Deuteronomy 1:17

1:17 They ¹  must not discriminate in judgment, but hear the lowly ²  and the great alike. Nor should they be intimidated by human beings, for judgment belongs to God. If the matter being adjudicated is too difficult for them, they should bring it before me for a hearing.

Deuteronomy 17:8-11

Appeal to a Higher Court

17:8 If a matter is too difficult for you to judge – bloodshed, ³  legal claim, ⁴  or assault ⁵  – matters of controversy in your villages ⁶  – you must leave there and go up to the place the Lord your God chooses. ⁷  17:9 You will go to the Levitical priests and the judge in office in those days and seek a solution; they will render a verdict. 17:10 You must then do as they have determined at that place the Lord chooses. Be careful to do just as you are taught. 17:11 You must do what you are instructed, and the verdict they pronounce to you, without fail. Do not deviate right or left from what they tell you.

Deuteronomy 19:15-19

19:15 A single witness may not testify ⁸  against another person for any trespass or sin that he commits. A matter may be legally established ⁹  only on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 19:16 If a false ¹⁰  witness testifies against another person and accuses him of a crime, ¹¹  19:17 then both parties to the controversy must stand before the Lord, that is, before the priests and judges ¹²  who will be in office in those days. 19:18 The judges will thoroughly investigate the matter, and if the witness should prove to be false and to have given false testimony against the accused, ¹³  19:19 you must do to him what he had intended to do to the accused. In this way you will purge ¹⁴  evil from among you.

Proverbs 18:13

18:13 The one who gives an answer ¹⁵  before he listens ¹⁶  –

that is his folly and his shame. ¹⁷ 

[1:17]  ¹ tn Heb “you,” and throughout the verse (cf. NASB, NRSV).

[1:17]  ² tn Heb “the small,” but referring to social status, not physical stature.

[17:8]  ³ tn Heb “between blood and blood.”

[17:8]  ⁴ tn Heb “between claim and claim.”

[17:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “between blow and blow.”

[17:8]  ⁶ tn Heb “gates.”

[17:8]  ⁷ tc Several Greek recensions add “to place his name there,” thus completing the usual formula to describe the central sanctuary (cf. Deut 12:5, 11, 14, 18; 16:6). However, the context suggests that the local Levitical towns, and not the central sanctuary, are in mind.

[19:15]  ⁸ tn Heb “rise up” (likewise in v. 16).

[19:15]  ⁹ tn Heb “may stand.”

[19:16]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “violent” (חָמָס, khamas). This is a witness whose motivation from the beginning is to do harm to the accused and who, therefore, resorts to calumny and deceit. See I. Swart and C. VanDam, NIDOTTE 2:177-80.

[19:16]  ¹¹ tn Or “rebellion.” Rebellion against God’s law is in view (cf. NAB “of a defection from the law”).

[19:17]  ¹² tn The appositional construction (“before the Lord, that is, before the priests and judges”) indicates that these human agents represented the Lord himself, that is, they stood in his place (cf. Deut 16:18-20; 17:8-9).

[19:18]  ¹³ tn Heb “his brother” (also in the following verse).

[19:19]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “you will burn out” (בִּעַרְתָּ, bi’arta). Like a cancer, unavenged sin would infect the whole community. It must, therefore, be excised by the purging out of its perpetrators who, presumably, remained unrepentant (cf. Deut 13:6; 17:7, 12; 21:21; 22:21-22, 24; 24:7).

[18:13]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “returns a word”; KJV “He that answereth a matter.”

[18:13]  ¹⁶ sn Poor listening and premature answering indicate that the person has a low regard for what the other is saying, or that he is too absorbed in his own ideas. The Mishnah lists this as the second characteristic of the uncultured person (m. Avot 5:7).

[18:13]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “it is folly to him and shame.” The verse uses formal parallelism, with the second colon simply completing the thought of the first.