Deuteronomy 25:1-8

1 "When a legal dispute {takes place} between men and they come near to the court, and [the judges] judge [with respect to] them, then they shall declare the righteous [to be] in the right and they shall condemn the wicked,

2 then it will happen if the guilty [one] {deserves beating}, then the judge shall make him lie, and he shall beat him {before him}, {according to} {the prescribed number of lashes proportionate to the offense}.

3 He may beat him [with] forty lashes, and he shall not do more [than these], so that he [will] not beat more in addition to these many blows, and your countryman would be degraded before your eyes.

4 "You shall not muzzle an ox {when he is threshing}.

5 "When brothers dwell together and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the deceased shall not become the wife of a {man of another family}; her brother-in-law {shall have sex with her}, and he shall take her {to himself} as [a] wife, and he shall perform his duty as [a] brother-in-law [with respect to] her.

6 And then the firstborn that she bears {shall represent his dead brother}, so that his name is not blotted out from Israel.

7 But if the man [does] not want to take his sister-in-law, then his sister-in-law shall go up to the gate, to the elders, and she shall say, 'My brother-in-law refused {to perpetuate his brother's name} in Israel, [for] he is not willing {to marry me}.'

8 Then the elders of his town shall summon him and speak to him, and [if] he persists and says, '{I do not desire to} marry her'

Deuteronomy 25:1-8 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO DEUTERONOMY 25

Several laws are contained in this chapter, as concerning beating such whose crimes required it, De 25:1-3; of not muzzling the ox in treading out the corn, De 25:4; of marrying a deceased brother's wife, when there was no issue, and of the disgrace of such that refused it, De 25:5-10; of the punishment of an immodest woman, De 25:11,12; and against bad weights and measures, De 25:13-16; and for the utter destruction of Amalek, De 25:17-19.

Footnotes

• [a]. Literally "shall be"
• [b]. Literally "[is] a son [of] beating"
• [c]. Literally "to the face of him"
• [d]. Literally "as"
• [e]. Literally "as is sufficient/necessary, with respect to number, for his wickedness/wicked behavior"
• [f]. Hebrew "blow"
• [g]. Or "brother"
• [h]. Hebrew "is"
• [i]. Literally "at his threshing"
• [j]. Others: "strange man," "man outside the family" (NEB)
• [k]. Literally "shall go to her"
• [l]. Literally "to/for him"
• [m]. Literally "he shall stand upon the name of his brother the deceased"
• [n]. Literally "to cause a name to stand for his brother"
• [o]. Literally "to consummate the marriage with the widow of a [his] brother"
• [p]. Literally "I do not delight in"