translation_id: net-engnet

book_id: DEU

label: NET study note

text: The unworked heifer, fresh stream, and uncultivated valley speak of ritual purity – of freedom from human contamination.


text: This requirement for the woman to shave her head may symbolize the putting away of the old life and customs in preparation for being numbered among the people of the Lord . The same is true for the two following requirements.


text: Heb “send her off.” The Hebrew term שִׁלַּחְתָּה ( shillakhtah ) is a somewhat euphemistic way of referring to divorce, the matter clearly in view here (cf. Deut 22:19, 29; 24:1, 3 ; Jer 3:1 ; Mal 2:16 ). This passage does not have the matter of divorce as its principal objective, so it should not be understood as endorsing divorce generally. It merely makes the point that if grounds for divorce exist (see Deut 24:1-4 ), and then divorce ensues, the husband could in no way gain profit from it.


text: You have humiliated her . Since divorce was considered rejection, the wife subjected to it would “lose face” in addition to the already humiliating event of having become a wife by force ( 21:11-13 ). Furthermore, the Hebrew verb translated “humiliated” here ( עָנָה , ’ anah ), commonly used to speak of rape (cf. Gen 34:2 ; 2 Sam 13:12, 14, 22, 32 ; Judg 19:24 ), likely has sexual overtones as well. The woman may not be enslaved or abused after the divorce because it would be double humiliation (see also E. H. Merrill, Deuteronomy [NAC], 291).


text: The idea behind the phrase cursed by God seems to be not that the person was impaled because he was cursed but that to leave him exposed there was to invite the curse of God upon the whole land. Why this would be so is not clear, though the rabbinic idea that even a criminal is created in the image of God may give some clue (thus J. H. Tigay, Deuteronomy [JPSTC], 198). Paul cites this text (see Gal 3:13 ) to make the point that Christ, suspended from a cross, thereby took upon himself the curse associated with such a display of divine wrath and judgment (T. George, Galatians [NAC], 238-39).