Deuteronomy 22:14

And give occasions of speech against her, and bring up an evil name upon her, and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid:

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

22:13-30 These and the like regulations might be needful then, and yet it is not necessary that we should curiously examine respecting them. The laws relate to the seventh commandment, laying a restraint upon fleshly lusts which war against the soul.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Compare Numbers 15:38 and its note.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

13-30. If a man take a wife, &c.—The regulations that follow might be imperatively needful in the then situation of the Israelites; and yet, it is not necessary that we should curiously and impertinently inquire into them. So far was it from being unworthy of God to leave such things upon record, that the enactments must heighten our admiration of His wisdom and goodness in the management of a people so perverse and so given to irregular passions. Nor is it a better argument that the Scriptures were not written by inspiration of God to object that this passage, and others of a like nature, tend to corrupt the imagination and will be abused by evil-disposed readers, than it is to say that the sun was not created by God, because its light may be abused by wicked men as an assistant in committing crimes which they have meditated [Horne].

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Of speech, Heb. of words, i.e. of discourses or defamations.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And give occasions of speech against her,.... Among her neighbours, who by his behaviour towards her, and by what he says of her, will be led in all company and conversation to traduce her character, and speak of her as a very bad woman:

and bring up an evil name upon her; take away her good name, and give her a bad one; defame her, and make her appear scandalous and reproachful to all that know her: though the Jews understand this not of private slander, but of bringing an action against her in a public court of judicature, the substance of which follows: "and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid"; the sense is, that he had married her, and when he came to cohabit with her as man and wife, it appeared to him that she was vitiated, and not a pure virgin. This is the charge in court against her, the action laid by him; so Jarchi observes, a man might not say this but before a magistrate, in a court of judicature, which is thus represented by Maimonides (p);"a man comes to the sanhedrim, and says, this young woman I married, and I did not find her virginities; and when I inquired into the matter, it appeared to me that she had played the whore under me, after I had betrothed her; and these are my witnesses that she played the whore before them.''

(p) Hilchot Naarah Betulah, c. 3. sect. 6.

Geneva Study Bible

And give {g} occasions of speech against her, and bring up an evil name upon her, and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid:

(g) That is, be an occasion that she is slandered.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

14. and lay shameful things to her charge] So some versions, and so still Marti. But others following Dillm. trans. frame wanton charges against her (Heb. ‘ȧlilôth debarîm, cp. the cognate ta‘alulîm, caprice or wantonness, Isaiah 3:4; Isaiah 66:4, and Psalm 141:4). So Dri. Berth., and the Oxford Heb. Lex. Aq. has ἐναλλακτικὰ ῥήματα, but LXX προφασιστικοὺς λόγους. Steuern., ‘evil deeds that are only words.’

bring up] Heb. bring out, techn. term.

tokens of virginity] See introd. note, and cp. Deuteronomy 22:17.

Deuteronomy 22:14

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Laws of Chastity and Marriage. - Higher and still holier than the order of nature stands the moral order of marriage, upon which the well-being not only of domestic life, but also of the civil commonwealth of nations, depends. Marriage must be founded upon fidelity and chastity on the part of those who are married. To foster this, and secure it against outbreaks of malice and evil lust, was the design and object of the laws which follow. The first (Deuteronomy 22:13-21) relates to the chastity of a woman on entering into the married state, which might be called in question by her husband, either from malice or with justice. The former case is that which Moses treats of first of all. If a man took a wife, and came to her, and hated her, i.e., turned against her after gratifying his carnal desires (like Amnon, for example, 2 Samuel 13:15), and in order to get rid of her again, attributed "deeds or things of words" to her, i.e., things which give occasion for words or talk, and so brought an evil name upon her, saying, that on coming to her he did not find virginity in her. בּתוּלים, virginity, here the signs of it, viz., according to Deuteronomy 22:17, the marks of a first intercourse upon the bed-clothes or dress.