Deuteronomy 22:18-28

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

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,

Deuteronomy 22:18-28 Meaning and Commentary

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.

Footnotes

• [a] Dt 25:1-3