What Does Deuteronomy 24:4 Mean?
Her former husband, who sent her away, may not turn back to take her again to himself as a wife, once she has been soiled; for that is an abomination before the LORD, and you shall not cause the land to miss the mark, which the LORD your God gives you as an inheritance.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Her former husband, which sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after that she is defiled; for that is abomination before the LORD: and thou shalt not cause the land to sin, which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.THE KEY
Once another marriage intervenes, the first husband’s act of sending her away becomes a boundary he cannot cross, and the consequence reaches the land itself.
THE MEANING
After the first husband sends his former wife away and she becomes another man’s wife, the verse calls her defiled and forbids him to take her again. It names that return an abomination before the LORD. The reader is also told not to cause the land given as inheritance to sin.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
That the first husband can reclaim her as though the intervening marriage left the original bond untouched.
THE ROOT
שִׁלְּחָהּ
shilleḥāh
GROWS FROM
שׁ־ל־ח
sh-l-ḥ
send, send forth, release
“sent her away” in this verse is shilleḥāh. The same root carries both sending away and sending forth. The prohibition comes from the full sequence in the verse; the root reveals that sending is the act from which this boundary begins.
ALSO GROWS
shalach: send, send forth, release
שָׁלַח
This is the root of the husband’s act of sending her away.
Shiloach: sent; the name of the pool of Siloam
שִׁלֹחַ
In John 9:7, Siloam is glossed as “Sent”; the same root can name a sending connected with restored sight.
הֻטַּמָּאָה
huttamme’ah
GROWS FROM
ט־מ־א
ṭ-m-ʾ
be unclean, become impure
“soiled” in this verse is huttamme’ah. The verse uses a form of טמא to name a state of uncleanness, and the same root gives both “unclean” and “uncleanness.” It attaches the legal prohibition to that stated change of status.
ALSO GROWS
ṭāmēʾ: unclean
טָמֵא
This is the adjective from the same root, naming the status the verse assigns.
ṭumʾāh: uncleanness, impurity
טֻמְאָה
This noun names the state carried by the root in the verse’s description.
תַחֲטִיא
taḥati
GROWS FROM
ח־ט־א
ḥ-ṭ-ʾ
miss, err, sin
“miss the mark” in this verse is taḥati. The grammar makes the land the object of the act: the reader can cause it to miss or sin. The verse widens the consequence from the couple’s prohibited return to the ground given as inheritance.
ALSO GROWS
ḥēṭʾ: missing, sin
חֵטְא
The noun preserves the root’s sense of missing within the verse’s language of wrongdoing.
ḥaṭṭāʾt: offering for the missing; sin offering
חַטָּאת
This branch carries the same root into the Torah’s language for an offering associated with the missing.
THE PATTERN
A separation leaves a path to return only while no intervening marriage has altered the bond.
They say, if a man sends away his wife, and she goes from him and becomes another man's, will he turn back to her again? Will that land not be greatly soiled? But you have played the harlot with many lovers. Yet turn back to me, says the LORD.But if she does put space between, let her remain unmarried, or return to her husband. And let the husband not let go of his wife.THE THREAD
They say, if a man sends away his wife, and she goes from him and becomes another man's, will he turn back to her again? Will that land not be greatly soiled? But you have played the harlot with many lovers. Yet turn back to me, says the LORD.Jeremiah repeats the same chain of events, and its “put away” comes from שׁלח (shalach), the root behind Deuteronomy’s “sent her away.” Both verses bring the land into the consequence, linking a marriage boundary to the condition of the whole land.
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