He replied, "You must take these seven ewe lambs from my hand as legal proof that I dug this well."

Abraham got up and bowed down to the local people, the sons of Heth.

Abraham bowed before the local people

Rebekah also told herself, "Heth's daughters are making me tired of living. If Jacob marries one of Heth's daughters, and she turns out to be just like these other local women, what kind of life would there be left for me?"

Later, Isaac called Jacob and blessed him, instructing him, "Don't marry a wife from the local Canaanite women.

So he returned to Judah, and said, “I cannot find her; also the local men said, ‘There was no prostitute around here.’”

You will not {follow} a majority for evil, and you will not testify concerning a legal dispute to turn aside after a majority to pervert [justice].

You will not be partial to a powerless [person] in his legal dispute.

" 'You will not pervert the justice of your poor in his legal dispute.

But to the elders he said, “Wait here for us until we return to you. And behold, Aaron and Hur are with you; whoever has a legal matter, let him approach them.”

"You are to make a breast piece to be worn by the high priest when he makes legal decisions. It is to be skillfully worked, made like the work of the ephod from gold, blue, purple, and scarlet material, and from fine woven linen.

"Aaron is to carry the names of Israel's sons on his heart on the breast piece to be worn by the high priest when he makes legal decisions, that is, whenever he goes into the Holy Place in order to remember them continuously in the LORD's presence.

If the people of the land should ever tolerate that man when he gives any of his children [as a burnt offering] to Molech, and fail to put him to death [as My law requires],

If there is a man who lies [intimately] with his uncle’s wife, he has uncovered his uncle’s nakedness; they will bear their sin. They will die childless.

If a man takes his brother’s wife, it is a hated and unclean thing; he has uncovered his brother’s nakedness. They will be childless.

So they placed him in custody until they were able to make a clear legal decision for themselves based on words from the mouth of the Lord.

Only the Levites shall perform the service of the Tent of Meeting (tabernacle), and they shall bear their iniquity; it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations, that the Levites shall have no inheritance [of land] among the children of Israel.

“This is the legal statute that the Lord has commanded: Instruct the Israelites to bring you an unblemished red cow that has no defect and has never been yoked.

and if his father has no brothers, then you are to give his inheritance to his relative nearest to him from his family, and he will possess it. This will be for the Israelites a legal requirement, as the Lord commanded Moses.'"

Then Eleazar the priest said to the soldiers who had gone to battle, “This is the legal statute the Lord commanded Moses:

these are the legal provisions and the rules and the regulations that Moses spoke to the {Israelites} {when they left Egypt},

You shall diligently keep the commandments of Yahweh your God and his legal provisions and his rules that he has commanded you.

"When your child asks you in the future, {saying}, 'What [is the meaning of] the legal provisions and the rules and the regulations that Yahweh our God commanded for you?'

"{If a matter is too difficult for you}, [for example disputes] between blood and blood, between legal claim and legal claim and between assault and assault [and between] matters of discernment in your {towns}, then you shall get up and you shall go to the place that Yahweh your God will choose;

then the two men {to whom the legal dispute pertains} shall stand {before} Yahweh, {before} the priests and the judges who are [in office] in those days.

Then the priests, the descendants of Levi, shall come near, for Yahweh your God has chosen them to bless in the name of Yahweh, and every legal dispute and every [case of] assault will be {subject to their ruling}.

But he shall acknowledge the firstborn son of the disliked [wife] {by giving} him a double portion of {all that he has}, for he [is] the firstfruit of his vigor; to him [is] the legal claim of the birthright.

"When a legal dispute {takes place} between men and they come near to the court, and [the judges] judge [with respect to] them, then they shall declare the righteous [to be] in the right and they shall condemn the wicked,

Three days after they made the treaty with them, the Israelites found out they were from the local area and lived nearby.

The two of them traveled until they came to Bethlehem. When they entered Bethlehem, the whole town was excited about their arrival and the local women exclaimed, “Can this be Naomi?”

Absalom used to rise early in the morning, and he stood {beside} the road [at] the gate; {anyone} who had a legal dispute to bring to the king for judgment Absalom would call to him and say, "{Where are you from?}" And he would say, "Your servant [is] from one of the tribes of Israel."

Then Absalom would say, "{Oh, that someone would} appoint me as judge in the land, that {anyone} might come to me who had a legal dispute or a case, and I would give him justice."

Now as for you, if you commune with me like your father did, doing everything that I have commanded you, including obeying my statutes and my legal decisions,

Moreover, Jehoshaphat appointed in Jerusalem some of the Levites and the priests and heads of the {families} of Israel as judges and to decide legal disputes for Yahweh. And they sat [in] Jerusalem.

Any legal dispute that comes before you from your brothers who live in their cities concerning bloodguilt, law, commandment, statutes, and justice, you must warn them, so that they do not incur guilt before Yahweh, and that wrath may not come upon you and your brothers. Thus you must do that you do not incur guilt.

They established the altar on its foundations, even though they were in terror of the local peoples, and they offered burnt offerings on it to the Lord, both the morning and the evening offerings.

Then the local people began to discourage the people of Judah and to dishearten them from building.

Now when these things had been completed, the leaders approached me and said, "The people of Israel, the priests, and the Levites have not separated themselves from the local residents who practice detestable things similar to those of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites.

Indeed, they have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and for their sons, so that the holy race has become intermingled with the local residents. Worse still, the leaders and the officials have been at the forefront of all of this!"

From the days of our fathers until this very day our guilt has been great. Because of our iniquities we, along with our kings and priests, have been delivered over by the local kings to sword, captivity, plunder, and embarrassment -- right up to the present time.

which you commanded us through your servants the prophets with these words: 'The land that you are entering to possess is a land defiled by the impurities of the local residents! With their abominations they have filled it from one end to the other with their filthiness.

Then Shecaniah son of Jehiel, from the descendants of Elam, addressed Ezra: "We have been unfaithful to our God by marrying foreign women from the local peoples. Nonetheless, there is still hope for Israel in this regard.

Now give praise to the Lord God of your fathers, and do his will. Separate yourselves from the local residents and from these foreign wives."

The local officials did not know where I had gone or what I had done I informed neither the Judeans, nor the priests, nor the nobles, nor the officials, nor any of the rest who would be doing the work.

In reply to them, I said, "The God of Heaven will prosper us. That's why we're preparing to build. But as far as you're concerned, there exists no ancestral heritage, no legal right, nor any historic claim in Jerusalem.

Mordecai was the legal guardian of his cousin Hadassah (that is, Esther), because she didn’t have a father or mother. The young woman had a beautiful figure and was extremely good-looking. When her father and mother died, Mordecai had adopted her as his own daughter.

Indeed, have you opened your eyes on one like this to bring me into a legal fight with you?

I [was] a father to the poor, and I investigated {the stranger's} legal dispute.

He judges the world fairly; he makes just legal decisions for the nations.

He says, "How long will you make unjust legal decisions and show favoritism to the wicked? (Selah)

The king is strong; he loves justice. You ensure that legal decisions will be made fairly; you promote justice and equity in Jacob.

Indeed, the leaders sit there on thrones and make legal decisions, on the thrones of the house of David.

The righteous person cares for the legal rights of the poor; the wicked does not understand such knowledge.

lest they drink and forget what is decreed, and remove from all the poor their legal rights.

Open your mouth on behalf of those unable to speak, for the legal rights of all the dying.

Your princes [are] rebels and companions of thieves. Every one loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not defend [the] orphan and [the] legal dispute of [the] widow does not come before them.

Yahweh takes his stand to conduct a legal case and takes his stand to judge [the] peoples.

Tie up the scroll as legal evidence, seal the official record of God's instructions and give it to my followers.

to guide [the] needy away from legal claims, and to rob the justice from the poor of my people, to make widows their spoil; and they plunder orphans.

Even these men stagger because of wine, they stumble around because of beer -- priests and prophets stagger because of beer, they are confused because of wine, they stumble around because of beer; they stagger while seeing prophetic visions, they totter while making legal decisions.

"Present your legal case," says Yahweh. "Bring your evidence," says the king of Jacob.

Every weapon formed against you shall not succeed, and you shall declare guilty every tongue [that] rises against you for judgment. This [is] the inheritance of the servants of Yahweh, and their {legal right} from me," {declares} Yahweh.

They have grown fat, they have grown sleek, also, {their evil deeds have no limit}. They do not judge [with] justice, [the] legal cause of [the] orphan, or allow it to succeed, and [the] legal case of [the] poor, they do not defend.

But Yahweh of hosts, who judges [in] righteousness, who tests [the] {inmost being}, and [the] {mind}, let me see your retribution upon them, for to you I have revealed my legal case.

Yet, Yahweh of hosts, who tests [the] righteous, who sees [the] {heart} and [the] {mind}, let me see your retribution upon them, for to you I have revealed my legal case.

He judged [the] legal cause of [the] needy and [the] poor, [and] then it was well. {Is that not what it means to know me}?" {declares} Yahweh.

Do you people think that I am some local deity and not the transcendent God?" the Lord asks.

{Because of} [the fact] that you made smoke offerings, and that you sinned against Yahweh, and you did not listen to the voice of Yahweh, and you have not walked in his law, and in his statute, and in his legal provisions, {therefore} this disaster has happened to you, as [it is] this day."

to subvert a person in a legal dispute --the Lord has not found delight [in these things].

And at a legal dispute they themselves shall stand to judge; employing my judgments they shall judge it, and [with respect to] my laws and my statutes. All my festivals they shall keep and my Sabbaths they shall consecrate.

They utter empty words, taking false oaths and making empty agreements. Therefore legal disputes sprout up like poisonous weeds in the furrows of a plowed field.

This is what my Lord Yahweh showed me, and look, my Lord Yahweh was going to call for a legal case with fire, and it devoured the great deep and it ate up the plots of ground.

Her leaders take bribes when they decide legal cases, her priests proclaim rulings for profit, and her prophets read omens for pay. Yet they claim to trust the Lord and say, "The Lord is among us. Disaster will not overtake us!"

Why are you forcing me to look at iniquity and to stare at wickedness? Social havoc and oppression are all around me; there are legal conflicts, and disputes abound.

"It was said, 'Whoever divorces his wife must give her a legal document.'

Watch out for people who will hand you over to the local councils and whip you in their synagogues.

They replied, "Why then did Moses order [a man] to provide a legal divorce decree [Deut. 24:1], and then divorce his wife?"

And one of them, a legal expert, put a question to [him] to test him:

The chief priests, picking up the pieces of silver, said, “It is not lawful to put these in the treasury [of the temple], because it is the price of blood.”

So, they conferred together [and decided] to buy "The Potter's Field" with the money [Note: This was probably an abandoned field where clay had been obtained for making pottery], for use in burying people who were not from the local area.

They replied, "Moses allowed us to provide a legal divorce decree and [then] to divorce her."

"As for yourselves, be on your guard! People will hand you over to local councils, and you will be beaten in their synagogues. You will stand before governors and kings to testify to them because of me.

And His [legal] father and His mother were amazed at what was said about Him.

"Do not exact more than the legal amount," he replied.

And Jesus was about thirty years old when He began to teach. (It was assumed that) He was the son of Joseph, who was the [legal] son of Heli [Note: A lineage through Jesus' mother Mary follows:]

but the Pharisees and the legal experts rejected the purpose of God for themselves, [because they] had not been baptized by him.)

And behold, a certain legal expert stood up to test him, saying, "Teacher, what must I do so that I will inherit eternal life?"

And one of the legal experts answered [and] said to him, "Teacher, [when you] say these [things], you insult us also!"

So he said, "Woe to you also, legal experts, because you load people [with] burdens hard to bear, and [you] yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers!

Woe to you, legal experts, because you have taken away the key to knowledge! You did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering!"

And Jesus answered [and] said to the legal experts and Pharisees, saying, "Is it permitted to heal on the Sabbath, or not?"

There was a widow in that city, and she kept coming to him, saying, ‘Give me legal protection from my opponent.’

yet because this widow bothers me, I will give her legal protection, otherwise by continually coming she will wear me out.’”

There was a man there called Zacchaeus, who was the local surveyor of taxes, and was wealthy.

Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the One Moses in the Law and also the Prophets wrote about—Jesus from Nazareth, the son of Joseph [according to public record].”

So Pilate told them, “Take Him yourselves and judge Him according to your law.”

“It’s not legal for us to put anyone to death,” the Jews declared.

The Jewish leaders told him, "It is not legal for us to put anyone to death." This was to fulfill what Jesus had said when he indicated the kind of death he was to die.

In the church that was at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius the Cyrenian, Manaen, a close friend of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul.

"After that He gave the people judges [i.e., local military rulers] until the time of Samuel the [first] prophet. [See 3:24].

so, as Paul wished him to go abroad with him, he took and circumcised him on account of the local Jews, all of whom knew his father had been a Greek.