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Deuteronomy 25:8

in Deuteronomy 25

Then the elders of his city shall summon him and speak with him. If he persists and says, “I do not want to marry her,”

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾

ASV

Then the elders of his city shall call him, and speak unto him: and if he stand, and say, I like not to take her;

KJV

Then the elders of his city shall call him, and speak unto him: and if he stand to it, and say, I like not to take her;

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This verse in Deuteronomy 25

Commentary

4 notes on this verse

A commentator

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

1802–1910

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)

But the Mosaic law rendered the custom obligatory (Mt 22:25) on younger brothers, or the nearest kinsman, to marry the widow (Ru 4:4), by associating the natural desire of perpetuating a brother's name with the preservation of property in the Hebrew families and tribes.

This site's exposition

If brethren dwell together

on Deuteronomy 25:5-10

The statute exists so that a dead man's name be not put out of Israel, and Genesis 38 shows the duty already assumed in Judah's house before there was a law for it. A brother who refuses is not compelled but shamed, since the widow looses his shoe before the elders and spits, and his house carries the name of the shoe loosed from then on. Ruth 4:7-8 is the ceremony being performed, though there the shoe passes between the nearer kinsman and Boaz rather than from the widow's own hand. The Sadducees build their resurrection puzzle out of this law at Matthew 22:24, taking seven brothers and one wife in turn.

The record, by era

The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices

A commentator

Matthew Henry

1662–1714

Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710)

In the case of Ruth we find this law executed ( Ruth iv. 7 ), but because, upon the refusal of the next kinsman, there was another ready to perform the duty of a husband's brother, it was that other that plucked off the shoe, and not the widow--Boaz, and not Ruth.
Then the elders of his city shall call him,....

How the passage was read

On Deuteronomy 25:5-10

On Deuteronomy 25:5-10

The law behind Ruth, and behind a famous riddle

This is levirate marriage (from Latin levir, “husband's brother”; in Hebrew yibbum): when a man dies childless, his brother marries the widow, and the first son “shall succeed to the name of his brother who is dead.” The same passage provides the release ceremony (chalitzah, the loosing of the sandal) for a brother who refuses. The book of Ruth turns on this family duty, and the tradition built a whole tractate of the Mishnah, Yevamot, on its cases.

This law is the machinery of the Sadducees' riddle in Matthew 22:23-33: seven brothers, one widow, “in the resurrection, whose wife shall she be?” The riddle only works because the duty was real law. Jesus answers the question behind the question, proving the resurrection from the Torah itself (Exodus 3:6), the one canon His questioners fully granted.

This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.

Sources: Mishnah Yevamot 1:1 (the tractate built on this law)

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.

  • וְקָֽרְאוּ־and they will summon

    vekareu-H7121 →733 times

  • ל֥וֹ<to> <the> him

    lo

  • זִקְנֵי־[the] elders of

    ziknei-H2205 →178 times

  • עִיר֖וֹcity his

    iroH5892 →1090 times

  • וְדִבְּר֣וּand they will speak

    vediberuH1696 →1141 times

  • אֵלָ֑יוto him

    ʾelavH413 →5510 times

  • וְעָמַ֣דand he will stand firm

    veamadH5975 →521 times

  • וְאָמַ֔רand he will say

    veamarH559 →5305 times

  • לֹ֥אnot

    lo'H3808 →5168 times

  • חָפַ֖צְתִּיI desire

    chafatztiH2654 →74 times

  • לְקַחְתָּֽהּ׃to take her

    lekachtahH3947 →966 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

2 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

    Ruth 4:6

    The kinsman-redeemer replied, “I cannot redeem it myself, or I would jeopardize my own inheritance. Take my right of redemption, because I cannot redeem it.”

    it leads to

    • Leviticus 25:25

      If your brother becomes impoverished and sells some of his property, his nearest of kin may come and redeem what his brother has sold.

    • Ruth 3:13

      Stay here tonight, and in the morning, if he wants to redeem you, good. Let him redeem you. But if he does not want to redeem you, as surely as the LORD lives, I…

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 25 →

This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.

Read on in Deuteronomy 25 →