Rectifying Public and Private Wrongs: Each of the five sections of this chapter deals with a situation of human distress or misconduct and seeks either to rectify the wrong or to mitigate its worst effects. We have seen already that this is a characteristic feature of Deuteronomy—part of its “pastoral strategy.” Another feature is that the first and fifth of the laws both require actions that involve removing pollution from the sight of God and from the land.

21:10–14  The female prisoner of war. Here we have another law that on first reading seems not only remote from our normal experience but superficially harsh. But on closer inspection, it furnishes a good example of the value of asking the kind of questions suggested in the introduction of this book for getting at the underlying object…