<P> The command against false testimony is seen as a natural consequence of the command to "love your neighbor as yourself". This moral prescription flows from the command for holy people to bear witness to their deity . Offenses against the truth express by word or deed a refusal to commit oneself to moral uprightness: they are fundamental infidelities to God and, in this sense, they undermine the foundations of covenant with God . </P> <P> You shall not spread a false report . You shall not join hands with a wicked man to be a malicious witness . You shall not fall in with the many to do evil, nor shall you bear witness in a lawsuit, siding with the many, so as to pervert justice, nor shall you be partial to a poor man in his lawsuit . </P> <P> The Hebrew Bible contains a number prohibitions of false witness, lying, spreading false reports, etc . For a person who had a charge brought against them and were brought before a religious prosecution, the charge was considered as established only on the evidence of two or three sworn witnesses . In cases where false testimony was suspected, the religious judges were to make a thorough investigation, and if false testimony were proven, the false witness was to receive the punishment he had intended to bring on the person falsely accused . For example, since murder was a capital crime, giving false testimony in a murder case was subject to the death penalty . Those eager to receive or listen to false testimony were also subject to punishment . </P> <P> False witness is among the six things God hates, king Solomon says . False testimony is among the things that defile a person, Jesus says . </P>

Punishment for bearing false witness in the bible