except from foreigners. Usury was strongly condemned (Proverbs 28:8;
Ezekiel 18:8, 13, 17; 22:12; Psalm 15:5). On the Sabbatical year all
pecuniary obligations were cancelled (Deuteronomy 15:1-11). These
regulations prevented the accumulation of debt.
- DEBTOR Various regulations as to the relation between debtor and
creditor are laid down in the Scriptures.
(1.) The debtor was to deliver up as a pledge to the creditor what he could
most easily dispense with (Deuteronomy 24:10, 11).
(2.) A mill, or millstone, or upper garment, when given as a pledge, could
not be kept over night (Exodus 22:26, 27).
(3.) A debt could not be exacted during the Sabbatic year (Deuteronomy
15:1-15).
For other laws bearing on this relation see Leviticus 25:14, 32, 39;
Matthew 18:25, 34.
(4.) A surety was liable in the same way as the original debtor (Proverbs
11:15; 17:18).
- DECALOGUE the name given by the Greek fathers to the ten
commandments; “the ten words,” as the original is more literally rendered
(Exodus 20:3-17). These commandments were at first written on two
stone slabs (31:18), which were broken by Moses throwing them down on
the ground (32:19). They were written by God a second time (34:1). The
decalogue is alluded to in the New Testament five times (Matthew 5:17,
18, 19; Mark 10:19; Luke 18:20; Romans 7:7, 8; 13:9; 1 Timothy 1:9, 10).
These commandments have been divided since the days of Origen the
Greek father, as they stand in the Confession of all the Reformed Churches
except the Lutheran. The division adopted by Luther, and which has ever
since been received in the Lutheran Church, makes the first two
commandments one, and the third the second, and so on to the last, which
is divided into two. “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house” being
ranked as ninth, and “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife,” etc., the
tenth. (See COMMANDMENTS.)
- DECAPOILS ten cities=deka, ten, and polis, a city, a district on the east
and south-east of the Sea of Galilee containing “ten cities,” which were
chiefly inhabited by Greeks. It included a portion of Bashan and Gilead,