Deuteronomy 22

Rules for property and mixtures

1 Don't just watch your fellow Israelite's ox or sheep wandering around and do nothing about it. You must return the animal to its owner.

2 If the owner doesn't live nearby, or you don't know who owns the animal, then you must take care of it. It should stay with you until your fellow Israelite comes looking for it, at which point you must return it to him.

3 Do the same thing in the case of a donkey. Do the same thing in the case of a piece of clothing. Do the same thing in the case of anything that your fellow Israelite loses and you end up finding. You are not allowed to sit back and do nothing about it.

4 Don't just watch your fellow Israelite's donkey or ox fall down in the road and do nothing about it. You must help your fellow Israelite get the animal up again.

5 Women must not wear men's clothes, and men must not wear women's clothes. Everyone who does such things is detestable to the LORD your God.

6 If you come across a bird's nest along your way, whether in a tree or on the ground, with baby birds or eggs, and the mother is sitting on the baby birds or eggs, do not remove the mother from her young.

7 You must let the mother go, though you may take the young for yourself so that things go well for you and so you can prolong your life.

8 Whenever you build a new house, you must build a railing for the roof so that you don't end up with innocent blood on your hands because someone fell off of it.

9 Don't plant your vineyards with two types of seed; otherwise, the entire crop that you have planted and the produce of the vineyard will be unusable.

10 Don't plow with an ox and a donkey together.

11 Don't wear clothes that mix wool and linen together.

12 Make tassels for the four corners of the coat you wear.

Virgin bride

13 Suppose a man gets married and consummates the marriage but subsequently despises his wife.

14 He then spreads false claims about her to the point that she has a bad reputation, because he said such things as, "I married this woman, but when I went to have sex with her, I couldn't find any proof that she was a virgin."

15 At that point, the young woman's father and mother will bring proof of her virginity to the city's elders at the city gate.

16 The young woman's father will say to the elders: "I gave my daughter to this man to be his wife, but he doesn't like her anymore.

17 That's why he has spread false claims about her, saying, ‘I couldn't find any proof that your daughter was a virgin.' But look! Here's proof of my daughter's virginity." At that point they will spread out the blanket in front of the city's elders.

18 The city's elders must then take that husband and punish him.

19 They will fine him one hundred silver shekels, giving that to the young woman's father, because that husband gave one of Israel's virgin daughters a bad reputation. Moreover, she must remain his wife; he is never allowed to divorce her.

20 However, if the claim is true and proof of the young woman's virginity can't be produced,

21 then the city's elders will bring the young woman to the door of her father's house. The citizens of that city must stone her until she dies because she acted so sinfully in Israel by having extramarital sex while still in her father's house. Remove such evil from your community!

Inappropriate sexual behavior

22 If a man is found having sex with a woman who is married to someone else, both of them must die—the man who was having sex with the woman and the woman herself. Remove such evil from Israel!

23 If a young woman who is a virgin is engaged to one man and another man meets up with her in a town and has sex with her,

24 you must bring both of them to the city gates there and stone them until they die—the young woman because she didn't call for help in the city, and the man because of the fact that he humiliated his neighbor's wife. Remove such evil from your community!

25 But if the man met up with the engaged woman in a field, grabbing her and having sex with her there, only the man will die.

26 Don't do anything whatsoever to the young woman. She hasn't committed any capital crime—rather, this situation is exactly like the one where someone attacks his neighbor and kills him.

27 Since the man met up with her in a field, the engaged woman may well have called out for help, but there was no one to rescue her.

28 If a man meets up with a young woman who is a virgin and not engaged, grabs her and has sex with her, and they are caught in the act,

29 the man who had sex with her must give fifty silver shekels to the young woman's father. She will also become his wife because he has humiliated her. He is never allowed to divorce her.

30 A man cannot marry his father's former wife so that his father's private matters are not exposed.

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]. Or sanctified
• [b]. Or burn; so also 22:22, 24
• [c]. See 19:11.
• [d]. 23:1 in Heb
• [e]. Or so that he doesn’t uncover his father’s skirt

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.