Exodus 20:16

20:16 “You shall not give ¹  false testimony ²  against your neighbor.

Deuteronomy 5:20

5:20 You must not offer false testimony against another. ³ 

Deuteronomy 19:16-21

19:16 If a false ⁴  witness testifies against another person and accuses him of a crime, ⁵  19:17 then both parties to the controversy must stand before the Lord, that is, before the priests and judges ⁶  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, ⁷  19:19 you must do to him what he had intended to do to the accused. In this way you will purge ⁸  evil from among you. 19:20 The rest of the people will hear and become afraid to keep doing such evil among you. 19:21 You must not show pity; the principle will be a life for a life, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, and a foot for a foot. ⁹ 

Psalms 27:12

27:12 Do not turn me over to my enemies, ¹⁰ 

for false witnesses who want to destroy me testify against me. ¹¹ 

Psalms 35:11

35:11 Violent men perjure themselves, ¹² 

and falsely accuse me. ¹³ 

Proverbs 6:19

6:19 a false witness who pours out lies, ¹⁴ 

and a person who spreads discord ¹⁵  among family members. ¹⁶ 

Proverbs 19:5

19:5 A false witness ¹⁷  will not go unpunished,

and the one who spouts out ¹⁸  lies will not escape punishment. ¹⁹ 

Proverbs 19:9

19:9 A false witness will not go unpunished,

and the one who spouts out ²⁰  lies will perish. ²¹ 

Proverbs 25:18

25:18 Like a club or a sword or a sharp arrow, ²² 

so is the one who testifies against ²³  his neighbor as a false witness. ²⁴ 

Malachi 3:5

3:5 “I ²⁵  will come to you in judgment. I will be quick to testify against those who practice divination, those who commit adultery, those who break promises, ²⁶  and those who exploit workers, widows, and orphans, ²⁷  who refuse to help ²⁸  the immigrant ²⁹  and in this way show they do not fear me,” says the Lord who rules over all.

Mark 14:56-59

14:56 Many gave false testimony against him, but their testimony did not agree. 14:57 Some stood up and gave this false testimony against him: ³⁰  14:58 “We heard him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with hands and in three days build another not made with hands.’” 14:59 Yet even on this point their testimony did not agree.

[20:16]  ¹ tn Heb “answer” as in a court of law.

[20:16]  ² tn The expression עֵד שָׁקֶר (’ed shaqer) means “a lying witness” (B. S. Childs, Exodus [OTL], 388). In this verse the noun is an adverbial accusative, “you will not answer as a lying witness.” The prohibition is against perjury. While the precise reference would be to legal proceedings, the law probably had a broader application to lying about other people in general (see Lev 5:1; Hos 4:2).

[5:20]  ³ tn Heb “your neighbor.” Clearly this is intended generically, however, and not to be limited only to those persons who live nearby (frequently the way “neighbor” is understood in contemporary contexts). So also in v. 20.

[19:16]  ⁴ 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]  ⁵ tn Or “rebellion.” Rebellion against God’s law is in view (cf. NAB “of a defection from the law”).

[19:17]  ⁶ 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]  ⁷ tn Heb “his brother” (also in the following verse).

[19:19]  ⁸ 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).

[19:21]  ⁹ sn This kind of justice is commonly called lex talionis or “measure for measure” (cf. Exod 21:23-25; Lev 24:19-20). It is likely that it is the principle that is important and not always a strict application. That is, the punishment should fit the crime and it may do so by the payment of fines or other suitable and equitable compensation (cf. Exod 22:21; Num 35:31). See T. S. Frymer-Kensky, “Tit for Tat: The Principle of Equal Retribution in Near Eastern and Biblical Law,” BA 43 (1980): 230-34.

[27:12]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “do not give me over to the desire of my enemies.”

[27:12]  ¹¹ tn Heb “for they have risen up against me, lying witnesses and a testifier of violence.” The form יָפֵחַ (yafeakh) is traditionally understood as a verb meaning “snort, breathe out”: “for false witnesses are risen up against me, and such as breathe out cruelty” (KJV; cf. BDB 422 s.v.). A better option is to take the form as a noun meaning “a witness” (or “testifier”). See Prov 6:19; 12:17; 14:5, 25; 19:5, 9, and Hab 2:3.

[35:11]  ¹² tn Heb “witnesses of violence rise up.”

[35:11]  ¹³ tn Heb “[that] which I do not know they ask me.”

[6:19]  ¹⁴ sn The Lord hates perjury and a lying witness (e.g., Ps 40:4; Amos 2:4; Mic 1:4). This is a direct violation of the law (Exod 20).

[6:19]  ¹⁵ sn Dissension is attributed in Proverbs to contentious people (21:9; 26:21; 25:24) who have a short fuse (15:8).

[6:19]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “brothers,” although not limited to male siblings only. Cf. NRSV, CEV “in a family”; TEV “among friends.”

[19:5]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “a witness of lies.” This expression is an attributive genitive: “a lying witness” (cf. CEV “dishonest witnesses”). This is paralleled by “the one who pours out lies.”

[19:5]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “breathes out”; NAB “utters”; NIV “pours out.”

[19:5]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “will not escape” (so NAB, NASB); NIV “will not go free.” Here “punishment” is implied, and has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[19:9]  ²⁰ tn Heb “breathes out”; NAB “utters”; NIV “pours out.”

[19:9]  ²¹ sn The verse is the same as v. 5, except that the last word changes to the verb “will perish” (cf. NCV “will die”; CEV, NLT “will be destroyed”; TEV “is doomed”).

[25:18]  ²² sn The first line identifies the emblem of the proverb: False witnesses are here compared to deadly weapons because they can cause the death of innocent people (e.g., Exod 20:16; Deut 5:20; and Prov 14:5).

[25:18]  ²³ tn The verb עָנָה (’anah) followed by the preposition בְּ (bet) with its object means “to testify against” (answer against someone). With the preposition לְ (lamed) it would mean “to testify for” someone. Here the false witness is an adversary, hence the comparison with deadly weapons.

[25:18]  ²⁴ tn While עֵד (’ed) could be interpreted as “evidence” (a meaning that came from a metonymy – what the witness gives in court), its normal meaning is “witness.” Here it would function as an adverbial accusative, specifying how he would answer in court.

[3:5]  ²⁵ tn The first person pronoun (a reference to the Lord) indicates that the Lord himself now speaks (see also v. 1). The prophet speaks in vv. 2-4 (see also 2:17).

[3:5]  ²⁶ tn Heb “those who swear [oaths] falsely.” Cf. NIV “perjurers”; TEV “those who give false testimony”; NLT “liars.”

[3:5]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and against the oppressors of the worker for a wage, [the] widow and orphan.”

[3:5]  ²⁸ tn Heb “those who turn aside.”

[3:5]  ²⁹ tn Or “resident foreigner”; NIV “aliens”; NRSV “the alien.”

[14:57]  ³⁰ tn Grk “Some standing up gave false testimony against him, saying.”