Deuteronomy 21:21

21 Then all the men of his city shall stone him with stones and let him die; and so you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all of Israel will hear, and they will fear.

Deuteronomy 21:21 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 21:21

And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that
he die
The populace; that is, after his trial is finished, and he is condemned to die; and he was not stoned until the three first judges were there (by whom he was admonished, and ordered to be beaten), as it it said, "this is our son", this is he that was beaten before you F6; and according to the Targum of Jonathan,

``if he feared (God, and showed any token of repentance) and received instruction, and they (his parents) desired to preserve him alive, they preserved him; but if he refused and was rebellious, then they stoned him;''

but the Jews say this law, and that of retaliation, were never put into execution:

so shalt thou put away evil from among you;
put a stop to, and prevent such an evil for the future, and remove the guilt of it; or, as the Targum of Jonathan, him that doeth that evil:

and all Israel shall hear, and fear;
it being to be publicly notified throughout the land, that such an one suffered death for such a crime, which would be a means of deterring others from the same; so Jarchi remarks,

``here (says he) a proclamation was necessary to be made by the sanhedrim, as that such an one was stoned because he was stubborn and rebellious;''

for the mystical sense of this see ( Ephesians 2:2 ) ( Colossians 3:6 ) .


FOOTNOTES:

F6 Misn. Sanhedrin, c. 3. sect. 4.

Deuteronomy 21:21 In-Context

19 then his father and his mother shall take hold of him, and they shall bring him out to the elders of his city and to the gate of his {town},
20 and they shall say to the elders of his city, 'This our son [is] stubborn and rebellious; {he does not obey us}, [and] he is a glutton and a drunkard.'
21 Then all the men of his city shall stone him with stones and let him die; and so you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all of Israel will hear, and they will fear.
22 "And {if a man commits a sin punishable by death}, and [so] he is put to death and you hang him on a tree,
23 his dead body shall not hang on the tree, but certainly you shall bury him on that day, for cursed by God [is] one that is [being] hung; so you shall not defile your land that Yahweh your God [is] giving to you [as an] inheritance."
Scripture quotations marked (LEB) are from the Lexham English Bible. Copyright 2012 Logos Bible Software. Lexham is a registered trademark of Logos Bible Software.