The Cursed Tree and the Triumphant Cross Text: Deuteronomy 21:22-23
Introduction: The Public Reality of Sin
We live in an age that wants all its sins to be private. Our culture treats sin like a personal hobby, something you do in the privacy of your own home, and as long as it doesn't "hurt anyone," which is usually defined as "bother me," then it is considered acceptable. We have privatized our morality to the point of making it irrelevant. But God does not deal in private sins. All sin is public because all sin is an offense against a public God, the Creator of heaven and earth. All sin has public consequences because it is a treasonous act against the King of all creation.
In our text today, we are confronted with a stark and unsettling picture. It is a piece of case law from ancient Israel that seems, to our delicate modern sensibilities, quite severe. It deals with the public display of a capital criminal after his execution. But this is not some arbitrary, barbaric custom. This is a profound theological lesson, a visible sermon preached in the civic square. It teaches us about the nature of sin, the nature of God's curse, and the geography of holiness. This law is a shadow, a signpost, pointing down the long corridor of history to a hill outside Jerusalem where the ultimate curse would be put on ultimate display.
If we do not understand this passage, we will not understand the cross. If we sanitize the Old Testament law to make it more palatable to our therapeutic age, we will gut the gospel of its power. The cross is not a sentimental piece of jewelry; it is a cursed tree. And unless we understand the curse, we will never understand the glory of our salvation. This passage forces us to confront the public reality of sin and the public nature of the curse that sin incurs. It is a necessary foundation for understanding how our Savior could possibly save us by being publicly executed and publicly cursed in our place.
The Text
"And if a man has committed a sin, the judgment of which is death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his corpse shall not hang all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him on the same day (because cursed of God is he who is hanged), so that you do not make unclean your land which Yahweh your God gives you as an inheritance."
(Deuteronomy 21:22-23 LSB)
Sin, Judgment, and Public Display (v. 22)
We begin with the scenario laid out in verse 22:
"And if a man has committed a sin, the judgment of which is death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree," (Deuteronomy 21:22)
First, notice the progression. There is a sin, a judgment, an execution, and then a post-mortem display. The sin is one "the judgment of which is death." This is not a petty crime. This is a high-handed, capital offense against the law of God. The society, through its lawful magistrates, has rendered a just verdict. The man has been "put to death." The hanging on the tree is not the method of execution; it is what is done with the body afterward. This was a common practice in the ancient world, meant to be a potent deterrent. It was a way of saying, "This is what happens to those who defy the law and the gods."
But Israel was not to be like the other nations. Their public displays had to mean what God said they meant. For Israel, hanging a body on a tree was a public declaration. It was a symbol, a ritual sign. It was the nation acting as God's bailiff, posting an eviction notice. This man, by his capital crime, had demonstrated that he was outside the covenant. He had forfeited his place among the people of God. The hanging was a visible representation of his accursed status.
This connects us back to the very beginning. Where did sin and the curse enter the world? At a tree. Adam committed a capital crime, the judgment of which was death, at the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. He reached out his hand in rebellion and brought the curse of God down upon himself and all his posterity. The tree, which was meant to be a place of testing and graduation into greater glory, became the instrument of our fall. From that moment on, the tree has stood in Scripture as a symbol of this great conflict: a place of disobedience and curse, or a place of obedience and life. Adam disobeyed at a tree; Jesus obeyed on one.
The Curse and the Land (v. 23a)
Verse 23 gives the specific regulations and the theological reason for them.
"his corpse shall not hang all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him on the same day (because cursed of God is he who is hanged)," (Deuteronomy 21:23a LSB)
Here is the heart of the matter. The body was not to be left hanging overnight. Why? "Because cursed of God is he who is hanged." The Hebrew is stark: "for a curse of God is a hanged man." This public display was a formal acknowledgment that this man was under the divine curse. He was not just an enemy of the state; he was an enemy of God. His crime was not merely anti-social; it was a form of cosmic treason.
The curse of God is the active manifestation of His holy opposition to sin. It is not a grumpy mood. It is the logical and necessary consequence of a holy God confronting unholy rebellion. In Deuteronomy 28, God lays out the blessings for obedience and the curses for disobedience. The curses are a systematic dismantling of the created order: disease, famine, defeat, exile. The curse is de-creation. It is God handing men over to the chaos and death they have chosen.
So, the man on the tree is a living (or rather, dead) illustration of the curse. He is a picture of what every sinner deserves. He is a walking, hanging embodiment of the wrath of God against sin. This is why the Apostle Paul quotes this very verse in Galatians. He is explaining the very mechanism of our salvation when he says, "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: 'Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree'" (Galatians 3:13). The cross was not an accident. It was not a tragedy. It was a transaction. Jesus, the innocent one, stepped into the place of the guilty. He took the capital sentence we deserved. He was put on that Roman tree as a public spectacle, not just of Roman injustice, but of divine justice. God the Father placed the full weight of the curse that we deserved upon His own Son. On the cross, Jesus became the man from Deuteronomy 21. He became a curse for us.
Holiness and Inheritance (v. 23b)
The verse concludes with the practical reason for the command: the purity of the land.
"so that you do not make unclean your land which Yahweh your God gives you as an inheritance." (Deuteronomy 21:23b LSB)
Leaving the accursed body exposed overnight would defile the land. This is a crucial principle. The land of Israel was a holy space, a typological Garden of Eden. It was God's land, which He was giving to His people as an inheritance. The presence of an unresolved, publicly displayed curse would pollute it. It would be like leaving a container of radioactive waste open in the middle of the temple court. The curse had to be dealt with. The body had to be removed from sight, taken outside the camp, and buried. The defilement had to be contained.
Sin pollutes. Unholiness is contagious. The land itself could vomit out the people if it became too defiled by their sin (Leviticus 18:28). God's holiness requires separation from sin and its effects. The burial of the cursed man was a way of cleansing the land, of restoring the boundary between the holy and the profane.
And here again, we see the gospel in shadow form. When Jesus became a curse for us, He was taken down from the cross before sunset, in accordance with this very law (John 19:31). He was buried. The curse was removed from public view and placed in the ground. But unlike the criminals of the Old Testament, the curse could not hold Him. Death could not hold Him. He absorbed the full, toxic dose of the curse into Himself, and on the third day, He detoxified it by His resurrection. He exhausted the curse. He swallowed up death in victory.
Conclusion: From Cursed Tree to Tree of Life
So what does this ancient piece of civic law have to do with us? Everything. It is the grammar of the gospel.
First, it teaches us to take sin seriously. We live in a world that trivializes sin, rebrands it as a mistake, a weakness, or an alternative lifestyle. This passage shows us God's evaluation. Sin that leads to death makes a man a curse. It is a public stench in the nostrils of a holy God. We must learn to hate our sin as God hates it, to see it as the treasonous rebellion that it is.
Second, it shows us the genius of the cross. The cross was not simply a display of love; it was a display of the curse. God did not wave a magic wand and ignore our sin. He is not a sentimental grandfather. He is a just judge. The penalty had to be paid. The curse had to be executed. And so He sent His Son to be the man on the tree, to become the curse in our place. He did not compromise His justice in order to show mercy; He satisfied His justice in order to display His mercy. The cross is where the love and justice of God meet and kiss.
Finally, this passage shows us that the curse has been dealt with. Because Jesus was hung on the tree, because He was buried, the land can be made clean. And we are that land. We are God's inheritance. By nature, our hearts are defiled, polluted by the curse of sin. But when we, by faith, are united to Christ, His death becomes our death. His burial becomes our burial. The curse is removed. We are cleansed. The tree of the curse, the cross, becomes for us the tree of life. Through the cursed man on the tree, we are granted access back to the Tree of Life in the paradise of God (Revelation 2:7). He took the ultimate defilement so that we could receive the ultimate inheritance: a clean heart, a new life, and an eternity in the presence of a holy God.