Verse 17

In judging, do not let a man's position have any weight with you; give hearing equally to small and great; have no fear of any man, for it is God who is judge: and any cause in which you are not able to give a decision, you are to put before me and I will give it a hearing.

Referenced Verses

  • Exod 18:26 : 26 And they were judges in the causes of the people at all times: the hard questions they put before Moses; but on every small point they gave decisions themselves.
  • Deut 16:19 : 19 You are not to be moved in your judging by a man's position, you are not to take rewards; for rewards make the eyes of the wise man blind, and the decisions of the upright false.
  • 2 Chr 19:6 : 6 And said to the judges, Take care what you do, for you are judging not for man but for the Lord, and he is with you in the decisions you give.
  • Lev 19:15 : 15 Do no wrong in your judging: do not give thought to the position of the poor, or honour to the position of the great; but be a judge to your neighbour in righteousness.
  • Prov 24:23 : 23 These are more sayings of the wise: To have respect for a person's position when judging is not good.
  • Exod 18:22 : 22 And let them be judges in the causes of the people at all times: and let them put before you all important questions, but in small things let them give decisions themselves: in this way, it will be less hard for you, and they will take the weight off you.
  • Jas 2:9 : 9 But if you take a man's position into account, you do evil, and are judged as evil-doers by the law.
  • Deut 10:17 : 17 For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, strong in power and greatly to be feared, who has no respect for any man's position and takes no rewards:
  • Exod 23:6-7 : 6 Let no wrong decisions be given in the poor man's cause. 7 Keep yourselves far from any false business; never let the upright or him who has done no wrong be put to death: for I will make the evil-doer responsible for his sin.
  • Prov 22:22-23 : 22 Do not take away the property of the poor man because he is poor, or be cruel to the crushed ones when they come before the judge: 23 For the Lord will give support to their cause, and take the life of those who take their goods.
  • Prov 29:25 : 25 The fear of man is a cause of danger: but whoever puts his faith in the Lord will have a safe place on high.
  • Jer 1:17 : 17 So make yourself ready, and go and say to them everything I give you orders to say: do not be overcome by fear of them, or I will send fear on you before them.
  • Jer 5:28-29 : 28 They have become fat and strong: they have gone far in works of evil: they give no support to the cause of the child without a father, so that they may do well; they do not see that the poor man gets his rights. 29 Am I not to give punishment for these things? says the Lord: will not my soul take payment from such a nation as this?
  • Amos 5:11-12 : 11 So because the poor man is crushed under your feet, and you take taxes from him of grain: you have made for yourselves houses of cut stone, but you will not take your rest in them; the fair vine-gardens planted by your hands will not give you wine. 12 For I have seen how your evil-doing is increased and how strong are your sins, you troublers of the upright, who take rewards and do wrong to the cause of the poor in the public place.
  • Mic 2:1-3 : 1 A curse on the designers of evil, working on their beds! in the morning light they do it, because it is in their power. 2 They have a desire for fields and take them by force; and for houses and take them away: they are cruel to a man and his family, even to a man and his heritage. 3 For this cause the Lord has said, See, against this family I am purposing an evil from which you will not be able to take your necks away, and you will be weighted down by it; for it is an evil time.
  • Mic 3:1-4 : 1 And I said, Give ear, now, you heads of Jacob and rulers of the people of Israel: is it not for you to have knowledge of what is right? 2 You who are haters of good and lovers of evil, pulling off their skin from them and their flesh from their bones; 3 Like meat they take the flesh of my people for their food, skinning them and crushing their bones, yes, cutting them up as if for the pot, like flesh inside the cooking-pot. 4 Then they will be crying to the Lord for help, but he will not give them an answer: yes, he will keep his face veiled from them at that time, because their acts have been evil.
  • Mic 7:3-4 : 3 Their hands are made ready to do evil; the ruler makes requests for money, and the judge is looking for a reward; and the great man gives decisions at his pleasure, and the right is twisted. 4 The best of them is like a waste plant, and their upright ones are like a wall of thorns. Sorrow! the day of their fate has come; now will trouble come on them.
  • Matt 22:16 : 16 And they sent to him their disciples, with the Herodians, saying, Master, we see that you are true, and that you are teaching the true way of God, and have no fear of anyone, because you have no respect for a man's position.
  • Mark 12:14 : 14 And when they had come, they said to him, Master, we are certain that you are true, and have no fear of anyone: you have no respect for a man's position, but you are teaching the true way of God: Is it right to give taxes to Caesar or not?
  • Luke 20:21 : 21 And they put a question to him, saying, Master, we are certain that your teaching and your words are right, and that you have no respect for a man's position, but you are teaching the true way of God:
  • Acts 10:34-35 : 34 Then Peter said, Truly, I see clearly that God is no respecter of persons: 35 But in every nation, the man who has fear of him and does righteousness is pleasing to him.
  • Rom 2:11 : 11 For one man is not different from another before God.
  • Eph 6:9 : 9 And, you masters, do the same things to them, not making use of violent words: in the knowledge that their Master and yours is in heaven, and he has no respect for a man's position.
  • Col 3:25 : 25 For the wrongdoer will have punishment for the wrong he has done, without respect for any man's position.
  • 1 Thess 2:4 : 4 But even as the good news was given to us by the approval of God, so we give it out; not as pleasing men, but God by whom our hearts are tested.
  • Jas 2:1-5 : 1 My brothers, if you have the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ of glory, do not take a man's position into account. 2 For if a man comes into your Synagogue in fair clothing and with a gold ring, and a poor man comes in with dirty clothing, 3 And you do honour to the man in fair clothing and say, Come here and take this good place; and you say to the poor man, Take up your position there, or be seated at my feet; 4 Is there not a division in your minds? have you not become judges with evil thoughts? 5 Give ear, my dear brothers; are not those who are poor in the things of this world marked out by God to have faith as their wealth, and for their heritage the kingdom which he has said he will give to those who have love for him?
  • Job 22:6-9 : 6 For you have taken your brother's goods when he was not in your debt, and have taken away the clothing of those who have need of it. 7 You do not give water to the tired traveller, and from him who has no food you keep back bread. 8 For it was the man with power who had the land, and the man with an honoured name who was living in it. 9 You have sent widows away without hearing their cause, and you have taken away the support of the child who has no father.
  • Job 29:11-17 : 11 For when it came to their ears, men said that I was truly happy; and when their eyes saw, they gave witness to me; 12 For I was a saviour to the poor when he was crying for help, to the child with no father, and to him who had no supporter. 13 The blessing of him who was near to destruction came on me, and I put a song of joy into the widow's heart. 14 I put on righteousness as my clothing, and was full of it; right decisions were to me a robe and a head-dress. 15 I was eyes to the blind, and feet to him who had no power of walking. 16 I was a father to the poor, searching out the cause of him who was strange to me. 17 By me the great teeth of the evil-doer were broken, and I made him give up what he had violently taken away.
  • Job 31:13-16 : 13 If I did wrong in the cause of my man-servant, or my woman-servant, when they went to law with me; 14 What then will I do when God comes as my judge? and what answer may I give to his questions? 15 Did not God make him as well as me? did he not give us life in our mothers' bodies? 16 If I kept back the desire of the poor; if the widow's eye was looking for help to no purpose;
  • Job 31:34 : 34 For fear of the great body of people, or for fear that families might make sport of me, so that I kept quiet, and did not go out of my door;
  • Ps 82:3-4 : 3 Give ear to the cause of the poor and the children without fathers; let those who are troubled and in need have their rights. 4 Be the saviour of the poor and those who have nothing: take them out of the hand of the evil-doers.
  • Exod 18:18 : 18 Your strength and that of the people will be completely used up: this work is more than you are able to do by yourself.
  • Exod 23:2-3 : 2 Do not be moved to do wrong by the general opinion, or give the support of your words to a wrong decision: 3 But, on the other hand, do not be turned from what is right in order to give support to a poor man's cause.
  • Deut 17:8-9 : 8 If you are not able to give a decision as to who is responsible for a death, or who is right in a cause, or who gave the first blow in a fight, and there is a division of opinion about it in your town: then go to the place marked out by the Lord your God; 9 And come before the priests, the Levites, or before him who is judge at the time: and they will go into the question and give you a decision: 10 And you are to be guided by the decision they give in the place named by the Lord, and do whatever they say:
  • Deut 24:17 : 17 Be upright in judging the cause of the man from a strange country and of him who has no father; do not take a widow's clothing on account of a debt:
  • 1 Sam 12:3-4 : 3 Here I am: give witness against me before the Lord and before the man on whom he has put the holy oil: whose ox or ass have I taken? to whom have I been untrue? who has been crushed down by me? from whose hand have I taken a price for the blinding of my eyes? I will give it all back to you. 4 And they said, You have never been untrue to us or cruel to us; you have taken nothing from any man.
  • 1 Sam 16:7 : 7 But the Lord said to Samuel, Do not take note of his face or how tall he is, because I will not have him: for the Lord's view is not man's; man takes note of the outer form, but the Lord sees the heart.
  • 2 Sam 14:14 : 14 For death comes to us all, and we are like water drained out on the earth, which it is not possible to take up again; and God will not take away the life of the man whose purpose is that he who has been sent away may not be completely cut off from him.
  • 1 Kgs 21:8-9 : 8 So she sent a letter in Ahab's name, stamped with his stamp, to the responsible men and the chiefs who were in authority with Naboth. 9 And in the letter she said, Let a time of public sorrow be fixed, and put Naboth at the head of the people; 10 And get two good-for-nothing persons to come before him and give witness that he has been cursing God and the king. Then take him out and have him stoned to death. 11 So the responsible men and the chiefs who were in authority in his town, did as Jezebel had said in the letter she sent them. 12 They gave orders for a day of public sorrow, and put Naboth at the head of the people. 13 And the two good-for-nothing persons came in and took their seats before him and gave witness against Naboth, in front of the people, saying, Naboth has been cursing God and the king. Then they took him outside the town and had him stoned to death. 14 And they sent word to Jezebel, saying, Naboth has been stoned and is dead.
  • 1 Pet 1:17 : 17 And if you give the name of Father to him who, judging every man by his acts, has no respect for a man's position, then go in fear while you are on this earth: