Deuteronomy 21.18-21

¹⁸ “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and who, when they have chastened him, will not heed them, ¹⁹ then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city, to the gate of his city. ²⁰ And they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ ²¹ Then all the men of his city shall stone him to death with stones; so you shall put away the evil from among you, and all Israel shall hear and fear.”

Exodus 21.15

“And he who strikes his father or his mother shall surely be put to death.”

We recall that, in ancient Israel, the people did not yet possess the Spirit of God; deep-seated and lasting heart-change was therefore not as readily possible as in this age of grace (cf. Deut. 5.29; 30.1-10; Ezek. 36.26, 27). While it would have been every parent’s greatest horror to see his child sentenced to death, this rule should probably best be understood as intending to reinforce the previous mandate to fear parents.

No parent could carry punishment of a child all the way to the point of death on his or her authority alone. Such a severe punishment was the decision, first, of the judges of the city, and then of all the men in the community. Types of behavior for which this drastic discipline could be imposed are here clearly spelled out: cursing or striking one’s parents, rebelling against their will, stubbornly refusing to obey, becoming a glutton or a drunkard. Such behavior was clearly a threat to the stability of the community as a whole. Any disobedience or disrespect short of these must be addressed by parents. Children and youth thus had spelled out for them the outside parameters of behavior expected of them by the members of their community.

In our day the equivalent of the death sentence would be separation from the believing community for a season (cf. 1 Cor. 5). Parents might accomplish such a sentence by “grounding” children from their favored activities, and church leaders might do so by prohibiting recalcitrant youth from participating in the activities of their peers within the believing community.

T. M. Moore

The Law of God is the soil which, fertilized by the rest of God’s Word and watered by His Spirit, brings forth the fruit of Christian life. If you’d like to understand this process better, and how to make best use of the Law in your walk with and work for the Lord, order the book, The Ground for Christian Ethics, from our online store.