Deuteronomy 13:15-17

13:15 you must by all means ¹  slaughter the inhabitants of that city with the sword; annihilate ²  with the sword everyone in it, as well as the livestock. 13:16 You must gather all of its plunder into the middle of the plaza ³  and burn the city and all its plunder as a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. It will be an abandoned ruin ⁴  forever – it must never be rebuilt again. 13:17 You must not take for yourself anything that has been placed under judgment. ⁵  Then the Lord will relent from his intense anger, show you compassion, have mercy on you, and multiply you as he promised your ancestors.

Deuteronomy 13:2

13:2 and the sign or wonder should come to pass concerning what he said to you, namely, “Let us follow other gods” – gods whom you have not previously known – “and let us serve them.”

Deuteronomy 25:13

25:13 You must not have in your bag different stone weights, ⁶  a heavy and a light one. ⁷ 

Deuteronomy 28:6-9

28:6 You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out. ⁸  28:7 The Lord will cause your enemies who attack ⁹  you to be struck down before you; they will attack you from one direction ¹⁰  but flee from you in seven different directions. 28:8 The Lord will decree blessing for you with respect to your barns and in everything you do – yes, he will bless you in the land he ¹¹  is giving you. 28:9 The Lord will designate you as his holy people just as he promised you, if you keep his commandments ¹²  and obey him. ¹³ 

Proverbs 18:19

18:19 A relative ¹⁴  offended ¹⁵  is harder to reach than ¹⁶  a strong city,

and disputes are like the barred gates ¹⁷  of a fortified citadel. ¹⁸ 

¹ tn The Hebrew text uses the infinitive absolute for emphasis, indicated in the translation by the words “by all means.” Cf. KJV, NASB “surely”; NIV “certainly.”

² tn Or “put under divine judgment. The Hebrew word (חֵרֶם, kherem) refers to placing persons or things under God’s judgment, usually to the extent of their complete destruction.Though primarily applied against the heathen, this severe judgment could also fall upon unrepentant Israelites (cf. the story of Achan in Josh 7). See also the note on the phrase “divine judgment” in Deut 2:34.

³ tn Heb “street.”

⁴ tn Heb “mound”; NAB “a heap of ruins.” The Hebrew word תֵּל (tel) refers to this day to a ruin represented especially by a built-up mound of dirt or debris (cf. Tel Aviv, “mound of grain”).

⁵ tn Or “anything that has been put under the divine curse”; Heb “anything of the ban” (cf. NASB). See note on the phrase “divine judgment” in Deut 2:34.

⁶ tn Heb “a stone and a stone.” The repetition of the singular noun here expresses diversity, as the following phrase indicates. See IBHS 116 §7.2.3c.

⁷ tn Heb “a large and a small,” but since the issue is the weight, “a heavy and a light one” conveys the idea better in English.

⁸ sn Come in…go out. To “come in” and “go out” is a figure of speech (merism) indicating all of life and its activities.

⁹ tn Heb “who rise up against” (so NIV).

¹⁰ tn Heb “way” (also later in this verse and in v. 25).

¹¹ tn Heb “the Lord your God.” Because English would not typically reintroduce the proper name following a relative pronoun (“he will bless…the Lord your God is giving”), the pronoun (“he”) has been employed here in the translation.

¹² tn Heb “the commandments of the Lord your God.” See note on “he” in the previous verse.

¹³ tn Heb “and walk in his ways” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

¹⁴ tn Heb “brother,” but this is not limited to actual siblings (cf. NRSV “an ally”; CEV, NLT “friend”).

¹⁵ tn The Niphal participle from פָּשַׁע (pasha’) modifies “brother”: a brother transgressed, offended, sinned against.

¹⁶ tc The LXX has a clear antithetical proverb here: “A brother helped is like a stronghold, but disputes are like bars of a citadel.” Accordingly, the editors of BHS propose מוֹשִׁיעַ (moshia’) instead of נִפְשָׁע (nifsha’, so also the other versions and the RSV). But since both lines use the comparison with a citadel (fortified/barred), the antithesis is problematic.

¹⁷ tn Heb “bars,” but this could be understood to mean “taverns,” so “barred gates” is employed in the translation.

¹⁸ sn The proverb is talking about changing a friend or a relative into an enemy by abuse or strife – the bars go up, as it were. And the “walls” that are erected are not easily torn down.