Pledges

A solemn, binding promise, often involving the deposit of valuable items or property as a guarantee that the promise will be kept. To break a pledge is to sin against God.

Pledges were binding

Numbers 30:2 See also Numbers 30:3–15 In certain cases pledges made by daughters or wives could be nullified by fathers or husbands respectively.

If a man makes a vow to the LORD or swears an oath to obligate himself by a pledge, he must not break his word; he must do everything he has promised.

Pledges were solemn promises

2 Kings 23:3 parallel 2 Chronicles 34:31–32 See also 1 Chronicles 29:24; Ezra 10:19; Ezekiel 17:16–18; Micah 7:20; 1 Peter 3:21

So the king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the LORD to follow the LORD and to keep His commandments, decrees, and statutes with all his heart and all his soul, and to carry out the words of the covenant that were written in this book. And all the people entered into the covenant.

Pledges were guarantees that a promise would be kept

Items deposited to secure a pledge

Genesis 38:17–18 See also Exodus 22:26–27; Deuteronomy 24:10–13; Proverbs 20:16, Proverbs 27:13

“I will send you a young goat from my flock,” Judah answered. But she replied, “Only if you leave me something as a pledge until you send it.” “What pledge should I give you?” he asked. She answered, “Your seal and your cord, and the staff in your hand.” So he gave them to her and slept with her, and she became pregnant by him.

Unjust exaction of pledges condemned

Deuteronomy 24:17 See also Job 22:4–6, Job 24:2–3; Amos 2:6–8

Do not deny justice to the foreigner or the fatherless, and do not take a widow’s cloak as security.

Warning against making pledges on behalf of others

Proverbs 11:15 The foolishness of making a pledge as security for someone else's debt. See also Proverbs 6:1–5, Proverbs 17:18, Proverbs 22:26–27

He who puts up security for a stranger will surely suffer, but the one who hates indebtedness is secure.

Pledges and betrothal

Matthew 1:18–19 Betrothal was a pledge to marry and as such was much more binding than the modern Western practice of engagement. It could only be broken by divorce and the betrothed woman was already described as a wife. See also Exodus 22:16; Deuteronomy 22:23–25; Luke 1:27

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged in marriage to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and was unwilling to disgrace her publicly, he resolved to divorce her quietly.