Deuteronomy 21:22-23

The burial of a hanged person 21:22-23

"The preceding law had proceeded from parental to official judicial authority and had prescribed the death penalty. The present case takes the judicial process a step beyond the execution, to the exposure of the corpse as a monitory, public proclamation of the satisfaction of justice." [Note: Kline, "Deuteronomy," p. 185.]

The method of public execution prescribed in Israel was normally stoning. After criminals had died, sometimes their executioners hung their bodies up for all to see as a deterrent to similar crimes (cf. 1 Samuel 31:9-13). [Note: Thompson, p. 232.] This law required that in such cases those responsible had to bury the body the same day as the execution to avoid defiling the land further because of death (cf. Numbers 35:33-34; Leviticus 18:24-27). Hanging the body up was the result of God’s curse, not its cause.

The fact that Jesus Christ’s enemies crucified Him on a tree for all to see demonstrated that God had cursed Him because He bore our sins as our substitute. His hanging on a tree did not result in God cursing Him (John 19:31; Galatians 3:13).