⁷ Has anyone become engaged to a woman but not yet married her? He should go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another marry her.’^(A)

Miscellaneous Laws

⁵ “When a man is newly married, he shall not go out with the army or be charged with any related duty. He shall be free at home one year, to be happy with the wife whom he has married.^(A)

³⁰ You shall become engaged to a woman, but another man shall lie with her. You shall build a house but not live in it. You shall plant a vineyard but not enjoy its fruit.^(A)

⁴ No one serving in the army gets entangled in everyday affairs; the soldier’s aim is to please the enlisting officer.

¹⁸ But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of land, and I must go out and see it; please accept my regrets.’ ¹⁹ Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out; please accept my regrets.’ ²⁰ Another said, ‘I have just been married, and therefore I cannot come.’^(A)

The Birth of Jesus the Messiah

¹⁸ Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah^[a] took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be pregnant from the Holy Spirit.^(A)

²³ “If there is a young woman, a virgin already engaged to be married, and a man meets her in the town and lies with her, ²⁴ you shall bring both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death, the young woman because she did not cry for help in the town and the man because he violated his neighbor’s wife. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.^(A)

²⁵ “But if the man meets the engaged woman in the open country and the man seizes her and lies with her, then only the man who lay with her shall die.^(B)