Discovery BoxDeuteronomy 22:17-21 
Context22:17 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 1 before the city’s elders. 22:18 The elders of that city must then seize the man and punish 2 him. 22:19 They will fine him one hundred shekels of silver and give them to the young woman’s father, for the man who made the accusation 3 ruined the reputation 4 of an Israelite virgin. She will then become his wife and he may never divorce her as long as he lives.
22:20 But if the accusation is true and the young woman was not a virgin, 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 5 in Israel by behaving like a prostitute while living in her father’s house. In this way you will purge 6 evil from among you.
1 tn Heb “they will spread the garment.”
2 tn Heb “discipline.”
3 tn Heb “for he”; the referent (the man who made the accusation) has been specified in the translation to avoid confusion with the young woman’s father, the last-mentioned male.
4 tn Heb “brought forth a bad name.”
5 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.”
6 tn Heb “burn.” See note on Deut 21:21.
