Deuteronomy 25:1-9 ▼

1 If controversy arises between people, they should go to court for judgment. When the judges hear the case, they shall exonerate the innocent but condemn the guilty.

2 Then, if the guilty person is sentenced to a beating, the judge shall force him to lie down and be beaten in his presence with the number of blows his wicked behavior deserves.

3 The judge may sentence him to forty blows, but no more. If he is struck with more than these, you might view your fellow Israelite with contempt.

4 You must not muzzle your ox when it is treading grain.

5 If brothers live together and one of them dies without having a son, the dead man's wife must not remarry someone outside the family. Instead, her late husband's brother must go to her, marry her, and perform the duty of a brother-in-law.

6 Then the first son she bears will continue the name of the dead brother, thus preventing his name from being blotted out of Israel.

7 But if the man does not want to marry his brother's widow, then she must go to the elders at the town gate and say, |My husband's brother refuses to preserve his brother's name in Israel; he is unwilling to perform the duty of a brother-in-law to me!|

8 Then the elders of his city must summon him and speak to him. If he persists, saying, |I don't want to marry her,|

9 then his sister-in-law must approach him in view of the elders, remove his sandal from his foot, and spit in his face. She will then respond, |Thus may it be done to any man who does not maintain his brother's family line!|