Deuteronomy 24:15

_THOU SHALT NOT OPPRESS AN HIRED SERVANT THAT IS POOR AND NEEDY, WHETHER HE BE OF THY BRETHREN, OR OF THY STRANGERS THAT ARE IN THY LAND WITHIN THY GATES:_ Thou shalt not oppress an hired servant that is poor and needy. Hirelings, who consisted for the most part, though not exclusively, of foreigners (Exodus 12:45), were entitled by express statute to kind and considerate treatment: and as they had it in their power to choose their services, they could doubtless be influenced in the kind and degree of employment they deemed the best and easiest. Hired servants, with the exception of a particular class resident in the family of their master, and whose term of employment lasted for a year (Gen. 25:53), were among the Israelites (cf. Matthew 20:1), as in the East generally, day labourers

14-22 It is not hard to prove that purity, piety, justice, mercy, fair conduct, kindness to the poor and destitute, consideration for them, and generosity of spirit, are pleasing to God, and becoming in his redeemed people. The difficulty is to attend to them in our daily walk and conversation....

Verse Deuteronomy 24:15. _HE IS POOR, AND SETTETH HIS HEART UPON IT_] How exceedingly natural is this! The poor servant who seldom sees money, yet finds from his master's affluence that it procures all the conveniences and comforts of life, longs for the time when he shall receive his wages; should his pay be delayed after the time is expired, he may naturally be expected to _cry unto God_ against him who withholds it. See most of these subjects treated at large on Exodus 22:21-2....

EXPOSITION LAWS RESPECTING DIVORCE, AGAINST MAN-STEALING AND INJUSTICE. DEUTERONOMY 24:1 _Of divorce_._ _If a man put away his wife because she did not any longer please him, and she became the wife of another man, by whom also she was put away, or from whom she was severed by his death, the first husband might not remarry her, for that would be an abomination in the eyes of the Lord, and would bring sin on the land. This is not a law sanctioning or regulating divorce; that is simply assumed as what might occur, and what is here regulated is the treatment by the first husband of a woman who has been divorced a second time....

AT HIS DAY THOU SHALT GIVE [HIM] HIS HIRE,.... At the close of the day, when his work is done, the hire agreed for must be paid him; and, by the same rule, all such that were hired by the week, month, or year, were to have their wages paid them at the day their time was up: NEITHER SHALL THE SUN GO DOWN UPON IT; it was to be paid before sun setting, or at it; see Leviticus 19:13; FOR HE [IS] POOR, AND SETTETH HIS HEART UPON IT; being poor, he cannot wait any longer for the payment of it; his personal and family wants are such as require immediate payment; and besides, he has been eagerly expecting it, and earnestly desiring it, that he may satisfy the craving necessities of himself and family; and therefore it would be a great balk and disappointment to him to have his wages detained: LEST HE CRY AGAINST THEE TO THE LORD; havin

20. CONCERNING DIVORCE AND LAWS OF MERCY CHAPTER 24 _ 1. Concerning divorce (Deuteronomy 24:1)_ 2. Concerning pledge and slavery (Deuteronomy 24:6) 3. Concerning leprosy (Deuteronomy 24:8) 4. Concerning the oppression of the poor (Deuteronomy 24:10) 5. Concerning injustice (Deuteronomy 24:16) 6. The stranger, the fatherless and the widow remembered (Deuteronomy 24

XXIV. 6_ F_., 10- 13, which stood perhaps originally together, belong to the many humanitarian laws of D (Deuteronomy 15:12 *). Corn is still ground in the home in Palestine; this is done by the rotation of an upper on a lower round stone (_cf._ the British quern used in Scotland in 1880 according to E. B. Tylor (_Academy_, vol. xviii. (1880) p. 204). Deuteronomy 24:7. Exodus 21:16 (JE). Here the law is narrower. In CH (§ 14) it is only the nobleman who may not be stolen (Deuteronomy 15:12 *)....

THE SUN GO DOWN. Compare James 5:4. AND SETTETH. and he lifteth up. HIS HEART. his soul. Hebrew. _nephesh._ App-13....

Deuteronomy 24:5 to Deuteronomy 25:4. Thirteen Laws of Equity and Humanity Besides the humane temper common to most of them, and a few cue-words, there are no apparent reasons for their being grouped or for the order in which they occur. They have various openings, mostly conditional, otherwise negative. Three are not in the direct form of address, and two only close with this; the rest are in the Sg. form, except one mixed of Sg. and Pl. Some are peculiar to D, others have parallels in E and H. In particular note the separation of the three laws on pledges, and their use of two different terms for -pledge." All this suggests a compilation from different sources....

_VER._ 15. _AT HIS DAY THOU SHALT GIVE HIM HIS HIRE_— This particularly concerns those who live by their daily labour: they ought to be paid before the sun goes down; all ought to receive their wages, whether labourers or servants, at the time agreed upon; _for this is what he setteth his heart upon;_ or, as the Vulgate has it, for _from hence he supports his soul, or life. The bread of the needy is their life,_ saith the son of Sirach; _he that defraudeth him thereof is a man of blood: he that taketh away his neighbour's living, slayeth him; and he that defraudeth the labourer of his hire, is a blood-shedder._ Sir 34:21-22. He _sheddeth blood,_ inasmuch as the wages of the labourer are what supports him, and as, according to the Scripture, the life of man is in his blood. See St. Augustin. Quaest. in Levit. col. 516....