Deuteronomy 24:1-8

1 Suppose a man gets married to a woman. But later he decides he doesn't like her. He finds something shameful about her. So he gives her a letter of divorce and sends her away from his house.

2 Then after she leaves his house she becomes another man's wife.

3 But her second husband doesn't like her either. So he gives her a letter of divorce and sends her away from his house. Or perhaps he dies.

4 Then her first husband isn't allowed to marry her again. The LORD would hate that. When her first husband divorced her, she became "unclean." Don't bring sin on the land the LORD your God is giving you as your own.

5 Suppose a man has just gotten married. Then don't send him into battle. Don't give him any other duty either. He's free to stay home for one year. He needs time to make his new wife happy.

6 Someone might borrow money from you and give you two millstones to keep until you are paid back. Don't keep them. Don't even keep the upper one. That person depends on the millstones to make a living.

7 Suppose a man is caught kidnapping another Israelite. And he sells or treats that person as a slave. Then the kidnapper must die. Get rid of that evil person.

8 What about skin diseases? Be very careful to do exactly what the priests, who are Levites, tell you to do. You must be careful to follow the commands I've given them.

Deuteronomy 24:1-8 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO DEUTERONOMY 24

This chapter contains various laws concerning divorces, De 24:1-4; the discharge of a newly married man from war and business, De 24:5; about taking pledges, De 24:6,10-13; man stealing, De 24:7; the plague of leprosy, De 24:8,9; and giving servants their hire in due time, De 24:14,15; concerning doing justice in capital cases, and towards the stranger, fatherless, and widow, De 24:16-18; and of charity to the poor, in allowing them the forgotten sheaf, and the gleanings of their oliveyards and vineyards, De 24:19-22.