What makes a son a stubborn and rebellious son in Deuteronomy 21:18?
According to the passage, a son is stubborn and rebellious when he will not obey the voice of his father or mother, and when they have chastened him he will not hearken to them. The same context describes him as refusing to obey their voice, being a glutton and a drunkard.
Les teaches from Deuteronomy 21:18 that the stubborn and rebellious son is one who will not obey the voice of his father or his mother, and even after they have chastened him he will not hearken to them. The parents then lay hold on him and bring him out to the elders of the city and to the gate of his place. Les connects this with a person who will not obey their voice, a glutton and a drunkard, and notes that families know this kind of individual. He refers to Dobson’s book Tough Love, which advocated taking steps and exercising tough love rather than continually feeding him, paying him, and helping him out of tight places. Israel dealt with it, Les says, far worse than Dobson would have suggested: all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die, and so put away evil from among you.
If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them: