EXTRA · Side-ring · Parashas Shoftim · Passuk 18:21
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And if you say in your heart, ‘How shall we know the word that the Eternal has not spoken?’
Chazal / classical source (beyond TT-numbered main-ring units): Sifrei Devarim 178.
Lemma: אֵיכָה נֵדַע אֶת הַדָּבָר.
English: ‘How shall we know the word that the Eternal has not spoken’ – this is the question of verification.
Derash on the need for a criterion (Sifrei) — the Torah itself raises the question of how to distinguish true from false.
The people are expected to ask how to recognize a word that Hashem has not spoken; the next verse supplies the test of fulfillment.