The Torah · Old Testament
Deuteronomy 22
Neighbourly duties and severe sexual penalties
General context
The chapter begins with duties that cannot be ignored: return lost property, help a fallen animal and put a protective edge around a new roof. It also regulates clothing, birds' nests, mixed planting, ploughing, fabric and garment fringes. The marriage cases are severe. A husband whose accusation about his bride's virginity is disproved is punished, fined and forbidden to divorce her; if the charge is found true, she is stoned. Adultery with a married woman incurs death for both parties. The city case treats a betrothed woman's failure to cry out as grounds for her execution alongside the man. In the field case, the man forces a betrothed woman, and he alone is to die: the text compares the attack to murder and declares her free of a capital offence. A separate case concerning an unbetrothed virgin requires payment to her father, marriage and no subsequent divorce. The chapter ends by forbidding a man to take his father's wife.
Cited passages: Deuteronomy 22:1, Deuteronomy 22:2, Deuteronomy 22:3, Deuteronomy 22:4, Deuteronomy 22:5, Deuteronomy 22:6, Deuteronomy 22:7, Deuteronomy 22:8, Deuteronomy 22:9, Deuteronomy 22:10, Deuteronomy 22:11, Deuteronomy 22:12, Deuteronomy 22:13, Deuteronomy 22:14, Deuteronomy 22:15, Deuteronomy 22:16, Deuteronomy 22:17, Deuteronomy 22:18, Deuteronomy 22:19, Deuteronomy 22:20, Deuteronomy 22:21, Deuteronomy 22:22, Deuteronomy 22:23, Deuteronomy 22:24, Deuteronomy 22:25, Deuteronomy 22:26, Deuteronomy 22:27, Deuteronomy 22:28, Deuteronomy 22:29, Deuteronomy 22:30
Deuteronomy 22 (KJV)
1Thou shalt not see thy brother’s ox or his sheep go astray, and hide thyself from them: thou shalt in any case bring them again unto thy brother.
2And if thy brother be not nigh unto thee, or if thou know him not, then thou shalt bring it unto thine own house, and it shall be with thee until thy brother seek after it, and thou shalt restore it to him again.
3In like manner shalt thou do with his ass; and so shalt thou do with his raiment; and with all lost thing of thy brother’s, which he hath lost, and thou hast found, shalt thou do likewise: thou mayest not hide thyself.
4Thou shalt not see thy brother’s ass or his ox fall down by the way, and hide thyself from them: thou shalt surely help him to lift them up again.
5The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman’s garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God.
6If a bird’s nest chance to be before thee in the way in any tree, or on the ground, whether they be young ones, or eggs, and the dam sitting upon the young, or upon the eggs, thou shalt not take the dam with the young:
7But thou shalt in any wise let the dam go, and take the young to thee; that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest prolong thy days.
8When thou buildest a new house, then thou shalt make a battlement for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thine house, if any man fall from thence.
9Thou shalt not sow thy vineyard with divers seeds: lest the fruit of thy seed which thou hast sown, and the fruit of thy vineyard, be defiled.
10Thou shalt not plow with an ox and an ass together.
11Thou shalt not wear a garment of divers sorts, as of woollen and linen together.
12Thou shalt make thee fringes upon the four quarters of thy vesture, wherewith thou coverest thyself.
13If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her,
14And give occasions of speech against her, and bring up an evil name upon her, and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid:
15Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel’s virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate:
16And the damsel’s father shall say unto the elders, I gave my daughter unto this man to wife, and he hateth her;
17And, lo, he hath given occasions of speech against her, saying, I found not thy daughter a maid; and yet these are the tokens of my daughter’s virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city.
18And the elders of that city shall take that man and chastise him;
19And they shall amerce him in an hundred shekels of silver, and give them unto the father of the damsel, because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel: and she shall be his wife; he may not put her away all his days.
20But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel:
21Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father’s house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you.
22If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel.
23If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her;
24Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour’s wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you.
25But if a man find a betrothed damsel in the field, and the man force her, and lie with her: then the man only that lay with her shall die:
26But unto the damsel thou shalt do nothing; there is in the damsel no sin worthy of death: for as when a man riseth against his neighbour, and slayeth him, even so is this matter:
27For he found her in the field, and the betrothed damsel cried, and there was none to save her.
28If a man find a damsel that is a virgin, which is not betrothed, and lay hold on her, and lie with her, and they be found;
29Then the man that lay with her shall give unto the damsel’s father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife; because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days.
30A man shall not take his father’s wife, nor discover his father’s skirt.
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Historical context
Parents, elders at the city gate, a displayed cloth and payments to the father belong to the chapter's stated legal procedure. The cloth is presented as evidence in that procedure, without an explanation of how it establishes the claim. The field case explicitly says there was no one to rescue the woman. Its counterpart in the city assumes an available cry for help; that assumption should not be converted into a general claim that silence establishes consent. For the unbetrothed woman, the KJV and ASV say the man lays hold on her; the BBE says he takes her by force. The rule does not record her consent to the required marriage.
Cited passages: Deuteronomy 22:15, Deuteronomy 22:16, Deuteronomy 22:17, Deuteronomy 22:18, Deuteronomy 22:19, Deuteronomy 22:23, Deuteronomy 22:24, Deuteronomy 22:25, Deuteronomy 22:26, Deuteronomy 22:27, Deuteronomy 22:28, Deuteronomy 22:29
Literary context
Repeated commands against hiding oneself begin the chapter with active responsibility for a neighbour's loss. The roof rule then makes foreseeable harm a household responsibility. The later cases repeatedly change a condition, including whether an accusation is sustained, whether a woman is married or betrothed, and whether an attack occurs in a city or field. Those distinctions explain the text's different judgments; they do not make its violent penalties or assumptions about women disappear.
Cited passages: Deuteronomy 22:1, Deuteronomy 22:2, Deuteronomy 22:3, Deuteronomy 22:4, Deuteronomy 22:8, Deuteronomy 22:13, Deuteronomy 22:14, Deuteronomy 22:15, Deuteronomy 22:16, Deuteronomy 22:17, Deuteronomy 22:18, Deuteronomy 22:19, Deuteronomy 22:20, Deuteronomy 22:21, Deuteronomy 22:22, Deuteronomy 22:23, Deuteronomy 22:24, Deuteronomy 22:25, Deuteronomy 22:26, Deuteronomy 22:27, Deuteronomy 22:28, Deuteronomy 22:29
Key moments
- Do not look away (Deuteronomy 22:4). A neighbour's fallen animal requires help, not deliberate avoidance.
- A protective roof edge (Deuteronomy 22:8). The new house must include a barrier against a fall and the bloodguilt it would bring.
- The attacked woman is not condemned (Deuteronomy 22:26). In the field case the text compares the assault to murder and prohibits punishment of the woman.
- Marriage without a recorded choice (Deuteronomy 22:29). The unbetrothed woman's case requires fifty shekels to her father and marriage with no divorce; her assent is not stated.
For reflection
Verse 26 says that the attacked woman in the field bears no capital guilt. What changes when you read the surrounding laws while attending closely to the person exposed to harm and to whose voice the passage records?