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Deuteronomy 21:10

in Deuteronomy 21

When you go to war against your enemies and the LORD your God delivers them into your hand and you take them captive,

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾

ASV

When thou goest forth to battle against thine enemies, and Jehovah thy God delivereth them into thy hands, and thou carriest them away captive,

KJV

When thou goest forth to war against thine enemies, and the Lord thy God hath delivered them into thine hands, and thou hast taken them captive,

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This verse in Deuteronomy 21

Commentary

5 notes on this verse

A commentator

Origen of Alexandria

HOMILIES ON LEVITICUS 7.6.7 · Written before 253.

But nevertheless I also intellectually have "gone out to war against my enemies, and I saw there" in the plunder "a woman with a beautiful figure." Whatever we find said well and reasonably among our philosophical enemies, or we read anything said among them wisely and knowingly, we must cleanse it. We must remove and cut off all that is dead and worthless. It is as if one were trimming the hairs of the head and the nails of the woman taken from the spoils of the enemy. Only then would you take her as a wife.

This site's exposition

When thou goest forth to war

on Deuteronomy 21:10-14

A woman taken captive is brought into the house and a full month passes before anything else happens, in which she shaves her head, puts off the clothes she was captured in, and mourns her father and her mother. The text gives no reason for the shaving and the nails, and readers have supplied different ones: Adam Clarke takes it as the mark of leaving her former religion, Matthew Henry as a check on the man's desire, and Clarke adds that the Hebrew rendered pare her nails may as easily mean letting them grow. If the man then has no delight in her she goes free where she will, and he may not sell her for money, because thou hast humbled her. Albert Barnes reads the war in view as one against nations outside Canaan, since chapter 7 and chapter 20 give a different rule for the Canaanite cities.

The record, by era

The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices

A commentator

Matthew Henry

1662–1714

Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710)

proposed

), it is true thou needest not ask her parents' consent, for she is thy captive, and is at thy disposal.

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens

When thou goest forth to war against thine enemies,....

The Nineteenth Century1 voice

The regulations which now follow in the rest of this and throughout the next chapter bring out the sanctity of various personal rights and relations fundamental to human life and society. Deu 21:10-14. The war supposed here is one against the neighboring nations after Israel had utterly destroyed the Canaanites (compare Deu 7:3), and taken possession of their land.

The words behind it

11 Hebrew words

Every Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

  • כִּֽי־if

    ki-H3588 →4482 times

  • תֵצֵ֥אyou will go out

    tetze'H3318 →1067 times

  • לַמִּלְחָמָ֖הto <the> war

    lamilchamahH4421 →320 times

  • עַל־on

    ʾal-H5921 →5755 times

  • אֹיְבֶ֑יךָenemies your

    ʾoyeveikhaH341 →282 times

  • וּנְתָנ֞וֹand he will give him

    unetanoH5414 →2011 times

  • יְהוָ֧הYahweh

    yahwehH3068 →6520 times

  • אֱלֹהֶ֛יךָGod your

    ʾeloheikhaH430 →2601 times

  • בְּיָדֶ֖ךָin hand your

    beyadekhaH3027 →1618 times

  • וְשָׁבִ֥יתָand you will take captive

    veshavitaH7617 →

  • שִׁבְיֽוֹ׃captive[s] his

    shivyoH7628 →49 times

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

Related verses

2 in all, six open

The walk

5 stops

Each card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.

  • Through

    Joshua 21:44

    And the LORD gave them rest on every side, just as He had sworn to their fathers. None of their enemies could stand against them, for the LORD delivered all their enemies into their…

    it leads to

    • Joshua 11:23

      So Joshua took the entire land, in keeping with all that the LORD had spoken to Moses. And Joshua gave it as an inheritance to Israel according to the allotments to their tribes. Then…

    • Hebrews 4:9

      There remains, then, a Sabbath rest for the people of God.

    • Deuteronomy 31:3–5

      The LORD your God Himself will cross over ahead of you. He will destroy these nations before you, and you will dispossess them. Joshua will cross ahead of you, as the LORD has said.

    • Exodus 23:31

      And I will establish your borders from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the Euphrates. For I will deliver the inhabitants into your hand, and you…

    • Deuteronomy 7:22–24

      The LORD your God will drive out these nations before you little by little. You will not be enabled to eliminate them all at once, or the wild animals would multiply around you.

Where this verse is studied

About Deuteronomy

Moses Comes Down from Mount Sinai, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.
Moses Comes Down from Mount Sinai, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.
Deuteronomy: the study guide →Read Deuteronomy 21 →

This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes on the Old Testament; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Origen of Alexandria, HOMILIES ON LEVITICUS 7.6.7.

Read on in Deuteronomy 21 →