Discovery BoxDeuteronomy 24:6 
Context24:6 One must not take either lower or upper millstones as security on a loan, for that is like taking a life itself as security. 1
Deuteronomy 24:10-13
Context24:10 When you make any kind of loan to your neighbor, you may not go into his house to claim what he is offering as security. 2 24:11 You must stand outside and the person to whom you are making the loan will bring out to you what he is offering as security. 3 24:12 If the person is poor you may not use what he gives you as security for a covering. 4 24:13 You must by all means 5 return to him at sunset the item he gave you as security so that he may sleep in his outer garment and bless you for it; it will be considered a just 6 deed by the Lord your God.
1 sn Taking millstones as security on a loan would amount to taking the owner’s own life in pledge, since the millstones were the owner’s means of earning a living and supporting his family.
2 tn Heb “his pledge.” This refers to something offered as pledge of repayment, i.e., as security for the debt.
3 tn Heb “his pledge.”
4 tn Heb “may not lie down in his pledge.” What is in view is the use of clothing as guarantee for the repayment of loans, a matter already addressed elsewhere (Deut 23:19-20; 24:6; cf. Exod 22:25-26; Lev 25:35-37). Cf. NAB “you shall not sleep in the mantle he gives as a pledge”; NRSV “in the garment given you as the pledge.”
5 tn The Hebrew text uses the infinitive absolute for emphasis, which the translation seeks to reflect with “by all means.”
6 tn Or “righteous” (so NIV, NLT).
