17 He has accused her of shameful conduct, saying: 'I didn't find [any] evidence of your daughter's virginity, but here is the evidence of my daughter's virginity.' They will spread out the cloth before the city elders.

18 Then the elders of that city will take the man and punish him.^[e]

19 They will also fine him 100 silver [shekels] and give [them] to the young woman's father, because that man gave an Israelite virgin a bad name. She will remain his wife; he cannot divorce her as long as he lives.

20 But if this accusation is true and no evidence of the young woman's virginity is found,

21 they will bring the woman to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city will stone her to death. For she has committed an outrage in Israel by being promiscuous in her father's house. You must purge the evil from you.

22 "If a man is discovered having sexual relations with [another] man's wife, both the man who had sex with the woman and the woman must die. You must purge the evil from Israel.

23 If there is a young woman who is a virgin engaged to a man, and [another] man encounters her in the city and has sex with her,

24 you must take the two of them out to the gate of that city and stone them to death-the young woman because she did not cry out in the city and the man because he has violated his neighbor's fiancée. You must purge the evil from you.

25 But if the man encounters the engaged woman in the open country, and he seizes and rapes her, only the man who raped her must die.

26 Do nothing to the young woman, because she is not guilty of an offense deserving death. This case is just like one in which a man attacks his neighbor and murders him.

27 When he found her in the field, the engaged woman cried out, but there was no one to rescue her.

28 If a man encounters a young woman, a virgin who is not engaged, takes hold of her and rapes her, and they are discovered,

29 the man who raped her must give the young woman's father 50 silver [shekels], and she must become his wife because he violated her.^[f] He cannot divorce her as long as he lives.

30 "A man is not to marry his father's wife; he must not violate his father's marriage bed.^{[g] [h] [i]}

Deuteronomy 22 Commentary

Chapter 22

Of humanity towards brethren. (1-4) Various precepts. (5-12) Against impurity. (13-30)

Verses 1-4 If we duly regard the golden rule of "doing to others as we would they should do unto us," many particular precepts might be omitted. We can have no property in any thing that we find. Religion teaches us to be neighbourly, and to be ready to do all good offices to all men. We know not how soon we may have occasion for help.

Verses 5-12 God's providence extends itself to the smallest affairs, and his precepts do so, that even in them we may be in the fear of the Lord, as we are under his eye and care. Yet the tendency of these laws, which seem little, is such, that being found among the things of God's law, they are to be accounted great things. If we would prove ourselves to be God's people, we must have respect to his will and to his glory, and not to the vain fashions of the world. Even in putting on our garments, as in eating or in drinking, all must be done with a serious regard to preserve our own and others' purity in heart and actions. Our eye should be single, our heart simple, and our behaviour all of a piece.

Verses 13-30 These and the like regulations might be needful then, and yet it is not necessary that we should curiously examine respecting them. The laws relate to the seventh commandment, laying a restraint upon fleshly lusts which war against the soul.

Footnotes

• [a]. Ex 23:4
• [b]. Lv 19:19
• [c]. Nm 15:38-39
• [d]. Dt 17:8; 21:19; 25:7
• [e]. Dt 25:1-3
• [f]. Ex 22:16-17
• [g]. Dt 23:1 in Hb
• [h]. Lit not uncover the edge of his father's garment; Ru 3:9; Ezk 16:8
• [i]. Lv 18:8; 20:10-11

Chapter Summary

INTRODUCTION TO DEUTERONOMY 22

In this chapter are various laws, concerning care of a neighbour's cattle gone astray or in distress, and of anything lost by him, De 22:1-4, forbidding one sex to wear the apparel, of another, De 22:5 and the taking away of the dam with the young found in a bird's nest, De 22:6,7, ordering battlements to be made in a new house, De 22:8, prohibiting mixtures in sowing, ploughing, and in garments, De 22:9-11, requiring fringes on the four quarters of a garment, De 22:12, fining a man that slanders his wife, upon producing the tokens of her virginity, De 22:13-19 but if these cannot be produced, then orders are given that she be put to death, De 22:20-21, then follow other laws, punishing with death the adulterer and adulteress, and one that hath ravished a betrothed damsel, De 22:22-27, amercing a person that lies with a virgin not betrothed and she consenting, and obliging him to marry her, and not suffering him to divorce her, De 22:28-29 and another against a man's lying with his father's wife, De 22:30.