Deuteronomy 13:11-13
The Voice
11 All the rest of the Israelites will hear about this and be afraid, and none of them will dare to do such an evil thing again in your land.
Stoning has been chosen as the method of execution in these cases for several likely reasons: (1) The person who advocates worshiping other gods is like a contagious disease in the midst of Israel. Stoning, killing from a distance, expresses a horror of even touching such a person, for fear of being infected; (2) Stoning is also a community method of execution. Each and every person in the community has to express one’s own loyalty to the Lord and rejection of other gods by participating in this elimination of false worship; (3) Anyone who accuses a person falsely would incur bloodguilt when throwing the first stone of the execution. This would have been a deterrent against false testimony.
Moses: 12 You may hear a report in one of the cities the Eternal your God is giving you to live in: 13 “Some wicked people have abandoned our faith, and they’ve convinced everyone else in their own city to worship other gods we’ve never had anything to do with!”
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
