On his Town Hall blog this Wednesday, Michael Medved posted an article entitled “Biblical Liberation from Liberalism”. In the article, he echos the claim of Denis Prager that Leviticus 19:15 is “the most crucial conservative verse in the whole Bible” (emphasis his). For those who don’t know Leviticus by heart, that verse states:

You shall not commit a perversion of justice: you shall not favor the poor and you shall not honor the great, with righteousness shall you judge your fellow.

He goes on to say that liberals should note that Leviticus identifies favoring the poor as a perversion of justice. Since Leviticus is one of my favorite books and chapter 19 is a crux chapter, I wanted to address this.

I think Prager and Medved are wrong about this being an important conservative verse for a couple of reasons. First, what they are doing is prooftexting. Conservatives did not arrive at their conservative opinions based on this verse. Instead, they have simply found a verse that agrees with what they already believe. Liberals sometimes do this as well, but it is wrong in both cases.

Second, it seems that this verse also condemns showing preferential treatment in court for the rich, but I rarely hear conservatives arguing that this should be changed. Instead, they go along with a system where the rich can afford better lawyers and are acquitted even when guilty, while the poor cannot afford adequate legal representation.

Third, this verse is only talking about what happens in a court case. It does not mean that government should not help the poor in other cases. Medved states:

As I argued in my recent townhall column about the essence of liberalism (posted on March 21st), the outlook of the left insists upon favoring the poor and the unfortunate—and thereby injecting unfairness and discrimination into the very core of politics and government.

This has nothing to do with Leviticus 19:15. Favoring the poor out of court is not condemned by this verse. In fact, favoring the poor is illustrated in other instances in the Bible, including Jesus’ words that the kingdom of God belongs to the poor (Luke 6:20). Does Medved think that Jesus was going against Leviticus 19:15 in saying that the poor will inherit the kingdom? What about when Jesus told people not to invite rich neighbors to their parties but instead invite the poor (Luke 14:12-14)? Isn’t that giving the poor preferential treatment?1

In short, Leviticus 19:15 does not support the burden that Medved and Prager want it to hold. Conservative positions may or may not be correct, but they have little to do with Leviticus 19:15.


  1. For those who would point out that Medved is Jewish and doesn’t follow the New Testament, I agree. But at the same time, Prager — whom Medved is quoting — felt free to write a column explaining to Christians that Jesus would not support Democratic policies. [back]
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