Deuteronomy 17:7 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Ver. 7. The hands of the witnesses shall be first upon him— As this was an important matter in which life and death were concerned, the clearest and fullest evidence possible is required; at least two or three credible witnesses: and, that these witnesses might have the greater awe upon them, it is commanded, that their hands should be first upon the person whom they accused; thus to confirm the truth of their testimony, by being the first executioners of the sentence, and that the blood of the condemned person, if innocent, might lie at their door. See Goodwin's Antiq. p. 201. Under a theocratic government, where the laws of religion were the laws of the state, every idolatrous Israelite was guilty of high-treason, and consequently deserved to die. A citizen of a republic, who recognised for his king him whom he adored as his God, could not offend capitally that God, so as to apostatize to idolatry, without offending his royal majesty, and at the same time rendering himself worthy of the punishment which rebels and traitors merit. It would be a gross abuse to pretend, that in virtue of the command to put to death those Israelites who were guilty of idolatry, and to extirpate idolaters from the land of Canaan, we may now maltreat heretics, and persecute to death such of them as disgrace the Christian religion by their idolatry. The case of idolaters, in respect of the Jewish commonwealth, falls under a double consideration. The first, Of those who, being initiated in the Mosaical rites, afterwards apostatized from the worship of the God of Israel. These were proceeded against as traitors and rebels, guilty of no less than high-treason: for the republic of the Jews, different from all others, was an absolute theocracy; nor was there, or could there be, any difference between that commonwealth and the church. The laws established in that nation respecting the worship of one true God, almighty and invisible, were the civil law of that people, and a part of their political government, in which God himself was their legislator. Now, if any one can shew where there is a commonwealth at this time constituted upon that foundation, I will acknowledge that the ecclesiastical laws do there unavoidably become a part of the civil; and that the subjects of that government both may and ought to be kept in strict conformity with that church by the civil power. But there is absolutely no such thing under the Gospel, as a Christian commonwealth: the many cities and kingdoms which have embraced Christianity have only retained their ancient form of government, with which the law of Christ hath not at all meddled. Content to point out to men the way to eternal life, he prescribed to his followers no form of government; nor put he the sword into any magistrate's hand, whereby to force men to quit their former religion and receive his. Secondly, Foreigners, who were not members of the commonwealth of Israel, were not compelled to observe the rites of the Mosaical law. On the contrary, in the very same place in Exodus, ch. Deuteronomy 22:20-21 where it is ordered, that an Israelite, who was an idolater, should be put to death, it is forbidden to vex or oppress strangers. 'Tis true, the seven nations who possessed the land were utterly to be cut off; but this was not singly because they were idolaters; for, if that had been the reason, why were the Moabites and other idolatrous nations to be spared? The reason then is this: God, being in a peculiar manner the king of the Jews, would not suffer the adoration of any other deity, which was properly an act of high-treason against himself, in the land of Canaan, his kingdom. Such a manifest revolt could no way consist with his dominion, which was political in that country: all idolatry, therefore, was to be rooted out, as it was an acknowledgment of another god, i.e. another king, contrary to the laws of empire.—Every idolater, however, was not put to death. The whole family of Rahab, and the whole nation of the Gibeonites, were allowed by treaty; and there were many captives among the Jews, who were idolaters. David and Solomon subdued many countries without the confines of the Land of Promise, and carried their conquests as far as the Euphrates; and yet, among so many captives taken, and so many nations reduced to their obedience, we do not find one man forced into the Jewish religion, and the worship of the true God; or at all punished for idolatry, though all of them were certainly guilty of it. If any one indeed, becoming a proselyte, desired to be made a denizen of their commonwealth, he was obliged to submit to their laws; that is, to embrace their religion; but this he did willingly, not by constraint. He sought and solicited to shew his obedience, as for a privilege; and, as soon as he was admitted, became subject to the laws of the commonwealth, by which all idolatry was forbidden within the borders of the land of Canaan; but that law did not reach to any of those regions which were situated without the before-mentioned bounds.