Matthew Henry on Deuteronomy 22:5-12
Here are several laws in these verses which seem to stoop very low, and to take cognizance of things mean and minute. Men's laws commonly do not so: De minimis non curat lex - The law takes no cognizance of little things; but because God's providence extends itself to the smallest affairs, his precepts do so, that even in them we may be in the fear of the Lord, as we are under his eye and care. And yet the significancy and tendency of these statutes, which seem little, are such that, notwithstanding their minuteness, being fond among the things of God's law, which he has written to us, they are to be accounted great things.
I. The distinction of sexes by the apparel is to be kept up, for the…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Deuteronomy 22:12
thou shalt make thee fringes upon the four quarters--or, according to some eminent biblical interpreters, tassels on the coverlet of the bed. The precept is not the same as Num 15:38.
John Gill on Deuteronomy 22:12
Thou shalt make thee fringes,.... Though a different word is here used from that in Numbers 15:38, yet the same things are intended, and Onkelos translates both by one and the same word, and which is no other than a corruption of the Greek word used in Matthew 23:5. Though there have been some, whom Aben Ezra takes notice of, who supposed that this is a law by itself, and to be observed in the night, as that in Numbers 15:38 was in the day; but these he warmly opposes, and calls them liars:
upon the four quarters of thy vesture, wherewith thou coverest thyself; upon the four skirts of the uppermost vesture, called Talith; See Gill on Numbers 15:38.
John Calvin on Deuteronomy 22:12
Deuteronomy 22:12, 5
12. Thou shalt make thee fringes upon the four quarters of thy vesture, wherewith thou coverest thyself
12. Fimbrias facies tibi in quatuor oris operimenti tui quo operies te.
5. The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God.
5. Mulier non feret arma viri, nec induet vir muliebre vestimentum: quia abominatio Jehovae Dei tui est quicunque haec facit
12. This also was a part of, or accessory to, chastity, to have regard to modesty in dress; for since the thighs were then without covering, a door was thus opened to many improprieties, if the upper garmen…
