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Texts -- Deuteronomy 21:1-7 (NET)

Context
Laws Concerning Unsolved Murder
21:1 If a homicide victim should be found lying in a field in the land the Lord your God is giving you, and no one knows who killed him, 21:2 your elders and judges must go out and measure how far it is to the cities in the vicinity of the corpse . 21:3 Then the elders of the city nearest to the corpse must take from the herd a heifer that has not been worked – that has never pulled with the yoke 21:4 and bring the heifer down to a wadi with flowing water , to a valley that is neither plowed nor sown . There at the wadi they are to break the heifer’s neck . 21:5 Then the Levitical priests will approach (for the Lord your God has chosen them to serve him and to pronounce blessings in his name , and to decide every judicial verdict ) verdict ) 21:6 and all the elders of that city nearest the corpse must wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley . 21:7 Then they must proclaim , “Our hands have not spilled this blood , nor have we witnessed the crime.

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Expository Notes on the Bible (Constable)

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