Exodus 23:1-33
1 Thou shalt not raisea a false report: put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness.
2 Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speakb in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment:
3 Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause.
4 If thou meet thine enemy's ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again
5 If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help with him.
6 Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor in his cause.
7 Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay thou not: for I will not justify the wicked.
8 And thou shalt take no gift: for the gift blindeth the wise,c and perverteth the words of the righteous.
9 Also thou shalt not oppress a stranger: for ye know the heartd of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.
10 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof:
11 But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard.e
12 Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be refreshed.
13 And in all things that I have said unto you be circumspect: and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth.
14 Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year.
15 Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:)
16 And the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.
17 Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the Lord GOD.
18 Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrificef with leavened bread; neither shall the fat of my sacrifice remain until the morning.
19 The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.
20 Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared.
21 Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him.
22 But if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversaryg unto thine adversaries.
23 For mine Angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off.
24 Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images.
25 And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee.
26 There shall nothing cast their young, nor be barren, in thy land: the number of thy days I will fulfil.
27 I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies turn their backsh unto thee.
28 And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee.
29 I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee.
30 By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.
31 And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee.
32 Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.
33 They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.
Exodus 23:1. Put not thine hand with the wicked, do not conspire or agree with them.
Exodus 23:3. Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man. The meaning of this and the former verse is, there shall be no respect of persons whether rich or poor, but an impartial consideration of the cause.
Exodus 23:4. If thou meet thine enemy's ox. So far shalt thou be from revenging his injuries, that thou shalt render good to him for them. By doing this a man conquers enmity and gains his neighbour.
Exodus 23:8. The wise, or the open-eyed and quick-sighted. The righteous. The judgment of the righteous judge, that is, of them who were before such, and are inclined to be so, and probably would be so, were they not tempted with bribes. Or thus, the matters or causes of the righteous, which may be understood not of the judges, but of the parties pleading, whose righteous cause is by this means perverted by the judge, and a wrong sentence given.
Exodus 23:11. That the poor may eat, that which groweth spontaneously.
Exodus 23:12. On the seventh day thou shalt rest. This command is here repeated, lest any should think the weekly rest might cease when the whole year was consecrated to rest.
Exodus 23:13. Make no mention of the name of other gods; that is, with honour or delight, or without detestation.
Exodus 23:14. Keep a feast. The three feasts are illustrated in their proper places. Exodus 12; Leviticus 25. The males were commuted for one of a family. But the hope of the Jews to see the gentile world engrafted on their stock, and going to Jerusalem three times a year, is altogether unfounded. The Lord's temple is spiritual, and shall be built on “the tops of the mountains.”
Exodus 23:15. None shall appear before me empty. None shall ever come at those times without some offering or other, for the support of the Levites, and of the worship of God.
Exodus 23:16. The feast of harvest. Of wheat harvest, for the barley harvest was before this time. This feast was otherwise called Pentecost. The feast of ingathering. To wit, of all the rest of the fruits of the earth, as of the vines and olives. This was also called the feast of booths, and of tabernacles. All their three feasts had a respect to the harvest, which began in the passover, was carried on at the pentecost, and was fully completed and ended in this feast.
Exodus 23:19. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk. The words may be rendered, Thou shalt not seethe, or roast, (for the word bashal signifies to roast as well as boil, as is evident from Deuteronomy 16:7.) a kid, being or whilst it is in his mother's milk, which it may be said to be, while it is suckled, and so may be understood of the passover, referred to in the preseding verse, in which a lamb or kid was used; and then the word bashal must be rendered roast. But it is more probable that the prohibition refers to the lamb or kid used at a common meal, which should not be taken too young from its dam; for sucklings might be offered in sacrifice. Leviticus 22:27; 1 Samuel 7:9.
Exodus 23:20. I send an Angel. Christ, the angel of the covenant, as may be gathered from the following words, and because the pardon of sin, which is a divine prerogative, is here ascribed to him, and God's name is in him. Compare also Exodus 13:21; Exodus 14:19; Exodus 32:34; Acts 7:38; 1 Corinthians 10:9.
Exodus 23:25. Thy bread and thy water. All thy provisions, bread denoting any kind of meat, and water any kind of drink. 1 Samuel 25:11.
Exodus 23:26. The number of thy days I will fulfil. I will preserve thee so as thou shalt live as long as the course of nature and the temperament of thy body will permit.
Exodus 23:27. My fear. A great terror, or terror wrought by me.
Exodus 23:28. Hornets, properly so called, as may be gathered from Joshua 24:12; Deuteronomy 7:20. Hornets are of themselves very troublesome and mischievous; but these, it is very probable, were like those Egyptian flies, Exodus 8:21, of an extraordinary bigness and perniciousness. Nor is it strange that such creatures did drive many of those people from their habitations; for several heathen writers give us instances of people being driven from their seats by frogs, others by mice, others by bees and wasps.
Exodus 23:30. By little and little I will drive them out. This gave the Canaanites time to fly. Our Saxon chronicle mentions a colony coming to the north of Ireland from Armenia, in five long ships, which many take to be expelled Canaanites. They found inhabitants it is said, in the north of Ireland, who advised them to settle in Scotland, promising to be their friends.
Exodus 23:31. Sea of the Philistines, the mediterranean. The desert, of Egypt or Arabia, which was obtained by David. Euphrates is often called the river, by way of eminence.