but you shall surely kill him. Your hand shall be first on him to put him to death, and afterwards the hands of all the people.
Not to plead on behalf of the enticer to idol worship
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
וְלֹא־תַחְמֹל וְלֹא־תְכַסֶּה עָלָיו
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
שהזהיר המוסת שלא ילמד זכות למסית ואפילו יודע לו זכות אין מותר לו להזכירו וללמד. והוא אמרו יתברך לא תחמול ובא הפירוש לא תלמד עליו זכות. (שם, שם):
That He prohibited an incited one from arguing the merit of the inciter. Even if he [knows of] a merit for him, it is not permitted for him to mention it and argue [it]. And that is His, may He be blessed, saying, "nor have compassion on him" (Deuteronomy 13:9). And it appears in the explanation (Sifrei Devarim 89:4), "[It means,] do not argue in his merit." (See Parashat Re'eh; Mishneh Torah, Foreign Worship and Customs of the Nations 5.)
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
- Lashes (malkot)
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, with modification
- Conservative Kept as an ethical principle
- Reform Rejected
- Reconstructionist Rejected
- Karaite Position not stated
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.
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 1.316-318 affirmed it
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.
- neo assyrian vassal treaties duty to report and not conceal sedition against the sovereign; prohibition of shielding a conspirator who speaks against the king Relationship to the parallel: parallel with divergence §10 (lines 108ff.) Parpola and Watanabe, 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.
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ICCPR Article 14
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
The commandment prohibits defense advocacy in capital proceedings against the enticer and inverts normal trial procedure, allowing any person to argue for conviction while restricting acquittal arguments even by judges; ICCPR Article 14 guarantees the accused the right to present a full defense, and a procedural regime that systematically suppresses the defense function in capital cases directly contradicts this guarantee.
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Article 6 (right to life)
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
The procedural suspension of ordinary capital-trial safeguards — removing the court's active duty to seek acquittal and barring any advocate from presenting the defendant's case — operates to increase the likelihood of execution for a non-violent speech act, in direct conflict with ICCPR Article 6's requirement of full procedural protection in capital proceedings.