Deuteronomy 21

Atonement for an Unsolved Murder

1“If someone is found slain on the ground that the LORD your God is giving you to possess, fallen in the field, and it is not known who struck him, 2then your elders and judges will go out and measure the distance from the slain person to the cities around him. 3The city nearest to the slain person will be identified, and the elders of that city will take a heifer from the herd that has not been worked and has not pulled in a yoke. 4The elders of that city will bring the heifer down to a perennial valley that has not been plowed or sown, and there in the valley they will break the heifer’s neck. 5Then the priests, the sons of Levi, will approach, for the LORD your God has chosen them to minister to him and to bless in the name of the LORD, and by their mouth every dispute and every assault will be decided. 6All the elders of that city nearest to the slain person will wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley. 7They will answer and say, ‘Our hands did not shed this blood, and our eyes did not see it. 8Make atonement for your people Israel, whom you redeemed, O LORD, and do not place innocent blood among your people Israel.’ Then the bloodguilt will be atoned for them. 9So you will remove innocent blood from your midst when you do what is right in the eyes of the LORD.

A Woman Captured in War

10“When you go out to war against your enemies and the LORD your God gives them into your hand and you take them captive, 11and you see among the captives a woman beautiful in form, and you desire her and would take her for yourself as wife, 12then you will bring her into your house. She will shave her head and trim her nails. 13She will remove the garment of her captivity from upon her and remain in your house and weep for her father and mother a full month. After that you may go in to her and be her husband, and she will be your wife. 14But if you no longer delight in her, you will send her free according to her desire. You will not sell her for silver or treat her as merchandise, because you have humbled her.

The Right of the Firstborn

15“If a man has two wives, one loved and the other hated, and both the loved and the hated bear sons to him, and the firstborn son belongs to the hated wife, 16then on the day he causes his sons to inherit what he has, he may not treat the son of the loved wife as firstborn before the son of the hated wife, who is the firstborn. 17Rather, he will recognize the firstborn, the son of the hated wife, by giving him a double portion of all that is found with him, for he is the first of his strength. The right of the firstborn belongs to him.

A Stubborn and Rebellious Son

18“If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not listen to the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and though they discipline him he will not listen to them, 19then his father and his mother will seize him and bring him out to the elders of his city and to the gate of his place. 20They will say to the elders of his city, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he does not listen to our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ 21Then all the men of his city will stone him with stones so that he dies. So you will remove the evil from your midst, and all Israel will hear and fear.

A Body Hanged on a Tree

22“And if a man has committed a sin deserving death and he is put to death and you hang him on a tree, 23his corpse will not remain all night on the tree, but you will surely bury him that day, for one hanged is a curse of God. You will not defile your ground that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance.