Deuteronomy 25
The full text of Deuteronomy 25 in the Trinity Bible Version — clear modern English, translated from the original Hebrew. Free to read.
1 When people have a dispute, they are to take it to court and the judges will decide the case, acquitting the innocent and condemning the guilty.
2 If the guilty person deserves to be beaten, the judge shall make them lie down and have them flogged in his presence with the number of lashes the crime deserves,
3 but the judge must not impose more than forty lashes. If the guilty party is flogged more than that, your fellow Israelite will be degraded in your eyes.
4 Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain.
5 If brothers are living together and one of them dies without a son, his widow must not marry outside the family. Her husband's brother shall take her and marry her and fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law to her.
6 The first son she bears shall carry on the name of the dead brother so that his name will not be blotted out from Israel.
7 However, if a man does not want to marry his brother's wife, she shall go to the elders at the town gate and say, "My husband's brother refuses to carry on his brother's name in Israel. He will not fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law to me."
8 Then the elders of his town shall summon him and talk to him. If he persists in saying, "I do not want to marry her,"
9 his brother's widow shall go up to him in the presence of the elders, take off one of his sandals, spit in his face and say, "This is what is done to the man who will not build up his brother's family line."
10 That man's line shall be known in Israel as The Family of the Unsandaled.
11 If two men are fighting and the wife of one of them comes to rescue her husband from his assailant, and she reaches out and seizes him by his genitals,
12 you shall cut off her hand. Show no pity.
13 Do not have two differing weights in your bag—one heavy, one light.
14 Do not have two differing measures in your house—one large, one small.
15 You must have accurate and honest weights and measures, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.
16 For the LORD your God detests anyone who does these things, anyone who deals dishonestly.
17 Remember what the Amalekites did to you along the way when you came out of Egypt.
18 When you were weary and worn out, they met you on your journey and attacked all who were lagging behind; they had no fear of God.
19 When the LORD your God gives you rest from all the enemies around you in the land he is giving you to possess as an inheritance, you shall blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget!
Translation notes (9)
- Deuteronomy 25:3a The forty-lash cap protects even the guilty from being degraded as less than a fellow Israelite. Later practice limited it to thirty-nine lashes to avoid accidental excess (compare 2 Corinthians 11:24, 'forty lashes minus one').
- Deuteronomy 25:4a The threshing ox must be free to eat as it works. Paul applies this principle to supporting those who labor in ministry (1 Corinthians 9:9; 1 Timothy 5:18).
- Deuteronomy 25:5a This is the levirate law (from the Latin levir, meaning 'husband's brother'), where the brother marries the childless widow to raise an heir for the dead man, preserving his name and line. This law frames Genesis 38 and the book of Ruth, and the Sadducees cite it to Jesus (Matthew 22:24; Mark 12:19; Luke 20:28).
- Deuteronomy 25:9a Removing the sandal and spitting are public shaming acts that mark the refusal; the loosed sandal is a legal gesture echoed in Ruth 4:7-8. The widow performs these acts, asserting her right.
- Deuteronomy 25:11a This verse introduces the law of a woman who, intervening in a fight, seizes the other man's genitals; verse 12 prescribes cutting off her hand and showing no pity. This is one of only two laws in the Torah prescribing mutilation, and its scope (for example, whether the penalty is literal amputation or, on some readings, a monetary or 'eye for an eye' substitute) is debated. The meaning and ethics of this law are complex and are subjects of ongoing discussion.
- Deuteronomy 25:12a The penalty, 'you shall cut off her hand; your eye shall not pity,' is rendered as the Hebrew gives it. Some interpreters (ancient and modern) argue the Hebrew verb qatsah here, meaning 'to cut off,' may carry a non-literal or monetary/'eye for an eye' sense, as the law is unique and severe. The meaning and ethics of this law are complex and are subjects of ongoing discussion (see note at verse 11).
- Deuteronomy 25:17a This recalls Amalek's unprovoked attack on the exodus stragglers (Exodus 17:8-16). It introduces the command to blot out Amalek (verse 19), a command echoed in the Saul/Agag narrative (1 Samuel 15); the tradition of war against Amalek has significant theological implications.
- Deuteronomy 25:18a Amalek's particular guilt was striking the exhausted stragglers at the rear—the most vulnerable—and 'they did not fear God.' This stated reason underlies the severe command of verse 19; the war-against-Amalek tradition is a subject of ongoing discussion (see note at verse 19).
- Deuteronomy 25:19a This command, "Blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven," calls for total destruction, a concept known as ḥerem in Hebrew. This command was carried out in the story of Saul and Agag (1 Samuel 15) and remembered against Haman the Agagite in Esther. This is a morally and theologically debated command in the Hebrew Bible, and its meaning, scope, and ethics are not decided here.
About this translation
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