Discovery BoxDeuteronomy 4:1 
Context4:1 Now, Israel, pay attention to the statutes and ordinances 1 I am about to teach you, so that you might live and go on to enter and take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your ancestors, 2 is giving you.
Deuteronomy 4:10
Context4:10 You 3 stood before the Lord your God at Horeb and he 4 said to me, “Assemble the people before me so that I can tell them my commands. 5 Then they will learn to revere me all the days they live in the land, and they will instruct their children.”
Deuteronomy 22:2
Context22:2 If the owner 6 does not live 7 near you or you do not know who the owner is, 8 then you must corral the animal 9 at your house and let it stay with you until the owner looks for it; then you must return it to him.
Deuteronomy 25:5
Context25:5 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, 10 and perform the duty of a brother-in-law. 11
Deuteronomy 30:16
Context30:16 What 12 I am commanding you today is to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to obey his commandments, his statutes, and his ordinances. Then you will live and become numerous and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are about to possess. 13
Deuteronomy 30:20
Context30:20 I also call on you 14 to love the Lord your God, to obey him and be loyal to him, for he gives you life and enables you to live continually 15 in the land the Lord promised to give to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
1 tn These technical Hebrew terms (חֻקִּים [khuqqim] and מִשְׁפָּטִים [mishpatim]) occur repeatedly throughout the Book of Deuteronomy to describe the covenant stipulations to which Israel had been called to subscribe (see, in this chapter alone, vv. 1, 5, 6, 8). The word חֻקִּים derives from the verb חֹק (khoq, “to inscribe; to carve”) and מִשְׁפָּטִים (mishpatim) from שָׁפַט (shafat, “to judge”). They are virtually synonymous and are used interchangeably in Deuteronomy.
2 tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 31, 37).
3 tn The text begins with “(the) day (in) which.” In the Hebrew text v. 10 is subordinate to v. 11, but for stylistic reasons the translation treats v. 10 as an independent clause, necessitating the omission of the subordinating temporal phrase at the beginning of the verse.
4 tn Heb “the
5 tn Heb “my words.” See v. 13; in Hebrew the “ten commandments” are the “ten words.”
6 tn Heb “your brother” (also later in this verse).
7 tn Heb “is not.” The idea of “residing” is implied.
8 tn Heb “and you do not know him.”
9 tn Heb “it”; the referent (the ox or sheep mentioned in v. 1) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
10 tn Heb “take her as wife”; NRSV “taking her in marriage.”
11 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).
12 tc A number of LXX
13 tn Heb “which you are going there to possess it.” This has been simplified in the translation for stylistic reasons.
14 tn The words “I also call on you” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons. In the Hebrew text vv. 19-20 are one long sentence, which the translation divides into two.
15 tn Heb “he is your life and the length of your days to live.”
