Beginning

Clean and Unclean Food^(A)

14 You are the sons of the Lord your God. You shall not cut yourselves or make any baldness between your eyes for the dead. ² For you are a holy people to the Lord your God, and the Lord has chosen you to be a peculiar people to Himself, treasured above all the nations that are on the earth.

³ You must not eat any detestable thing. ⁴ These are the animals which you may eat: the ox, the sheep, and the goat, ⁵ the deer, the gazelle, the fallow deer, the wild goat, and the ibex, and the antelope, and the mountain sheep. ⁶ You may eat every animal with divided hooves, with the hoof divided into two parts, and that chews the cud. ⁷ Nevertheless, you may not eat of these that chew the cud, or of them that divide the hoof: the camel, the rabbit, and the coney. For they chew the cud, but their hoof is not divided, therefore they are unclean to you. ⁸ The pig is unclean to you because it divides the hoof, yet it does not chew the cud. You must not eat of their flesh or touch their dead carcass.

⁹ These you shall eat of all that are in the water: All that have fins and scales you may eat. ¹⁰ Whatever does not have fins and scales you may not eat. It is unclean to you.

¹¹ You may eat of all clean birds. ¹² However, these are the ones which you cannot eat: the eagle, the vulture, the buzzard, ¹³ the red kite, the falcon, and the kite after its kind, ¹⁴ every raven after its kind, ¹⁵ and the ostrich, the owl, the seagull, and the hawk after its kind, ¹⁶ the little owl, and the great owl, and the white owl, ¹⁷ the pelican, the carrion vulture, and the cormorant, ¹⁸ the stork, and the heron after its kind, and the hoopoe, and the bat.

¹⁹ Every creeping thing that flies is unclean to you. They must not be eaten. ²⁰ You may eat all the clean birds.

²¹ You must not eat of anything that dies of itself, but you may give it to the foreigner that is in your gates, so that he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner, for you are a holy people to the Lord your God.

You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.

Tithes

²² You must be certain to tithe all the produce of your seed, so that the field produces year by year. ²³ You must eat before the Lord your God, in the place in which He shall choose to place His name, the tithe of your grain, of your wine, of your oil, and of the firstborn of your herds and of your flocks so that you may learn to always fear the Lord your God. ²⁴ If the distance is too long for you, so that you are not able to carry it, because the place is too far from you, where the Lord your God shall choose to set His name, when the Lord your God blesses you, ²⁵ then you shall exchange it for money and bind up the money in your hand and go to the place which the Lord your God shall choose. ²⁶ Then you may spend that money for whatever your heart desires, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatever your heart desires, and you may eat there before the Lord your God, and you shall rejoice, you, and your household, ²⁷ and the Levite that is within your gates. You must not forsake him, for he has no portion or inheritance with you.

²⁸ At the end of three years you must bring forth all the tithe of your produce the same year and lay it up within your gates. ²⁹ Then the Levite (because he has no portion or inheritance with you), the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, who are within your gates, shall come and shall eat and be satisfied, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hand which you do.

The Sabbatical Year^(B)

15 At the end of every seven years you shall grant a relinquishing of debts. ² This is the manner of the relinquishing: Every creditor that has loaned anything to his neighbor shall relinquish it. He shall not exact it of his neighbor, or of his brother, because it is called the Lord’s relinquishment. ³ You may collect it from a foreigner, but that which your brother has that is yours your hand shall release. ⁴ However, there will be no poor among you, for the Lord will greatly bless you in the land which the Lord your God has given you for an inheritance to possess, ⁵ if only you carefully obey the voice of the Lord your God, by carefully observing all these commandments which I command you today. ⁶ For the Lord your God will bless you, just as He promised you, and you will lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. You will reign over many nations, but they will not reign over you.

⁷ If there be among you a poor man, one of your brothers within any of your gates in your land which the Lord your God has given you, you must not harden your heart or shut your hand from your poor brother. ⁸ But you shall open your hand wide to him and must surely lend him what is sufficient for his need, in that which he lacks. ⁹ Beware lest there be a wicked thought in your heart, saying, “The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand,” and your eye be evil against your poor brother and you give him nothing, and he cry out to the Lord against you, and it become sin in you. ¹⁰ You must surely give to him, and your heart shall not be grieved when you give to him, because in this thing the Lord your God will bless you in all your works, and in all that you put your hand to do. ¹¹ For the poor will never cease from being in the land. Therefore, I command you, saying, “You shall open your hand wide to your brother, to your poor and needy in your land.”

Freeing Servants^(C)

¹² If your brother, a Hebrew man, or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you and serves you six years, then in the seventh year you must let him go free from you. ¹³ When you send him out free from you, you must not let him go away empty-handed. ¹⁴ You shall supply him liberally out of your flock, out of your floor, and out of your winepress. From that with which the Lord your God has blessed you, you shall give to him. ¹⁵ You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you. Therefore, I command this to you today.

¹⁶ It shall be, if he says to you, “I will not go away from you,” because he loves you and your house, because he is well off with you, ¹⁷ then you must take an awl and pierce it through his ear into the door, and he shall be your servant forever. And you shall also do likewise to your female servant.

¹⁸ It will not seem difficult for you when you send him away free from you, for he has been worth a double hired servant^[a] in serving you six years. Then the Lord your God will bless you in all that you do.

The Firstborn Animals

¹⁹ You must sanctify all the firstborn males that come out of your herd and flock to the Lord your God. You must do no work with the firstborn of your bulls or shear the firstborn of your sheep. ²⁰ You shall eat it before the Lord your God year by year in the place where the Lord shall choose, you and your household. ²¹ If there is any defect in it, if it is lame or blind or has a serious defect, you shall not sacrifice it to the Lord your God. ²² You shall eat it within your gates. The unclean and the clean person alike shall eat it, as if it were a gazelle or a deer. ²³ Only you must not eat its blood. You shall pour it on the ground like water.

The Passover^(D)

16 Observe the month of Aviv^[b] and keep the Passover to the Lord your God, for in the month of Aviv the Lord your God brought you out of Egypt by night. ² Therefore, you must sacrifice the Passover to the Lord your God, from the flock or the herd, in the place where the Lord shall choose to place His name. ³ You must not eat leavened bread with it. For seven days you must eat unleavened bread, the bread of affliction, for you came out of the land of Egypt in a hurry, so that you may remember all the days of your life the day when you came out of the land of Egypt. ⁴ There must not be any leavened bread seen with you within all your borders for seven days, nor may any of the meat which you sacrificed in the evening on the first day remain overnight until morning.

⁵ You may not sacrifice the Passover within any of your gates that the Lord your God has given you. ⁶ But at the place where the Lord your God chooses to place His name, there you shall sacrifice the Passover in the evening at sunset, at the time that you came out of Egypt. ⁷ You shall roast and eat it in the place where the Lord your God will choose, and you must return in the morning, and go to your tents. ⁸ For six days you must eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day there shall be a solemn assembly to the Lord your God. You must do no work on that day.

The Feast of Weeks^(E)

⁹ You must count seven weeks for yourself. Begin counting the seven weeks from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain. ¹⁰ You must keep the Feast of Weeks to the Lord your God with a tribute of a freewill offering from your hand, which you must give to the Lord your God, in proportion to how much the Lord your God has blessed you. ¹¹ You shall rejoice before the Lord your God—you, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your female servant, the Levite who is within your gates, the foreigner, the orphan, and the widow who are among you—in the place where the Lord your God has chosen to place His name. ¹² You must remember that you were a slave in Egypt, and you must be careful to observe these statutes.

The Feast of Tabernacles^(F)

¹³ You shall observe the Feast of Tabernacles seven days after you have gathered in your threshing floor and your winepress, ¹⁴ and you shall rejoice in your feast, you, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your female servant, the Levite, the foreigner, the orphan, and the widow who are within your gates. ¹⁵ You are to celebrate the festival for seven days to the Lord your God in the place where the Lord will choose, because the Lord your God will bless you in all your produce, and in all the works of your hands. Therefore, you will indeed rejoice.

¹⁶ Three times a year all your males must appear before the Lord your God in the place where He will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Tabernacles, and they must not appear before the Lord empty. ¹⁷ Every man must give as he is able, in proportion to the blessing of the Lord your God, which He has given you.

Judges

¹⁸ You must appoint judges and officers in all your gates, which the Lord your God gives you, throughout your tribes, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment. ¹⁹ You must not pervert judgment nor show partiality. You must not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and perverts the words of the righteous. ²⁰ You must follow that which is altogether just, so that you may live and inherit the land which the Lord your God is giving you.

Idolatry Forbidden

²¹ You must not plant for yourself an Asherah^[c] of any trees near the altar of the Lord your God, which you make for yourself. ²² You shall not set up for yourself any image, which the Lord your God hates.