Ulangan 16:18

Provision for Justice

16:18 You must appoint judges and civil servants ¹  for each tribe in all your villages ²  that the Lord your God is giving you, and they must judge the people fairly. ³ 

Ulangan 21:2

21:2 your elders and judges must go out and measure how far it is to the cities in the vicinity of the corpse. ⁴ 

Ulangan 17:9

17:9 You will go to the Levitical priests and the judge in office in those days and seek a solution; they will render a verdict.

Ulangan 32:31

32:31 For our enemies’ ⁵  rock is not like our Rock,

as even our enemies concede.

Ulangan 19:18

19:18 The judges will thoroughly investigate the matter, and if the witness should prove to be false and to have given false testimony against the accused, ⁶ 

Ulangan 25:2

25:2 Then, ⁷  if the guilty person is sentenced to a beating, ⁸  the judge shall force him to lie down and be beaten in his presence with the number of blows his wicked behavior deserves. ⁹ 

Ulangan 19:17

19:17 then both parties to the controversy must stand before the Lord, that is, before the priests and judges ¹⁰  who will be in office in those days.

Ulangan 17:12

17:12 The person who pays no attention ¹¹  to the priest currently serving the Lord your God there, or to the verdict – that person must die, so that you may purge evil from Israel.

Ulangan 1:16

1:16 I furthermore admonished your judges at that time that they ¹²  should pay attention to issues among your fellow citizens ¹³  and judge fairly, ¹⁴  whether between one citizen and another ¹⁵  or a citizen and a resident foreigner. ¹⁶ 

Ulangan 25:1

25:1 If controversy arises between people, ¹⁷  they should go to court for judgment. When the judges ¹⁸  hear the case, they shall exonerate ¹⁹  the innocent but condemn ²⁰  the guilty.

Ulangan 22:17

22:17 Moreover, he has raised accusations of impropriety by saying, ‘I discovered your daughter was not a virgin,’ but this is the evidence of my daughter’s virginity!” The cloth must then be spread out ²¹  before the city’s elders.

Ulangan 7:10

7:10 but who pays back those who hate ²²  him as they deserve and destroys them. He will not ignore ²³  those who hate him but will repay them as they deserve!

Ulangan 22:15

22:15 Then the father and mother of the young woman must produce the evidence of virginity ²⁴  for the elders of the city at the gate.

Ulangan 17:8

Appeal to a Higher Court

17:8 If a matter is too difficult for you to judge – bloodshed, ²⁵  legal claim, ²⁶  or assault ²⁷  – matters of controversy in your villages ²⁸  – you must leave there and go up to the place the Lord your God chooses. ²⁹ 

Ulangan 22:21

22:21 the men of her city must bring the young woman to the door of her father’s house and stone her to death, for she has done a disgraceful thing ³⁰  in Israel by behaving like a prostitute while living in her father’s house. In this way you will purge ³¹  evil from among you.

[16:18]  ¹ tn The Hebrew term וְשֹׁטְרִים (vÿshoterim), usually translated “officers” (KJV, NCV) or “officials” (NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT), derives from the verb שֹׁטֵר (shoter, “to write”). The noun became generic for all types of public officials. Here, however, it may be appositionally epexegetical to “judges,” thus resulting in the phrase, “judges, that is, civil officers,” etc. Whoever the שֹׁטְרִים are, their task here consists of rendering judgments and administering justice.

[16:18]  ² tn Heb “gates.”

[16:18]  ³ tn Heb “with judgment of righteousness”; ASV, NASB “with righteous judgment.”

[21:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “surrounding the slain [one].”

[32:31]  ⁵ tn Heb “their,” but the referent (enemies) is specified in the translation for the sake of clarity.

[19:18]  ⁶ tn Heb “his brother” (also in the following verse).

[25:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “and it will be.”

[25:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “if the evil one is a son of smiting.”

[25:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “according to his wickedness, by number.”

[19:17]  ¹⁰ tn The appositional construction (“before the Lord, that is, before the priests and judges”) indicates that these human agents represented the Lord himself, that is, they stood in his place (cf. Deut 16:18-20; 17:8-9).

[17:12]  ¹¹ tn Heb “who acts presumptuously not to listen” (cf. NASB).

[1:16]  ¹² tn Or “you.” A number of English versions treat the remainder of this verse and v. 17 as direct discourse rather than indirect discourse (cf. KJV, NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

[1:16]  ¹³ tn Heb “brothers.” The term “brothers” could, in English, be understood to refer to siblings, so “fellow citizens” has been used in the translation.

[1:16]  ¹⁴ tn The Hebrew word צֶדֶק (tsedeq, “fairly”) carries the basic idea of conformity to a norm of expected behavior or character, one established by God himself. Fair judgment adheres strictly to that norm or standard (see D. Reimer, NIDOTTE 3:750).

[1:16]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “between a man and his brother.”

[1:16]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “his stranger” or “his sojourner”; NAB, NIV “an alien”; NRSV “resident alien.” The Hebrew word גֵּר (ger) commonly means “foreigner.”

[25:1]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “men.”

[25:1]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “they”; the referent (the judges) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[25:1]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “declare to be just”; KJV, NASB “justify the righteous”; NAB, NIV “acquitting the innocent.”

[25:1]  ²⁰ tn Heb “declare to be evil”; NIV “condemning the guilty (+ party NAB).”

[22:17]  ²¹ tn Heb “they will spread the garment.”

[7:10]  ²² tn For the term “hate” as synonymous with rejection or disobedience see note on the word “reject” in Deut 5:9 (cf. NRSV “reject”).

[7:10]  ²³ tn Heb “he will not hesitate concerning.”

[22:15]  ²⁴ sn In light of v. 17 this would evidently be blood-stained sheets indicative of the first instance of intercourse. See E. H. Merrill, Deuteronomy (NAC), 302-3.

[17:8]  ²⁵ tn Heb “between blood and blood.”

[17:8]  ²⁶ tn Heb “between claim and claim.”

[17:8]  ²⁷ tn Heb “between blow and blow.”

[17:8]  ²⁸ tn Heb “gates.”

[17:8]  ²⁹ tc Several Greek recensions add “to place his name there,” thus completing the usual formula to describe the central sanctuary (cf. Deut 12:5, 11, 14, 18; 16:6). However, the context suggests that the local Levitical towns, and not the central sanctuary, are in mind.

[22:21]  ³⁰ tn The Hebrew term נְבָלָה (nÿvalah) means more than just something stupid. It refers to a moral lapse so serious as to jeopardize the whole covenant community (cf. Gen 34:7; Judg 19:23; 20:6, 10; Jer 29:23). See C. Pan, NIDOTTE 3:11-13. Cf. NAB “she committed a crime against Israel.”

[22:21]  ³¹ tn Heb “burn.” See note on Deut 21:21.