He shall not multiply wives to himself, that his heart not turn away. He shall not greatly multiply to himself silver and gold.
The king shall not amass excessive gold and silver
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
וְכֶסֶף וְזָהָב לֹא יַרְבֶּה־לּוֹ מְאֹד
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
הזהיר המלך מהרבות ממון מיוחד לעצמו. והוא אמרו וכסף וזהב לא ירבה לו מאד. וגבול זה שלא יהיה מן הגודל אלא בשיעור מה שיהיה צריך למרכבתו ועבדים מיוחדים לו. אבל שיקבץ ממון לתועלת כל ישראל הרי זה מותר. וכבר באר האל יתעלה בכתוב טעם שלש מצות אלו, רוצה לומר לא ירבה לו נשים ולא ירבה לו סוסים וכסף וזהב לא ירבה לו, ובעבור שנודע טעמם וסבתם הגיע בעבורם מהנטיה מהדת מה שכבר התפרסם מספור שלמה המלך ע"ה עם גודל מדרגתו בידיעה ובחכמה והיותו ידיד יה. אמרו ז"ל שיש בזה רמז והערה לאנשים שהם ידעו טעמי המצות כלם יקרה להם הנטיה, אם זה השלם בחכמה וגדול במעלה כבר דמה וחשב שאין הפעולה זאת בהכרח סבה לעבירה ההיא מה יהיה שכל ההמון עם חולשת דעתם הנה יחשבו בהם ויאמרו כלום היה אסור כך או צוה בכך אלא מפני כך אני אהיה נזהר מהדבר שבעבורו צוה במצוה ההיא ולא אשים לב עליה. ואז יהיה נפסד יושר הדת. ולכן הסתיר האל יתעלה טעמם ואין מהם גם אחד שאין לו טעם ועלה וסבה, אבל רוב הטעמים ההם היה מן הצורך להסתירם שלא ישיגם שכל ההמון ולא יבינום, והם כלם כמו שהעיד הנביא פקודי ה' ישרים משמחי לב מצות ה' ברה מאירת עינים. ומאת האל אשאל עזר לקיים המצווה בו מהם ולהרחיק המוזהר מהם. (שופטים, הלכות מלכים פ"ג):
That He prohibited the king from having much money specifically for himself. And that is His saying, "and he may not have silver and gold for himself in great abundance" (Deuteronomy 17:17). And the measure of this is that its amount only be according to that which is required for his chariot and his designated servants. But it is permitted that he amass money for the benefit of all of Israel. And God, may He be exalted, has already explained the reason for these three commandments - meaning to say, "he may not have many horses," "he may not have many wives" and "he may not have silver and gold for himself in abundance" - in Scripture. But because their reason and cause was known, a veering away from the law occurred. [This is] that which is already famous in the story of King Shlomo, peace be upon him - in spite of the great level of his knowledge and wisdom, and his being a "friend of God (YedidYah)" (II Samuel 12:25). They, may their memory be blessed, said (Sanhedrin 21b) that there is a hint and message with this to people: That if they knew the reasons for all of the commandments, there would be a veering away. [For] if this one, who was so complete in wisdom and of such great stature, could already imagine and think that this [forbidden] act is not necessarily a cause for that sin; what will be when all of the masses with their weak minds will talk about them and say, "This would not be prohibited or this not commanded except for this. I will be careful about the thing for which this commandment was commanded, and I will not pay attention to it [since it was only meant as a fence]!" But then the law will be destroyed. And hence God, may He be exalted, hid their reasons. But there is none of [the commandments] that does not have a reason, a benefit and a cause. However most of these reasons needed to be hidden; for the intellect of the masses will not grasp and understand them. But they are all like the prophet testified - "The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes" (Psalms 19:9). And I shall ask assistance from God to fulfill that which we are commanded about, and to stay away from that which we are prohibited. (See Parashat Shoftim; Mishneh Torah, Kings and Wars 3.)
Hebrew: Sefer HaMitzvot, Warsaw 1883 (public domain). English: Sefaria Edition, trans. Rabbi Francis Nataf, 2021 (CC0). Via Sefaria; translator’s footnotes omitted.
Literary form: a prohibition
Applicability
How the catalog describes where and when this commandment applies. These are independent descriptions, not a verdict on which laws still count.
No applicability flags are recorded for this commandment.
Classical halakhic consequences
The consequences the classical halakhah attaches to this commandment, grouped by who imposes them. Where a category has none recorded, that absence is itself meaningful.
Imposed by a court
No court-imposed penalty is recorded.
At the hands of Heaven
No divinely-imposed consequence is recorded.
Ritual remedy
No ritual remedy is recorded.
How the streams of Judaism treat this commandment
The streams of Judaism read the same commandment differently — an ongoing plurality, not a ranking. Each position below is reported as the catalog records it; none is presented as the correct one.
- Orthodox Binding
- Conservative Kept as an ethical principle
- Reform Kept as an ethical principle
- Reconstructionist Kept as an ethical principle
- Karaite Binding
24 of 613 commandments have been examined in depth so far — this one is queued.
How later traditions received this commandment
How later traditions read or reworked this commandment, each attributed to its own voice. The catalog’s own classification of each reception is shown as it records it, never adopted as GEBible’s.
Qumran (the Dead Sea Scrolls)
- 11QTemple (11Q19) LVI-LIX (Law of the King) read it more strictly
Rabbinic aggadah
- Sifre Deuteronomy §159 expanded it homiletically
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 4.157-169 The catalog describes this reception as: general treatment
Josephus
- Ant. 4.223-224 The catalog describes this reception as: paraphrastic restatement
Beside the older legal codes of its world
The commandment set beside the ancient Near-Eastern legal collections scholars compare it to — a descriptive comparison, not a claim of dependence.
- code of hammurabi Hammurabi presents the amassing of royal wealth as a mark of divine favor and legitimate kingship; the prologue boasts of temples built, cities beautified, and treasuries filled as evidence of royal virtue — the Deuteronomic prohibition inverts this by treating royal wealth accumulation as a spiritual danger rather than a divine blessing Relationship to the parallel: polemical contrast Prologue and Epilogue Roth, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor, 2nd ed. (Scholars Press, 1997)
- neo assyrian vassal treaties Neo-Assyrian treaty ideology presupposes and celebrates the suzerain's unlimited accumulation of tribute, silver, gold, and military resources as demonstrations of divine mandate — the Deuteronomic restriction on royal wealth structurally counters this model of unconstrained sovereign enrichment Relationship to the parallel: polemical contrast Esarhaddon's Succession Treaty (SAA 2 no. 6), loyalty stipulations presupposing unlimited royal resources Parpola and Watanabe, Neo-Assyrian Treaties and Loyalty Oaths (SAA 2, 1988)
Where this commandment meets modern human-rights frameworks
One modern normative lens, attributed to it — not GEBible’s assessment. Each row names the framework it measures against and the catalog’s own classification of the relation.
This framework catalogues tensions; it records agreement in only one of its entries. The near-total tension rate is the shape of the instrument, not a finding.
No tension with the catalogued modern frameworks is recorded here.