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Read the Bible

New King James Version

Deuteronomy 14:1

"You are the children of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave the front of your head for the dead.

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Adoption;   Baldness;   Cutting;   God;   Idolatry;   Mourning;   Thompson Chain Reference - Baldness;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - Dead, the;   Eye, the;   Titles and Names of Saints;  

Dictionaries:

- American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Baldness (Natural or Artificial);   Clean and Unclean;   Mourning;   Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Adoption;   Funeral;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Fatherhood of God;   Funeral;   Touch;   Easton Bible Dictionary - Baldness;   Clean;   Cutting;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Baldness;   Giants;   Ishmael;   Noah;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Abstinence;   Baldness;   Burial;   Clean, Cleanness;   Eye;   Fertility Cult;   Hair;   Pentateuch;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Children (Sons) of God;   Clean and Unclean;   Crimes and Punishments;   Cuttings in the Flesh;   Deuteronomy;   Eye;   Forehead;   Head;   Marks;   Nature;   Sin;   Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament - Adoption;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - Baldness;   Hair;   People's Dictionary of the Bible - Clean and unclean;   Hair;   Wilson's Dictionary of Bible Types - Bald;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Adoption;   Antediluvians;   Baldness;   Burial;   Child;   Children of God;   Cut;   Cuttings in the Flesh;   Death;   Head;   Resurrection;   Sons of God (Old Testament);   Writing;   Kitto Biblical Cyclopedia - Baldness;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Commandments, the 613;   Cuttings;   Death, Angel of;   Debarim Rabbah;   Deuteronomy;   God, Children of;   Hair;   Hamnuna I.;   Judaism;   Love;   Mourning;   Parable;   Pharisees;  

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
“You are sons of the Lord your God; do not cut yourselves or make a bald spot on your head on behalf of the dead,
Hebrew Names Version
You are the children of the LORD your God: you shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
King James Version
Ye are the children of the Lord your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Lexham English Bible
"You are children of Yahweh your God; therefore you must not gash yourself, and you must not make your forehead bald for the dead.
English Standard Version
"You are the sons of the Lord your God. You shall not cut yourselves or make any baldness on your foreheads for the dead.
New Century Version
You are the children of the Lord your God. When someone dies, do not cut yourselves or shave your heads to show your sadness.
New English Translation
You are children of the Lord your God. Do not cut yourselves or shave your forehead bald for the sake of the dead.
Amplified Bible
"You are the sons of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave your forehead for the sake of the dead,
New American Standard Bible
"You are sons of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave a bald spot above your forehead for the dead.
Geneva Bible (1587)
Ye are the children of the Lord your God. Ye shall not cut yourselues, nor make you any baldnesse betweene your eyes for the dead.
Legacy Standard Bible
"You are the sons of Yahweh your God; you shall not gash yourselves nor shave your forehead for the sake of the dead.
Contemporary English Version
Moses said: People of Israel, you are the Lord 's children, so when you mourn for the dead, you must not cut yourselves or shave your forehead.
Complete Jewish Bible
(iv) "You are the people of Adonai your God. You are not to gash yourselves or shave the hair above your foreheads in mourning for the dead,
Darby Translation
Ye are sons of Jehovah your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for a dead person.
Easy-to-Read Version
"You are the children of the Lord your God. When someone dies, you must not cut yourselves or shave your heads to show your sadness.
George Lamsa Translation
YOU are the children of the LORD your God; you shall not make tattooed patterns in the skin, nor any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Good News Translation
"You are the people of the Lord your God. So when you mourn for the dead, don't gash yourselves or shave the front of your head, as other people do.
Literal Translation
You are sons to Jehovah your God; you shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Ye are the children of the LORDE youre God, Cut not youre selues therfore, & make you no baldnesse betwene youre eyes ouer eny deed.
American Standard Version
Ye are the children of Jehovah your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Bible in Basic English
You are the children of the Lord your God: you are not to make cuts on your bodies or take off the hair on your brows in honour of the dead;
Bishop's Bible (1568)
Ye are the childre of the Lord your God: Ye shall not cut your selues, nor make you any baldnes betwene your eyes for ye dead man.
JPS Old Testament (1917)
Ye are the children of the LORD your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
King James Version (1611)
Yee are the children of the Lord your God: yee shall not cutte your selues, nor make any baldnesse betweene your eyes for the dead.
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Ye are the children of the Lord your God: ye shall not make any baldness between you eyes for the dead.
English Revised Version
Ye are the children of the LORD your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Berean Standard Bible
You are sons of the LORD your God; do not cut yourselves or shave your forehead on behalf of the dead,
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Be ye the sones of youre Lord God; ye schulen not kitte you, nether ye schulen make ballidnesse,
Young's Literal Translation
`Sons ye [are] to Jehovah your God; ye do not cut yourselves, nor make baldness between your eyes for the dead;
Update Bible Version
You are the sons of Yahweh your God: you shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Webster's Bible Translation
Ye [are] the children of the LORD your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
World English Bible
You are the children of Yahweh your God: you shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
New Living Translation
"Since you are the people of the Lord your God, never cut yourselves or shave the hair above your foreheads in mourning for the dead.
New Life Bible
"You are the sons of the Lord your God. Do not cut yourselves or cut the hair from your foreheads because of the dead.
New Revised Standard
You are children of the Lord your God. You must not lacerate yourselves or shave your forelocks for the dead.
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Sons, are ye unto Yahweh your God, - ye shall not cut yourselves, neither shall ye put baldness between your eyes for the dead.
Douay-Rheims Bible
Be ye children of the Lord your God: you shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness for the dead;
Revised Standard Version
"You are the sons of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves or make any baldness on your foreheads for the dead.
THE MESSAGE
You are children of God , your God, so don't mutilate your bodies or shave your heads in funeral rites for the dead. You only are a people holy to God , your God; God chose you out of all the people on Earth as his cherished personal treasure.
New American Standard Bible (1995)
"You are the sons of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave your forehead for the sake of the dead.

Contextual Overview

1 "You are the children of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave the front of your head for the dead. 2 For you are a holy people to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. 3 Leviticus 11:1-47">[xr] "You shall not eat any detestable thing. 4 These are the animals which you may eat: the ox, the sheep, the goat, 5 the deer, the gazelle, the roe deer, the wild goat, the mountain goat, [fn] the antelope, and the mountain sheep. 6 And you may eat every animal with cloven hooves, having the hoof split into two parts, and that chews the cud, among the animals. 7 Nevertheless, of those that chew the cud or have cloven hooves, you shall not eat, such as these: the camel, the hare, and the rock hyrax; for they chew the cud but do not have cloven hooves; they are unclean for you. 8 Also the swine is unclean for you, because it has cloven hooves, yet does not chew the cud; you shall not eat their flesh or touch their dead carcasses. 9 "These you may eat of all that are in the waters: you may eat all that have fins and scales. 10 And whatever does not have fins and scales you shall not eat; it is unclean for you.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

the children: Genesis 6:2, Genesis 6:4, Exodus 4:22, Exodus 4:23, Psalms 82:6, Psalms 82:7, Jeremiah 3:19, Hosea 1:10, John 1:12, John 11:52, Romans 8:16, Romans 9:8, Romans 9:26, 2 Corinthians 6:18, Galatians 3:26, Hebrews 2:10, 1 John 3:1, 1 John 3:2, 1 John 3:10, 1 John 5:2

ye shall not: The heathen nations not only did these things in honour of their gods, but in grief for the death of a relative. Leviticus 19:27, Leviticus 19:28, Leviticus 21:5, Jeremiah 16:6, Jeremiah 41:5, Jeremiah 47:5, 1 Thessalonians 4:13

Reciprocal: Genesis 7:2 - every clean Leviticus 11:4 - unclean unto you Judges 20:7 - ye are all 1 Kings 18:28 - cut themselves Isaiah 15:2 - all Ezekiel 27:31 - they shall make Ezekiel 44:20 - shave John 8:41 - we have Acts 10:14 - for Romans 9:4 - the adoption

Cross-References

Genesis 10:22
The sons of Shem were Elam, Asshur, Arphaxad, Lud, and Aram.
Genesis 11:2
And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there.
Isaiah 11:11
It shall come to pass in that day That the Lord shall set His hand again the second time To recover the remnant of His people who are left, From Assyria and Egypt, From Pathros and Cush, From Elam and Shinar, From Hamath and the islands of the sea.
Isaiah 21:2
A distressing vision is declared to me; The treacherous dealer deals treacherously, And the plunderer plunders. Go up, O Elam! Besiege, O Media! All its sighing I have made to cease.
Isaiah 22:6
Elam bore the quiver With chariots of men and horsemen, And Kir uncovered the shield.
Isaiah 37:12
Have the gods of the nations delivered those whom my fathers have destroyed, Gozan and Haran and Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar?
Jeremiah 25:25
all the kings of Zimri, all the kings of Elam, and all the kings of the Medes;
Ezekiel 32:24
"There is Elam and all her multitude, All around her grave, All of them slain, fallen by the sword, Who have gone down uncircumcised to the lower parts of the earth, Who caused their terror in the land of the living; Now they bear their shame with those who go down to the Pit.
Daniel 1:2
And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, with some of the articles of the house of God, which he carried into the land of Shinar to the house of his god; and he brought the articles into the treasure house of his god.
Zechariah 5:11
11 And he said to me, "To build a house for it in the land of Shinar; [fn] when it is ready, the basket will be set there on its base."

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Ye are the children of the Lord your God,.... Some of them were so by the special grace of adoption, and all of them by national adoption; which was the peculiar privilege of the people of Israel, and laid them under great obligation to honour and obey the Lord their God, who stood in the relation of a father to them, and they of children to him, Malachi 1:6. The Targum of Jonathan paraphrases it "beloved children"; so the apostle calls the saints; the "dear children of God", who therefore ought to be followers of him, Ephesians 5:1 and for a like reason this relation is observed here, namely, to quicken a regard to the exhortations of the Lord, his cautions, commands, laws, and ordinances, particularly to what follows:

ye shall not cut yourselves; for the dead, as appears from the next clause, as the Heathens did, who not only tore their garments, but their flesh in several parts of their bodies, in their mouths, cheeks, breasts, c. r and used other extravagant signs of mourning, which the apostle cautions against, 1 Thessalonians 4:13 and were condemned by the Heathens themselves s. Though some think this refers to incisions the Heathens made in their flesh to the honour of their gods, cutting the names of them therein to whom they devoted themselves; or lashing their bodies at the worship of them, as the worshippers of Baal did when they called upon him, 1 Kings 18:28 and so the Jerusalem Targum,

"make not marks, marks,''

that is, here and there, in many places, or bruises black and blue by striping and beating themselves, for strange worship, or at it, in honour of their gods; but the former sense seems best to agree with what follows; see Leviticus 19:28,

nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead; by shaving the forepart of their head or their eyebrows, or both, which used to be done in lamentations for the dead; see Jeremiah 16:6 if this could be thought to have any respect to rites and ceremonies used in the worship of dead and lifeless idols, the customs of the Egyptians might be referred to, who are said to shave their heads and their eyebrows in their sacred rites to Isis t.

r Vid. Virgil. Aeneid. 12. ver. 870, 871. and Servium in Aeneid. 1. ver. 78. and in l. 12. s Vid. Cicero de Leg. l. 2. c. 23. and Tusculan. Quaest. l. 3. c. 27. t Ambros. Epist. l. 4. c. 30. p. 259.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Make any baldness between your eyes - i. e. by shaving the forepart of the head and the eyebrows. The practices named in this verse were common among the pagan, and seem to be forbidden, not only because such wild excesses of grief (compare 1 Kings 18:28) would be inconsistent in those who as children of a heavenly Father had prospects beyond this world, but also because these usages themselves arose out of idolatrous notions.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

CHAPTER XIV

The Israelites are not to adopt superstitious customs in

mourning, 1, 2.

The different kinds of clean and unclean animals, 3-20.

Nothing to be eaten that dieth of itself, 21.

Concerning offerings which, from distance cannot be carried to

the altar of God, and which may be turned into money, 22-26.

The Levite is not to be forsaken, 27.

The third year's tithe for the Levite, stranger, widow, c.,

28, 29.

NOTES ON CHAP. XIV

Verse Deuteronomy 14:1. Ye are the children of the Lord — The very highest character that can be conferred on any created beings ye shall not cut yourselves, i. e., their hair, for it was a custom among idolatrous nations to consecrate their hair to their deities, though they sometimes also made incisions in their flesh.


 
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