Deuteronomy 1:17

1:17 They ¹  must not discriminate in judgment, but hear the lowly ²  and the great alike. Nor should they be intimidated by human beings, for judgment belongs to God. If the matter being adjudicated is too difficult for them, they should bring it before me for a hearing.

Deuteronomy 8:18

8:18 You must remember the Lord your God, for he is the one who gives ability to get wealth; if you do this he will confirm his covenant that he made by oath to your ancestors, ³  even as he has to this day.

Deuteronomy 12:21

12:21 If the place he ⁴  chooses to locate his name is too far for you, you may slaughter any of your herd and flock he ⁵  has given you just as I have stipulated; you may eat them in your villages ⁶  just as you wish.

Deuteronomy 20:19

20:19 If you besiege a city for a long time while attempting to capture it, ⁷  you must not chop down its trees, ⁸  for you may eat fruit ⁹  from them and should not cut them down. A tree in the field is not human that you should besiege it! ¹⁰ 

Deuteronomy 22:2

22:2 If the owner ¹¹  does not live ¹²  near you or you do not know who the owner is, ¹³  then you must corral the animal ¹⁴  at your house and let it stay with you until the owner looks for it; then you must return it to him.

Deuteronomy 22:6

22:6 If you happen to notice a bird’s nest along the road, whether in a tree or on the ground, and there are chicks or eggs with the mother bird sitting on them, ¹⁵  you must not take the mother from the young. ¹⁶ 

Deuteronomy 25:5

Respect for the Sanctity of Others

25:5 If brothers live together and one of them dies without having a son, the dead man’s wife must not remarry someone outside the family. Instead, her late husband’s brother must go to her, marry her, ¹⁷  and perform the duty of a brother-in-law. ¹⁸ 

Deuteronomy 25:7

25:7 But if the man does not want to marry his brother’s widow, then she ¹⁹  must go to the elders at the town gate and say, “My husband’s brother refuses to preserve his brother’s name in Israel; he is unwilling to perform the duty of a brother-in-law to me!”

Deuteronomy 28:13

28:13 The Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you will always end up at the top and not at the bottom, if you obey his ²⁰  commandments which I am urging ²¹  you today to be careful to do.

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¹ tn Heb “you,” and throughout the verse (cf. NASB, NRSV).

² tn Heb “the small,” but referring to social status, not physical stature.

³ tc Smr and Lucian add “Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,” the standard way of rendering this almost stereotypical formula (cf. Deut 1:8; 6:10; 9:5, 27; 29:13; 30:20; 34:4). The MT’s harder reading presumptively argues for its originality, however.

⁴ tn Heb “the Lord your God.” See note on “he” in 12:5.

⁵ tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 12:5.

⁶ tn Heb “gates” (so KJV, NASB); NAB “in your own community.”

⁷ tn Heb “to fight against it to capture it.”

⁸ tn Heb “you must not destroy its trees by chopping them with an iron” (i.e., an ax).

⁹ tn Heb “you may eat from them.” The direct object is not expressed; the word “fruit” is supplied in the translation for clarity.

¹⁰ tn Heb “to go before you in siege.”

¹¹ tn Heb “your brother” (also later in this verse).

¹² tn Heb “is not.” The idea of “residing” is implied.

¹³ tn Heb “and you do not know him.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “it”; the referent (the ox or sheep mentioned in v. 1) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁵ tn Heb “and the mother sitting upon the chicks or the eggs.”

¹⁶ tn Heb “sons,” used here in a generic sense for offspring.

¹⁷ tn Heb “take her as wife”; NRSV “taking her in marriage.”

¹⁸ sn This is the so-called “levirate” custom (from the Latin term levir, “brother-in-law”), an ancient provision whereby a man who died without male descendants to carry on his name could have a son by proxy, that is, through a surviving brother who would marry his widow and whose first son would then be attributed to the brother who had died. This is the only reference to this practice in an OT legal text but it is illustrated in the story of Judah and his sons (Gen 38) and possibly in the account of Ruth and Boaz (Ruth 2:8; 3:12; 4:6).

¹⁹ tn Heb “want to take his sister-in-law, then his sister in law.” In the second instance the pronoun (“she”) has been used in the translation to avoid redundancy.

²⁰ tn Heb “the Lord your God’s.” See note on “he” in 28:8.

²¹ tn Heb “commanding” (so NRSV); NASB “which I charge you today.”