³⁵ We obligate ourselves to bring the first fruits of our soil and the first fruits of all fruit of every tree, year by year, to the house of the Lord;^(A)

² you shall take some of the first of all the fruit of the ground, which you harvest from the land that the Lord your God is giving you, and you shall put it in a basket and go to the place that the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for his name.^(A)

¹⁹ “The choicest of the first fruits of your ground you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.

“You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.^(A)

¹² All the best of the oil and all the best of the wine and of the grain, the choice produce that they give to the Lord, I have given to you.^(A)

²⁶ “The best of the first fruits of your ground you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God.

“You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.”^(A)

Do Not Rob God

⁸ Will anyone rob God? Yet you are robbing me! But you say, “How are we robbing you?” In your tithes and offerings!^{(A) 9} You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me—the whole nation of you! ¹⁰ Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in my house, and thus put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts; see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing.^{(B) 11} I will rebuke the locust^[a] for you, so that it will not destroy the produce of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not be barren, says the Lord of hosts. ¹² Then all nations will count you happy, for you will be a land of delight, says the Lord of hosts.

³ The contribution of the king from his own possessions was for the burnt offerings: the burnt offerings of morning and evening, and the burnt offerings for the Sabbaths, the new moons, and the appointed festivals, as it is written in the law of the Lord.^{(A) 4} He commanded the people who lived in Jerusalem to give the portion due to the priests and the Levites, so that they might devote themselves to the law of the Lord.^{(B) 5} As soon as the word spread, the people of Israel gave in abundance the first fruits of grain, wine, oil, honey, and of all the produce of the field, and they brought in abundantly the tithe of everything.^{(C) 6} The people of Israel and Judah who lived in the cities of Judah also brought in the tithe of cattle and sheep and the tithe of the dedicated things that had been consecrated to the Lord their God and laid them in heaps.^{(D) 7} In the third month they began to pile up the heaps and finished them in the seventh month. ⁸ When Hezekiah and the officials came and saw the heaps, they blessed the Lord and his people Israel. ⁹ Hezekiah questioned the priests and the Levites about the heaps. ¹⁰ The chief priest Azariah, who was of the house of Zadok, answered him, “Since they began to bring the contributions into the house of the Lord, we have had enough to eat and have plenty to spare, for the Lord has blessed his people, so that we have this great supply left over.”^(E)

² So bring with you also your brothers of the tribe of Levi, your ancestral tribe, in order that they may be joined to you and serve you while you and your sons with you are in front of the tent of the covenant.^(A)

²³ “When you come into the land and plant all kinds of trees for food, then you shall regard their fruit as forbidden;^[a] three years it shall be forbidden^[b] to you; it must not be eaten. ²⁴ In the fourth year all their fruit shall be set apart for rejoicing in the Lord.^{(A) 25} But in the fifth year you may eat of their fruit, that their yield may be increased for you: I am the Lord your God.