Deuteronomy 25:9

_IF BRETHREN DWELL TOGETHER, AND ONE OF THEM DIE, AND HAVE NO CHILD, THE WIFE OF THE DEAD SHALL NOT MARRY WITHOUT UNTO A STRANGER: HER HUSBAND'S BROTHER SHALL GO IN UNTO HER, AND TAKE HER TO HIM TO WIFE, AND PERFORM THE DUTY OF AN HUSBAND'S BROTHER UNTO HER._ Her husband's brother shall ... take her to him to wife. This usage existed before the age of Moses (Genesis 38:8; Genesis 38:11), and seems to have originated in patriarchal times, for preserving the name and honours of the oldest son-the chieftain of the family. But the Mosaic law rendered the custom obligatory (Matthew 22:25) on younger brothers, or the nearest kinsman, to marry the widow ...

5-12 The custom here regulated seems to have been in the Jewish law in order to keep inheritances distinct; now it is unlawful....

Verse Deuteronomy 25:9. _AND LOOSE HIS SHOE_] It is difficult to find the reason of these ceremonies of degradation. Perhaps the _shoe_ was the emblem of _power_; and by _stripping it off, deprivation_ of that power and authority was represented. _Spitting_ in the face was a mark of the utmost ignominy; but the Jews, who are legitimate judges in this case, say that the spitting was not in his face, but _before_ his face _on the ground_. And this is the way in which the Asiatics express their detestation of a person to the present day, as _Niebuhr_ and other intelligent travellers assure us. It has been remarked that the prefix ב _beth_ is seldom applied to פני _peney_; but when it is it signifies as well _before_ as _in_ the face. See Joshua...

The law of levirate marriage. The law on this subject is not unique to the Jews, but is found (see Genesis 38:8) in all essential respects the same among various Oriental nations, ancient and modern. The rules in these verses, like those upon divorce, do but incorporate existing immemorial usages, and introduce various wise and politic limitations and mitigations of them. The root of the obligation here imposed upon the brother of the deceased husband lies in the primitive idea of childlessness being a great calamity (compare Genesis 16:4; and note), and extinction of name and family one of the greatest that could happen (compare Deuteronomy 9:14;...

EXPOSITION LAWS RELATING TO CORPORAL PUNISHMENT, LEVIRATE MARRIAGES, AND WEIGHTS AND MEASURES. DEUTERONOMY 25:1 The first and second verses should be read as one sentence, of which the protasis is in Deuteronomy 25:1 and the apodosis in Deuteronomy 25:2, thus: IF THERE BE A STRIFE BETWEEN MEN, AND THEY COME TO JUDGMENT, AND THEY (_i_._e_._ _the judges) give judgment on them, and justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked, then

THEN SHALL HIS BROTHER'S WIFE COME UNTO HIM IN THE PRESENCE OF THE ELDERS,.... The time and place being appointed the evening before by three Rabbins, and two witnesses, as Leo of Modena says p; of which she was apprized, and ordered to come tasting: AND LOOSE HIS SHOE FROM OFF HIS FOOT; his right foot, which was thus done; "they bring him a leather shoe, which has a heel, but not sewed with linen (linen thread), and he puts it on the right foot, and binds the latchet on his foot, and stands, he and she, in the court; he fixes his foot on the ground, and she sits and stretches out her hand in the court, and looses the latchet of his shoe from off his foot, and pulls off his shoe, and casts it to the ground q:'' this he suffered to be done to show that he gave up his right to her; and he was so used by way of reproach, to signify that he deserved not to be reckoned among freemen, but a...

21. VARIOUS LAWS AND RESPONSIBILITIES CHAPTER 25 _ 1. Corporal punishment (Deuteronomy 25:1)_ 2. Thou shalt not muzzle the ox (Deuteronomy 25:4) 3. The brother-in-law's marriage (Deuteronomy 25:5) 4. Concerning a sinful freedom (Deuteronomy 25:11) 5. Concerning divers weights and measures (Deuteronomy 25:13) 6. Concerning the conquest of Amalek (Deuteronomy 25:17

DEUTERONOMY 25:1. Another of Dt.'s humanitarian laws. Punishment by the bastinado among the ancient Hebrews and Egyptians was common (see Wilkinson- Birch, _Ancient Egyptians_, i. pp. 305, 308). The present writer saw it in Egypt in 1888; see Exodus 21:20 (showing that a slave was sometimes beaten to death), Proverbs 10:13; Proverbs 19:29. Deuteronomy 25:3. The forty stripes became thirty- nine (2 Corinthians 11:24) i

IN THE PRESENCE, &C. Ruth 4:11. LOOSE HIS SHOE. Compare Ruth 4:7; Ruth 4:8. SHOE. sandal....

Of Levirate Marriage If, of brothers dwelling together, one die childless, his widow shall not marry beyond the family, her husband's brother shall marry her, and their firstborn be the dead man's heir and continue his name in Israel (Deuteronomy 25:5 f.). But if the husband's brother decline this duty, even if after it is pressed on him by the elders, then, in their presence, shall the widow formally dishonour him as a recusant to the family, and the dishonour shall adhere (Deuteronomy 25:7-10). Peculiar to D's code, but neither in the direct address nor with D's phraseology. It has the same opening, the same care in putting the case, the same style of introducing conditions (_but if_and not D's _only_= _rak_, see on...