If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and does not listen to them when disciplined, his father and mother are to lay hold of him and bring him to the elders of his city, to the gate of his hometown, and say to the elders, "This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he does not obey us. He is a glutton and a drunkard." Then all the men of his city will stone him to death. So you must purge the evil from among you, and all Israel will hear and be afraid.
Whoever strikes his father or mother must surely be put to death.
Significance
Exodus 21:15 stipulates that "Whoever strikes his father or mother must surely be put to death" (מוֹת יוּמָת, mot yumat), and Deuteronomy 21:18-21 develops the broader case of a persistently rebellious son (בֵּן סוֹרֵר וּמוֹרֶה, ben sorer umoreh) who refuses parental correction. The Deuteronomic law adds procedural safeguards: both parents must agree, the case must go before city elders, and the charge must be substantiated publicly before execution. This development transforms the Exodus law's focus on a single violent act into a broader category of incorrigible filial rebellion, while adding communal judicial process to protect against parental abuse of the death penalty.
Found via
Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type
Allusion
Connection Method(s)
Redemptive-Historical Progression — the Sinai case law on assaulting parents is carried forward into Deuteronomy's procedural statute — both parents' testimony, the elders at the gate, communal execution — one guarding of parental authority advanced from compact ruling to due process.
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