Deuteronomy 24:20

When thou beatest thine olive tree, thou shalt not go over the boughs again: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

24:14-22 It is not hard to prove that purity, piety, justice, mercy, fair conduct, kindness to the poor and destitute, consideration for them, and generosity of spirit, are pleasing to God, and becoming in his redeemed people. The difficulty is to attend to them in our daily walk and conversation.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Compare the marginal references. The motive assigned for these various acts of consideration is one and the same Deuteronomy 24:18, Deuteronomy 24:22.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

19-22. When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field—The grain, pulled up by the roots or cut down with a sickle, was laid in loose sheaves; the fruit of the olive was obtained by striking the branches with long poles; and the grape clusters, severed by a hook, were gathered in the hands of the vintager. Here is a beneficent provision for the poor. Every forgotten sheaf in the harvest-field was to lie; the olive tree was not to be beaten a second time; nor were grapes to be gathered, in order that, in collecting what remained, the hearts of the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow might be gladdened by the bounty of Providence.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

When thou beatest thine olive tree with staves, as they used to do to fetch down the olives.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

When thou beatest thine olive tree,.... With sticks and staves, to get off the olives when ripe:

thou shall not go over the boughs again; to beat off some few that may remain; they were not nicely to examine the boughs over again, whether there were any left or not:

it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow; who might come into their oliveyards after the trees had been beaten, and gather what were left.

Geneva Study Bible

When thou beatest thine olive tree, thou shalt not go over the boughs again: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

20. beatest thine olive tree] Isaiah 27:6; Isaiah 24:13 (but with another vb. for beating). ‘Some climb into the trees and shake the boughs, while others stand below and beat off the fruit with long slender poles’ (Van Lennep, op. cit. 128).

Deuteronomy 24:20

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Directions to allow strangers, widows, and orphans to glean in time of harvest (as in Leviticus 19:9-10, and Leviticus 23:22). The reason is given in Deuteronomy 24:22, viz., the same as in Deuteronomy 24:18 and Deuteronomy 15:15.