Deuteronomy 17:14-20

International Standard Version

Duties of the Future King

¹⁴ “When you have come to the land that the Lord your God is about to give you, and you have taken possession of it and have settled in it, then you will say, ‘I will appoint a king over me like all the nations around me.’ ¹⁵ You will certainly set a king over you, whom the Lord your God will choose from among your relatives, but you must not place a foreign king over you who is not from your relatives. ¹⁶ He must not amass horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt to obtain more horses, because the Lord said you must never return that way again. ¹⁷ Also, he must not accumulate wives for himself (otherwise, his affection will become diverted), nor accumulate for himself excessive quantities of^[a] silver and gold. ¹⁸ When he occupies his royal throne, he must make a copy of this Law for himself from a scroll used by the Levitical priests. ¹⁹ It is to remain with him the rest of his life so he may learn to fear the Lord his God and observe all the words of this Law and these statutes, in order to fulfill them. ²⁰ He is not to exalt himself over his relatives, nor turn aside from the commandment—neither to the right nor to the left—so that he and his sons may reign long in Israel.”