Leviticus 19:17

Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart,.... Although no hatred may be expressed either by words or deeds, yet being in the heart is a breach of the sixth command, see Matthew 5:21; and of

Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him. Thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour.

To prevent murder, last spoken of, he forbids hatred, which is the common cause, and a degree of murder, . Thy brother; the same with neighbour, as it follows, i.e. every man, ; for it is manifest that God’ s law commanded them to love strangers no less than Israelites. If thy brother hath done thee or others any injury, thou shalt neither divulge it to others as a tale-bearer, nor hate him, and smother that hatred by sullen silence, as , nor justify and flatter and encourage him therein; but shalt freely, and in love, not with hatred, tell him of his fault. And not suffer sin upon him, i.e. not suffer him to lie under the guilt of any sin, which thou by rebuking of him, and thereby bringing him to true repentance, couldest in some sort free him from. But the phrase of suffering sin upon him imperfect and unusual in Scripture, and I doubt whether the Hebrew verb nasa be ever used for permitting or suffering. The words may be rendered thus, And (or so) thou shalt not bear sin for him, or for his sake; thou shalt not make thyself guilty of his sin, as thou wilt assuredly do, if thou dost not perform thy duty of rebuking him for his sin, which is a likely way, and a course appointed by God, to remove the guilt of his sin from him; and consequently, as it was his fault that he sinned and contracted guilt, so it is thy fault that his guilt continues upon him. Many things favour this sense. 1. This is the proper and usual signification of the word nasa. 2. The same words are used in this sense . 3. The preposition al is oft used thus, as ,34 Jude 9:9 . 4. This phrase of bearing sin, or iniquity, is constantly used in this book for being guilty and liable to punishment. And so the sense is here full and complete, and a very weighty reason here given to enforce the foregoing precept.

Leviticus 19:17 Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him.Ver. 17. Thou shalt not hate thy brother.] Most unkindnesses that fall out among friends grow upon mistakes and misunderstandings. Now, a friendly reasoning the case, or, if need be, a godly reproof, cures both the reprover and the reproved; whereas the neglect of this duty breeds dwelling suspicions; suspicions breed a very habit of misinterpretation; this breeds a loathness to come to the light, to show the reasons af our dislike; this loathness begets a very separation in heart, which at length turns to downright hatred in heart. All which might have been better prevented by a seasonable venting our minds in a reproof or admonition. Thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour.] Neither is this any argument of hatred, but an office of love. Friends, as bees, are killed with the honey of flattery, but quickened with the vinegar of reproof. The eagle, though she loveth her young ones dearly, yet she pricketh and beateth them out of the nest. And not suffer sin upon him.] But save him "with fear, pulling him out of the fire." Out of the fire of hell, as Jerome interprets it, which sin suffered will bring him unto. Others read it thus: Lest thou suffer for his sin; which, by not opposing, thou makest to become thine own. To withstand evil in thy brother, is the best way to do him good, and thyself too. Others render it thus: Thou shalt not lift up his sin over him, as an ensign, by babbling or blazing it abroad to his just grief and disgrace; but clap a plaster of reproof upon the sore, and then, as surgeons use to do, cover it with thy hand, that the world may be never the wiser. Ex igne gehennali. - Jer.

(17) Shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart.—From the outward acts denounced in the preceding verse, the legislator now passes to inward feelings. Whatever wrong our neighbour has inflicted upon us, we are not to harbour hatred against him. Thou shalt in any wise rebuke.—Better, thou shalt by all means, or thou shalt freely rebuke him. If he has done wrong he is to be reproved, and the wrong is to be brought home to him by expostulation. In illustration of this precept the Jewish canonists remark, “when any man sinneth against another he must not inwardly hate him and keep silence, as it is said of the wicked, ‘And Absalom spake unto his brother Amnon neither good nor bad, for Absalom hated Amnon’ (2 Samuel 13:22); but he is commanded to make it known unto him, and to say, ‘Why hast thou done thus unto me?’” Similar is the admonition of Christ, “If thy brother sin against thee rebuke him, and if he repent forgive him” (Luke 17:3). And not suffer sin upon him.—Better so that thou bear not sin on his account. That is, by not reproving him, but harbouring inward hatred towards the offender, we not only become partakers of his offence, but incur the sin of bearing secret ill-will (Romans 1:32; Ephesians 4:26; 1 Timothy 5:20; 1 Timothy 5:22). According to the spiritual authorities during the second Temple, however, this clause denotes, “but thou shalt bear no sin by reason of it,” as the Authorised Version translates this phrase in Numbers 18:32; that is, “execute the duty of reproof in such a manner that thou dost not incur sin by it,” which they explain in the following manner: “Even if the reproof is ineffectual the first time, it must be repeated over and over again, but the rebuker must desist as soon as he sees blushes on the offender’s face, for it shows that the reproofs have made an impression. Every step taken by the one who reproves, after the offender has thus indicated by his countenance that he realises the offence, is an unnecessary humiliation, and hence brings sin upon him who rebukes by reason of it.”

Verse 17. Thou shalt not hate thy brother] Thou shalt not only not do him any kind of evil, but thou shalt harbour no hatred in thy heart towards him. On the contrary, thou shalt love him as thyself, Leviticus 19:18. Many persons suppose, from misunderstanding our Lord's words, John 13:34, A new commandment give I unto you, that ye love one another, c., that loving our neighbour as ourselves was first instituted under the Gospel. This verse shows the opinion to be unfounded: but to love another as Christ has loved us, i. e., to lay down our lives for each other, is certainly a new commandment we have it simply on the authority of Jesus Christ alone. And not suffer sin upon him.] If thou see him sin, or know him to be addicted to any thing by which the safety of his soul is endangered, thou shalt mildly and affectionately reprove him, and by no means permit him to go on without counsel and advice in a way that is leading him to perdition. In a multitude of cases timely reproof has been the means of saving the soul. Speak to him privately if possible; if not, write to him in such a way that himself alone shall see it.

17, 18. Against hatred and vengeance; instead of cherishing hatred, rebuke thy neighbour (i.e. point out his fault), and persist in so doing (thou shalt surely), e.g. as in the case mentioned in Matthew 18:15 f.; in so doing thou wilt not ‘bear sin because of him.’ The command to love thy neighbour as thyself is quoted in the N.T., Matthew 19:19; as the second great commandment, Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; also Luke 10:27; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14; the royal law, James 2:8. These commands here, however, are confined in thought to fellow-Israelites. Even Leviticus 19:34 extends only to the ‘stranger’ who worshipped Israel’s God. The universal application of the word ‘neighbour’ came first in our Lord’s teaching. In Leviticus 19:9-18 the laws are arranged in groups of two or three verses, each terminated by the phrase, ‘I am the Lord (your God).’ Each group contains either a complete pentad, or what seems to be the remains of a probable pentad. The laws, except in Leviticus 19:11-12, are on the whole in the 2nd pers. sing. Some of them are repeated elsewhere in this collection, e.g. part of Lev 19:5-8 in Leviticus 22:29 f., Leviticus 19:9-10 in Leviticus 23:22, Leviticus 19:4 in Leviticus 26:1, Leviticus 19:3 in Leviticus 19:30 and Leviticus 26:2. The precepts in Leviticus 19:3-4 are analogous to those in the first part of the Decalogue, and those in Leviticus 19:11-18 to those in the second part, though Leviticus 19:12 is parallel to the third commandment. Several commentators are of opinion that the order of thought of the Decalogue can be traced here, but see p. 107.

Not suffer sin upon him - Rather, not hear sin on his account; that is, either by bearing secret ill-will Ephesians 4:26, or by encouraging him to sin in withholding due rebuke Romans 1:32.

17. Not hate thy brother — As in our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, the evil of human action is traced back to the heart, the state of the will and the affections, and the command is laid upon the very dispositions and thoughts.