How to read this page

An Intertextuality Pair — one connection between two passages, shown as linked verse cards: the Later text and the Earlier text it quotes, alludes to or echoes. The Significance essay explains why the link matters and where it points in Christ.

Reference Type— how explicit the link is: Quotation, Allusion, or Echo
Connection Method(s)— how it carries meaning: e.g. Typology, Promise-Fulfillment, Analogy, Longitudinal Theme
Found via— where the connection was identified, e.g. the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge or an Anchor-Text Network

Graph View — tap the constellation icon in the top bar to see this page's connections as a web of light: gold points are passages, and the coloured threads are the connection types. Click any type in the graph's own legend to filter it in or out, and use the expand control for the full-screen night sky.

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Intertextuality Pair

Deuteronomy 19:18-21 → Exodus 21:24

Quotation

Later text

Deuteronomy 19:18-21BSB

The judges shall investigate thoroughly, and if the witness is proven to be a liar who has falsely accused his brother, you must do to him as he intended to do to his brother. So you must purge the evil from among you. Then the rest of the people will hear and be afraid, and they will never again do anything so evil among you. You must show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, and foot for foot.

Earlier text

Exodus 21:24BSB

eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,

Significance

Exodus 21:24 establishes the lex talionis principle: "eye for eye, tooth for tooth" (עַיִן תַּחַת עַיִן שֵׁן תַּחַת שֵׁן, ayin tachat ayin shen tachat shen). Deuteronomy 19:18-21 applies this identical formula specifically to the punishment of false witnesses: "you shall do to him as he intended to do to his brother... life for life, eye for eye." The Deuteronomic application narrows the lex talionis from a general injury principle to a specific judicial context—perjury. By assigning the perjurer the exact penalty he sought to inflict on the accused, Deuteronomy demonstrates that proportional justice (תַּחַת, tachat, "in place of") operates both in personal injury cases and in the protection of judicial integrity.

Found via: Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type: Direct Quotation
Connection Method(s): Longitudinal Theme