Justice and Forbidden Forms of Worship. Deu 16:18 to Deu 17:20
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT
The Law Repeated for the New Generation
II. MOSES’ SECOND DISCOURSE, Deuteronomy 5-28
2. Laws Regulating the Religious and Social Life of the People, Deuteronomy 12-26
INTRODUCTION
This is again the Greek name for this book, and signifies the “second giving of the Law.” It contains the records of public addresses to Israel, delivered in the eleventh month of the fortieth year of their wanderings through the Wilderness. As Moses uttered them on the eve of his own speedy removal, he was able to speak with unusual emphasis and urgency. The allusions to the natural features amidst which these addresses were given are consistent with the place and speaker. It has been shown also by competent scholarship that Deuteronomy has all the peculiarities of Moses’ style; and any differences of hortatory entreaty and appeal may be accounted for by the mellowing effect of age.
The special references to this book in the New Testament are very significant. Our Lord quoted from it thrice in His Temptation, Mat_4:4; Mat_4:7; Mat_4:10. See also Rom_10:19; Act_3:22; Act_7:37. There are touches by a later writer, and an appendix, Deu_34:1-12; but the origin of the treatise as a whole must be ascribed to the great Lawgiver.
JUSTICE
“You shall appoint judges and officers in all your cities (gates) which the LORD your God is giving you, according to your tribes, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment.
You shall not distort justice; you shall not be partial, and you shall not take a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and perverts the words of the righteous.
You shall pursue justice, and only justice [that which is uncompromisingly righteous], so that you may live and take possession of the land which the LORD your God is giving you.
FORBIDDEN FORMS OF WORSHIP
“You shall not plant for yourself an Asherah of any kind of tree or wood beside the altar of the LORD your God, which you shall make.
You shall not set up for yourself a sacred pillar which the LORD your God hates.
“You shall not sacrifice to the LORD your God an ox or sheep with a blemish or any defect, for that is a detestable thing to the LORD your God.
“If there is discovered among you, within any of your cities, which the LORD your God is giving you, a man or a woman who does evil in the sight of the LORD your God, by transgressing (violating) His covenant,
and has gone and served other gods and worshiped them, or the sun or the moon or any of the heavenly host, [doing these things] which I have commanded not to do,
and if it is told to you and you hear about it, then you shall investigate thoroughly [all the charges]. If it is confirmed beyond doubt that this detestable thing has been done in Israel,
then you shall bring that man or that woman who has done this evil thing to the gates [of your city] and you shall stone the man or the woman to death.
On the evidence of two or three witnesses, he who is to die shall be put to death; he shall not be put to death on the evidence of [only] one witness.
The hand of the witnesses shall be the first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. So you shall remove the evil from among you.
LEGAL DECISIONS BY PRIESTS AND JUDGES
“If any case is too difficult for you to judge–between one kind of homicide and another, between one kind of lawsuit and another, between one kind of assault and another, being controversial issues in your courts–then you shall arise and go to the place which the LORD your God chooses.
So you shall come to the Levitical priests or to the judge who is in office at that time, and you shall consult them and they will declare to you the verdict in the case.
You shall act in accordance with the terms of the verdict which they declare to you from that place which the LORD chooses. You shall be careful to act in accordance with all of their instructions.
“You shall act in accordance with the law which they teach you and the judgment which they tell you. You shall not turn aside from their verdict, to the right or to the left.
The man who acts presumptuously and insolently by not listening to the priest who stands there to serve the LORD your God, nor to the judge, that man shall die; so you shall remove the evil from Israel.
Then all the people will hear and be afraid, and will not act presumptuously again.
LAWS CONCERNING ISRAEL’S KINGS
“When you enter the land which the LORD your God is giving you, and you take possession of it and live there, and you say, ‘I will set a king over me like all the nations who are around me,’
you shall most certainly set a king over you whom the LORD your God chooses. You shall set a king over you from among your countrymen (brothers); you may not choose a foreigner [to rule] over you who is not your countryman.
Further, he shall not acquire many [war] horses for himself, nor make the people return to Egypt in order to acquire horses [to expand his military power], since the LORD said to you, ‘You shall never return that way again.’
He shall not acquire multiple wives for himself, or else his heart will turn away [from God]; nor [for the same reason] shall he acquire great amounts of silver and gold.
“Now it shall come about when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests.
And it shall be with him and he shall read it all the days of his life, so that he may learn to fear [and worship] the LORD his God [with awe-filled reverence and profound respect], by carefully obeying (keeping foremost in his thoughts and actively doing) all the words of this law and these statutes,
so that his heart will not be lifted up above his countrymen [by a false sense of self-importance and self-reliance] and that he will not turn away (deviate) from the commandment, to the right or to the left, so that he and his sons may continue [to reign] for a long time in his kingdom in Israel.
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