Bible in 90 Days

Remember the Lord Your God

8 You must carefully keep all the commandments that I am commanding you today, so that you may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the Lord swore to your fathers. ² You must remember that the Lord your God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you, and to prove you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. ³ He humbled you and let you suffer hunger, and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man does not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. ⁴ Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your feet swell these forty years. ⁵ You must also consider in your heart that, as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you.

⁶ Therefore you must keep the commandments of the Lord your God, to walk in His ways and to fear Him. ⁷ For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs that flow out of valleys and hills, ⁸ a land of wheat, barley, vines, fig trees, and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey, ⁹ a land where you may eat bread without scarcity, in which you will not lack anything, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you may dig copper.

¹⁰ When you have eaten and are full, then you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land which He has given you. ¹¹ Beware that you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping His commandments, and His judgments, and His statutes, which I am commanding you today. ¹² Otherwise, when you have eaten and are full and have built and occupied good houses, ¹³ and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold multiply, and all that you have multiplies, ¹⁴ then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of slavery, ¹⁵ who led you through that great and terrible wilderness, where there were fiery serpents and scorpions and drought, where there was no water, who brought forth for you water out of the rock of flint, ¹⁶ who fed you in the wilderness with manna, which your fathers did not know, that He might humble you and that He might prove you, to do good for you in the end. ¹⁷ Otherwise, you may say in your heart, “My power and the might of my hand have gained me this wealth.” ¹⁸ But you must remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you the ability to get wealth, so that He may establish His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is today.

¹⁹ If you ever forget the Lord your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, then I testify against you today that you will surely perish. ²⁰ Just like the nations which the Lord will destroy before you, so shall you perish because you would not be obedient to the voice of the Lord your God.

Not Because of Righteousness

9 Hear, O Israel! You are to cross over the Jordan today, to go in to possess nations greater and mightier than you, great cities fortified up to heaven, ² a great and tall people, the children of the Anakites, whom you know and of whom you have heard it said, “Who can stand before the children of Anak?” ³ Understand therefore today that the Lord your God is He who goes over before you as a consuming fire. He shall destroy them and shall bring them down before you, so that you drive them out and destroy them quickly, as the Lord has spoken to you.

⁴ Do not say in your heart, after the Lord your God has driven them out before you, “On account of my righteousness the Lord has brought me in to possess this land,” but it is because of the wickedness of these nations the Lord is driving them out before you. ⁵ It is not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you enter to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord your God drives them out before you, and that He may fulfill the word which the Lord swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. ⁶ Understand, therefore, that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess on account of your righteousness, for you are a stubborn people.

The Golden Calf

⁷ Remember, and do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God to wrath in the wilderness. From the day that you departed out of the land of Egypt until you came to this place, you have been rebellious against the Lord. ⁸ Also in Horeb you provoked the Lord to wrath, so that the Lord was angry enough with you to destroy you. ⁹ When I went up into the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant which the Lord made with you, then I remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I did not eat bread or drink water. ¹⁰ The Lord delivered to me two tablets of stone, written with the finger of God, and on them was written all the words which the Lord spoke to you at the mountain out of the midst of the fire on the day of the assembly.

¹¹ At the end of forty days and forty nights, the Lord gave me the two tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant. ¹² Then the Lord said to me, “Arise, go down from here quickly, for your people whom you brought out of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They are quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them. They have made a molded image for themselves.”

¹³ Furthermore the Lord spoke to me, saying, “I have seen this people, and indeed, they are a stubborn people. ¹⁴ Let Me alone, so that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven, and I will make of you a nation mightier and greater than they.”

¹⁵ So I returned and came down from the mount, and the mount burned with fire, and the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands. ¹⁶ I looked, and indeed, you had sinned against the Lord your God and had made yourselves a molded calf. You had quickly turned aside out of the way which the Lord had commanded you. ¹⁷ I took the two tablets and threw them out of my two hands and broke them before your eyes.

¹⁸ I fell down before the Lord, as at the first, forty days and forty nights. I did not eat bread or drink water because of all your sins which you committed, doing what was wicked in the sight of the Lord to provoke Him to anger. ¹⁹ For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure with which the Lord was wrathful against you to destroy you. But the Lord listened to me at that time also. ²⁰ The Lord was angry enough with Aaron to destroy him, so I also prayed for Aaron at the same time. ²¹ I took your sin, the calf which you had made, and burned it with fire, and crushed it, and ground it very small until it was as small as dust. Then I threw the dust into the brook that descended down from the mountain.

²² Also at Taberah and at Massah and at Kibroth Hattaavah you provoked the Lord to wrath.

²³ Likewise when the Lord sent you from Kadesh Barnea, saying, “Go up and possess the land which I have given you,” then you rebelled against the commandment of the Lord your God, and you did not believe Him or listen to His voice. ²⁴ You have been rebellious against the Lord from the day I knew you.

²⁵ So I fell down before the Lord forty days and forty nights; I fell down because the Lord had said He would destroy you. ²⁶ I prayed therefore to the Lord, and said, “O Lord God, do not destroy Your people, Your inheritance, which You have redeemed through Your greatness, which You have brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand. ²⁷ Remember Your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Do not look at the stubbornness of this people or at their wickedness or their sin. ²⁸ Otherwise, the land from which You brought us may say, ‘Because the Lord was not able to bring them into the land which He promised them and because He hated them, He has brought them out to slay them in the wilderness.’ ²⁹ Yet they are Your people, Your inheritance, whom You brought out by Your mighty power and by Your stretched-out arm.”

The Second Pair of Tablets

10 At that time the Lord said to me, “Cut out for yourself two tablets of stone like the first and come up to Me onto the mountain and make an ark of wood for yourself. ² I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke, and you shall put them in the ark.”

³ So I made an ark of acacia wood and cut out two tablets of stone just like the first and went up onto the mountain with the two tablets in my hand. ⁴ He wrote on the tablets just like the first writing, the Ten Commandments which the Lord spoke to you at the mountain out of the midst of the fire on the day of the assembly, and the Lord gave them to me. ⁵ I turned around and came down from the mountain and put the tablets in the ark which I had made, and there they are, just as the Lord commanded me.

⁶ (The children of Israel set out from Beeroth of the sons of Jaakan to Moserah. There Aaron died and was buried, and his son Eleazar ministered in the priest’s office in his place. ⁷ From there they journeyed to Gudgodah, and from Gudgodah to Jotbathah, a land of rivers of waters. ⁸ At that time the Lord set apart the tribe of Levi to carry the ark of the covenant of the Lord, to stand before the Lord to minister to Him, and to bless in His name, to this day. ⁹ Therefore, Levi has no portion or inheritance with his brothers. The Lord is his inheritance, just as the Lord your God promised him.)

¹⁰ As for me, I stayed on the mountain like the first time, forty days and forty nights, and the Lord listened to me at that time also. The Lord was not willing to destroy you. ¹¹ The Lord said to me, “Arise, take your journey before the people, so that they may go in and possess the land which I swore to give to their fathers.”

The Essence of the Law

¹² Now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, ¹³ to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your good?

¹⁴ Indeed, heaven and the highest heavens belong to the Lord your God, also the earth with all that is in it. ¹⁵ The Lord delighted only in your fathers, to love them; and He chose their descendants after them, even you above all people, as it is today. ¹⁶ Therefore, circumcise your heart, and do not be stubborn anymore. ¹⁷ For the Lord your God is the God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the fearsome God who is unbiased and takes no bribe. ¹⁸ He executes the judgment of the orphan and the widow and loves the foreigner, giving him food and clothing. ¹⁹ Therefore, love the foreigner, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. ²⁰ You must fear the Lord your God. You must serve Him and cling to Him, and swear by His name. ²¹ He is your praise, and He is your God, who has done for you these great and fearsome things which your eyes have seen. ²² Your fathers went down into Egypt with seventy people, and now the Lord your God has made you as numerous as the stars of heaven.

Love and Obey

11 You must love the Lord your God and keep His charge, His statutes, His ordinances, and His commandments always. ² Know this day that I am not speaking with your children who have not known and who have not seen the discipline of the Lord your God, His greatness, His mighty hand, and His outstretched arm, ³ and His signs and His works which He did in the midst of Egypt to Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, and to all his land, ⁴ and what He did to the army of Egypt, to their horses, and to their chariots, when He made the water of the Red Sea to flow over them as they pursued after you, and how the Lord utterly destroyed them, ⁵ and what He did to you in the wilderness until you came to this place, ⁶ and what He did to Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, the son of Reuben, when the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up, their households, their tents, and everything that was in their possession, in the midst of all Israel. ⁷ But your eyes have seen all the great deeds of the Lord which He did.

⁸ Therefore you must keep all the commandments which I am commanding you today, so that you may be strong and go in and possess the land which you are going to possess; ⁹ and that you may prolong your days in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers to give to them and to their descendants, a land flowing with milk and honey. ¹⁰ For the land which you are entering to possess is not like the land of Egypt from where you came, where you sowed your seed and watered it with your foot like a vegetable garden, ¹¹ but the land, which you are entering to possess, is a land of hills and valleys and drinks water from the rain of heaven, ¹² a land for which the Lord your God cares. The eyes of the Lord your God are always on it, from the beginning of the year even to the end of the year.

¹³ It will be, if you will diligently obey My commandments which I am commanding you today, to love the Lord your God, and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul, ¹⁴ then I will give you the rain of your land in its season, the early rain and the latter rain, that you may gather in your grain and your wine and your oil. ¹⁵ I will provide grass in your fields for your livestock, that you may eat and be full.

¹⁶ Take heed to yourselves that your heart be not deceived, and you turn away and serve other gods and worship them. ¹⁷ Then the Lord’s wrath will be inflamed against you, and He will shut up the heavens so that there will be no rain and the land will not yield its fruit, and you will quickly perish from the good land which the Lord is giving you. ¹⁸ Therefore you must fix these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and bind them as a sign on your hand, so that they may be as frontlets between your eyes. ¹⁹ You shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. ²⁰ You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, ²¹ so that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the days of heaven on the earth.

²² For if you diligently keep all these commandments which I am commanding you to do—to love the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, and to hold fast to Him— ²³ then the Lord will drive out all these nations from before you, and you will dispossess nations greater and mightier than you. ²⁴ Every place where the soles of your feet tread will be yours. Your border will be from the wilderness to Lebanon, from the river, the River Euphrates, as far as the Mediterranean Sea. ²⁵ No man will be able to resist you, for the Lord your God shall lay the fear of you and the dread of you on all the land where you shall tread, just as He has spoken to you.

²⁶ See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse: ²⁷ the blessing if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God, which I am commanding you today, ²⁸ and the curse, if you will not obey the commandments of the Lord your God, but turn from the way which I am commanding you today, to go after other gods which you have not known. ²⁹ Now it shall be, when the Lord your God has brought you into the land which you are entering to possess, that you shall put the blessing on Mount Gerizim and the curse on Mount Ebal. ³⁰ Are they not on the other side of the Jordan, west where the sun goes down, in the land of the Canaanites, who dwell in the plain opposite Gilgal, beside the oaks of Moreh? ³¹ For you will cross over the Jordan to go in to possess the land which the Lord your God is giving you, and you will possess it, and dwell in it. ³² You must be careful to do all the statutes and judgments which I am setting before you today.

The One Place of Worship

12 These are the statutes and judgments which you shall be careful to observe in the land, which the Lord, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess, all the days that you live on the earth. ² You must utterly destroy all the places where the nations which you will possess served their gods, on the high mountains, and on the hills, and under every green tree. ³ And you shall overthrow their altars, and break their pillars, and burn their Asherah poles^[a] with fire, and you shall cut down the engraved images of their gods, and eliminate their names out of that place.

⁴ You shall not act this way toward the Lord your God. ⁵ But you must seek only the place which the Lord your God shall choose out of all your tribes to establish His name, and there you must go. ⁶ There you shall bring your burnt offerings, your sacrifices, your tithes, the offerings of your hand, your vows, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herds and of your flocks. ⁷ There you must eat before the Lord your God, and you shall rejoice in all that you put your hand to, you and your households, where the Lord your God has blessed you.

⁸ You are not to do all the things that we are doing here today, where every man does whatever is right in his own eyes. ⁹ For you have not yet come to the rest and to the inheritance which the Lord your God has given you. ¹⁰ But when you cross the Jordan, and dwell in the land which the Lord your God has given you to inherit, and when He gives you rest from all your enemies round about, so that you dwell in safety, ¹¹ then there will be a place which the Lord your God will choose to cause His name to dwell. There you must bring all that I command you: your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, your tithes, the offering of your hand, and all your choice vows which you vow to the Lord. ¹² You will rejoice before the Lord your God, you, your sons, your daughters, your male servants, your female servants, and the Levite who is within your gates, for he has no portion or inheritance with you. ¹³ Be careful that you do not offer your burnt offerings in every place that you see. ¹⁴ Rather, in the place which the Lord will choose in one of your tribes, there you must offer your burnt offerings, and there you must do all that I command you.

¹⁵ Notwithstanding, you may kill and eat meat within all your gates, whatever your heart desires, according to the blessing of the Lord your God which He has given you. The unclean and the clean may eat of it, of the gazelle and of the deer, ¹⁶ only you must not eat the blood. You shall pour it on the ground like water. ¹⁷ You may not eat within your gates the tithe of your grain, your wine, your oil, the firstborn of your herds or of your flock, any of your vows which you vow, your freewill offerings, or the offering of your hand. ¹⁸ Rather you must eat them before the Lord your God in the place which the Lord your God will choose—you, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your female servant, and the Levite that is within your gates—and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God in all that you undertake to do. ¹⁹ Take heed to yourself that you do not forsake the Levite as long as you live on the earth.

²⁰ When the Lord your God shall enlarge your border as He has promised you, and you say, “I will eat meat,” because you desire to eat meat, then you may eat as much meat as your heart desires. ²¹ If the place which the Lord your God has chosen to put His name is too far from you, then you shall kill of your herd and of your flock, which the Lord has given you, as I have commanded you, and you must eat in your gates whatever your heart desires. ²² Even as the gazelle and the deer are eaten, so you shall eat them. The unclean and the clean shall eat of them alike. ²³ Only be sure that you do not eat the blood. For the blood is the life, and you may not eat the life with the meat. ²⁴ You must not eat it. You must pour it on the ground like water. ²⁵ You must not eat it, so that it may go well with you and with your children after you, when you do that which is right in the sight of the Lord.

²⁶ You shall take only your holy things which you have, along with your vows, and go to the place which the Lord shall choose. ²⁷ You must offer your burnt offerings, the meat and the blood, on the altar of the Lord your God, and the blood of your sacrifices will be poured out on the altar of the Lord your God, and you shall eat the meat. ²⁸ Observe and hear all these words which I command you, so that it may go well with you and with your children after you forever, when you do that which is good and right in the sight of the Lord your God.

²⁹ When the Lord your God shall cut off the nations from before you, where you go to possess them, and you dispossess them, and dwell in their land, ³⁰ take heed to yourself so that you are not ensnared by following them, after they have been destroyed before you, and that you not inquire after their gods, saying, “How did these nations serve their gods? Even so I will do likewise.” ³¹ You shall not do so to the Lord your God, for every abomination to the Lord, which He hates, they have done to their gods. They have even burned their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods.

³² Whatever I command you, be careful to do it. You shall not add to it or take away from it.

Idolatry

13 If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, ² and the sign or the wonder comes to pass concerning that which he spoke to you, saying, “Let us go after other gods,” which you have not known, “and let us serve them,” ³ you must not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams, for the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. ⁴ You must follow after the Lord your God, fear Him, and keep His commandments, obey His voice, and you must serve Him, and cling to Him. ⁵ That prophet or that dreamer of dreams must be put to death because he has spoken in order to turn you away from the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, to entice you away from the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you must put the evil away from your midst.

⁶ If your brother, the son of your mother, or your son, or your daughter, or your beloved wife, or your friend, who is as your own soul, entices you secretly, saying, “Let us go and serve other gods,” which you have not known, neither you nor your fathers, ⁷ namely, of the gods of the people who are all around you, near you or far away from you, from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth, ⁸ you shall not consent to him or listen to him, neither should your eye pity him, nor shall you spare or conceal him, ⁹ but you must surely kill him. Your hand must be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards, the hand of all the people. ¹⁰ You shall stone him with stones so that he dies because he has sought to entice you away from the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. ¹¹ All Israel shall hear and fear and no more do any such wickedness as this among you.

¹² If you hear it said in one of your cities, in which the Lord your God has given you to dwell, saying, ¹³ “Certain men, the sons of wickedness, are gone out from among you and have seduced the inhabitants of their city, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ ” which you have not known, ¹⁴ then you shall inquire, search out, and ask diligently. If it be true and certain that such an abomination has been among you, ¹⁵ you shall surely put the inhabitants of that city to the sword, utterly destroying it, all that is in it and its livestock—with the edge of the sword. ¹⁶ You must gather all the spoils of it into the middle of the street and burn the city with fire along with all the spoils within it for the Lord your God, and it will be a heap forever. It must not be rebuilt. ¹⁷ Nothing of the cursed thing there must cling to your hand, so that the Lord may turn from the fierceness of His anger and show you mercy, have compassion on you, and multiply you, just as He swore to your fathers, ¹⁸ if you listen to the voice of the Lord your God, to keep all His commandments which I command you today, and do that which is right in the eyes of the Lord your God.

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^[b] 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^[c] 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^[d] 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.

17 You must not sacrifice to the Lord your God any bull or sheep that has a blemish or any defect, for that is detestable to the Lord your God.

² If there be found among you, within any of your gates which the Lord your God gives you, man or woman, who has acted wickedly in the sight of the Lord your God, by transgressing His covenant, ³ and has gone and served other gods and worshipped them, either the sun, or moon, or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded, ⁴ and if it is told to you, and you have heard of it, and investigated diligently, and it is true, and the matter is certain that such a detestable thing has happened in Israel, ⁵ then you must bring forth that man or that woman who has committed that wicked thing to your gates, that very man or woman, and stone them with stones until they die. ⁶ On the testimony of two or three witnesses he that is to die must be put to death, but on the testimony of one witness he cannot be put to death. ⁷ The hands of the witnesses shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hands of all the people. So you shall purge the evil from among you.

Courts of Law

⁸ If there arises a matter too difficult for you in judgment, between one kind of bloodshed and another, between one kind of lawsuit and another, and between one kind of assault and another, matters of controversy within your gates, then you must arise and go up to the place where the Lord your God shall choose. ⁹ You must go to the Levitical priests or to the judge in office those days, and inquire, and they will show you the verdict of judgment. ¹⁰ You shall do according to the verdict which they declare to you from the place where the Lord will choose to show you, and you must be careful to do all that they instruct you to do. ¹¹ You must do according to the terms of the law which they instruct you and according to the verdict which they tell you. You must not deviate from the sentence which they show you, to the right or to the left. ¹² The man who acts presumptuously and does not listen to the priest who stands to minister before the Lord your God, or to the judge—that man must die, and you must purge the evil from Israel. ¹³ Then all the people will hear, and fear, and not act presumptuously again.

Appointing a King

¹⁴ When you have come into the land which the Lord your God gives you and possess it and dwell there and then say, “I will set a king over me just like all the nations that are around me,” ¹⁵ you must set a king over you whom the Lord your God will choose. You must select a king over you who is from among your brothers. You may not select a foreigner over you who is not your countryman. ¹⁶ What is more, he shall not accumulate horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt in order that he accumulate horses, for as the Lord has said to you, “You must not go back that way ever again.” ¹⁷ He shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away; nor shall he acquire for himself excess silver and gold.

¹⁸ It must be, when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write a copy of this law for himself on a scroll before the priests, the Levites. ¹⁹ It must be with him, and he must read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, and carefully observe all the words of this law and these statutes, and do them, ²⁰ that his heart will not be lifted up above his brothers and so that he may not turn aside from the commandment, to the right or to the left, to the end, so that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he and his children, in the midst of Israel.

Provision for Priests and Levites

18 The Levitical priests and all the tribe of Levi will not have any portion or inheritance with Israel. They must eat the offerings of the Lord made by fire and His portion. ² They will have no inheritance among their brothers. The Lord is their inheritance, just as He has said to them.

³ This shall be the priest’s due from the people, from them that offer a sacrifice, whether it be an ox or sheep: they shall give to the priest the shoulder, the two cheeks, and the stomach. ⁴ You must give him the first fruit of your grain, of your wine, and of your oil, and the first of the fleece of your sheep also. ⁵ For the Lord your God has chosen him out of all your tribes to stand to minister in the name of the Lord, him and his sons forever.

⁶ If a Levite comes from any of your gates out of all Israel, where he lives, and comes with all the desire of his mind to the place where the Lord shall choose, ⁷ then he shall minister in the name of the Lord his God, as all his brothers the Levites do, who stand there before the Lord. ⁸ They must have the same portions to eat, besides any profits he may receive from the sale of his father’s inheritance.

A Call to Holiness

⁹ When you enter into the land which the Lord your God gives you, you must not learn to practice the abominations of those nations. ¹⁰ There must not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or who uses divination, or uses witchcraft, or an interpreter of omens, or a sorcerer, ¹¹ or one who casts spells, or a spiritualist, or an occultist, or a necromancer. ¹² For all that do these things are an abomination to the Lord, and because of these abominations the Lord your God will drive them out from before you. ¹³ You must be blameless before the Lord your God.

The Prophet

¹⁴ For these nations, which you shall possess, listened to soothsayers and to diviners, but as for you, the Lord your God has not permitted you to do so. ¹⁵ The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet from the midst of you, of your brothers, like me. You must listen to him. ¹⁶ This is according to all that you desired of the Lord your God in Horeb on the day of the assembly, saying, “Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, nor let me see this great fire anymore, so that I do not die.”

¹⁷ The Lord said to me, “They have done well in what they have said. ¹⁸ I will raise up a prophet from among their brothers, like you, and will put My words in his mouth, and he will speak to them all that I command him. ¹⁹ It will be that whoever will not listen to My words which he will speak in My name, I will require it of him. ²⁰ But the prophet, who presumes to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who shall speak in the name of other gods—that prophet shall die.”

²¹ And you may say in your heart, “How can we know the word which the Lord has not spoken?” ²² When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not occur or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You shall not be afraid of him.

Cities of Refuge^(G)

19 When the Lord your God has cut off the nations, whose land the Lord your God is giving you, and you dispossess them, and dwell in their cities, and in their houses, ² you shall set apart three cities for yourselves in the midst of your land, which the Lord your God is giving you to possess. ³ You shall prepare a roadway for yourself, and divide the territory of your land into three parts, which the Lord your God is giving you to inherit, so that every manslayer may flee there.

⁴ This is the word concerning the manslayer who will flee there, so that he may live: Whoever kills his neighbor unintentionally, whom he did not hate previously, ⁵ like when a man goes into the forest with his neighbor to cut wood, and his hand raises the axe to cut down the tree, and the axe head slips from the handle and lands on his neighbor causing him to die, then he may flee to one of those cities, and live. ⁶ Otherwise the avenger of blood might, while he is angry, pursue the manslayer and overtake him (because the way is long) and kill him, even though he was not worthy of death (since he did not hate him previously). ⁷ Therefore, I command you, saying, “You shall set apart three cities for yourselves.”

⁸ If the Lord your God enlarges your borders as He promised your fathers, and gives you all the land which He promised to give to your fathers, ⁹ and if you will carefully keep all these commandments, which I command you today, to love the Lord your God, and to always walk in His ways, then you must add three cities more for yourself, besides these three. ¹⁰ Then innocent blood will not be shed in your land, which the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance, and blood guiltiness be on you.

¹¹ But if any man hates his neighbor, and lies in wait for him, and rises up against him, and mortally strikes him, causing him to die, and flees to one of these cities, ¹² then the elders of his city must send and fetch him from there, and deliver him to the hand of the avenger of blood, so that he may die. ¹³ Your eye must not pity him, but you must remove the guilt of innocent blood from Israel, so that it may go well with you.

¹⁴ You shall not remove your neighbor’s landmark, which they of old time have set in your inheritance, which you shall inherit in the land that the Lord your God is giving you to possess.

Witnesses

¹⁵ A single witness must not rise up against a man on account of any iniquity or any sin that he sins. At the testimony of two witnesses or at the testimony of three witnesses shall the matter be established.

¹⁶ If a false witness rises up against any man to testify against him to accuse him of doing wrong, ¹⁷ then both the men between whom the controversy is must stand before the Lord, before the priests and the judges, who are in office those days. ¹⁸ The judges will thoroughly investigate, and if the witness is a false witness and has testified falsely against his brother, ¹⁹ then you must do to him as he conspired to have done to his brother. In this way you must remove the evil from among you. ²⁰ Those who remain will hear and fear, and will never again commit any such evil among you. ²¹ You must not show pity. But life will be for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.

Rules of Warfare

20 When you go out to battle against your enemies, and see horses, and chariots, and a people that outnumber you, do not be afraid of them, for the Lord your God is with you, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. ² It will be, when you approach the battle, that the priest will approach and speak to the people, ³ and he shall say to them, “Hear, O Israel, you approach today to do battle against your enemies. Do not be fainthearted. Do not fear, and do not tremble or be terrified because of them. ⁴ For the Lord your God is He that goes with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you.”

⁵ The officers will speak to the people, saying, “What man is there who has built a new house and has not dedicated it? Let him go and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and another man dedicate it. ⁶ What man is there who has planted a vineyard, and has not yet eaten of it? Let him also go and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and another man eat of it. ⁷ What man is there who is engaged to a woman but has not married her? Let him go and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and another man take her.” ⁸ The officers are to speak further to the people, and they shall say, “What man is there that is fearful and fainthearted? Let him go and return to his house, lest his brother’s heart faint as well as his heart.” ⁹ It will be, when the officers have made an end of speaking to the people, that they must make captains of the armies to lead the people.

¹⁰ When you come near to a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace to it. ¹¹ It shall be, if it gives you a reply of peace and opens to you, then it must be that all the people that are found within shall become slaves to you and they shall serve you. ¹² If it will not make peace with you but makes war against you, then you are to besiege it. ¹³ And when the Lord your God has delivered it into your hands, you are to slay every male there with the edge of the sword. ¹⁴ But the women, and the little ones, and the livestock, and all that is in the city, all the spoil within, you are to take to yourself, and you will eat the spoil of your enemies, which the Lord your God has given you. ¹⁵ Thus you are to do to all the cities which are far away, which are not the cities of these nearby nations.

¹⁶ But of the cities of these people, which the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance, you must not leave alive anything that breathes. ¹⁷ But you shall completely destroy them: namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, just as the Lord your God has commanded you, ¹⁸ so that they do not teach you to participate in all their abominations, which they have done to their gods, causing you to sin against the Lord your God.

¹⁹ When you lay siege to a city for a long time, in making war against it in order to take it, you shall not destroy the trees there by chopping them down with an axe, for you may eat from them, and you shall not cut them down. For the tree of the field is not a man in which to lay siege. ²⁰ However, you may destroy and cut down only the trees which you know are not fruit trees, so that you may build siege engines against the city that makes war with you until it falls.

Atonement for Unsolved Murders

21 If someone is found slain in the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess, lying in the field, and it is not known who has slain him, ² then your elders and your judges are to come forth, and they must measure how far it is to the cities which are around him who was slain. ³ And it must be, that the city which is closest to the slain man, that is, the elders of that city shall take a heifer which has not been worked, that has never pulled in yoke, ⁴ and the elders of that city must bring down the heifer to a valley with flowing water, which is neither plowed nor sown, and shall break the heifer’s neck there in the valley. ⁵ Then the priests, the sons of Levi, must come near, for the Lord your God has chosen them to minister to Him, and to bless in the name of the Lord, and by their word every controversy and every assault will be settled. ⁶ And all the elders of that city, which is nearest to the slain man, shall wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley. ⁷ Then they must answer and say, “Our hands have not shed this blood, and our eyes have not seen it. ⁸ Be merciful, O Lord, to Your people Israel, whom You have redeemed, and lay not innocent blood in the midst of Your people Israel.” And the blood guilt will be forgiven them. ⁹ In this way you are to remove the guilt of innocent blood from among you when you do that which is right in the eyes of the Lord.

Marrying Female Captives

¹⁰ When you go forth to war against your enemies, and the Lord your God has delivered them into your hands, and you have taken them captive, ¹¹ and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and have a desire for her to have her as your wife, ¹² then you are to bring her home to your house, and she is to shave her head and trim her nails. ¹³ She must also discard the clothing of her captivity and shall remain in your house, and mourn her father and her mother for a full month. After that you may have relations with her, and be her husband, and she will be your wife. ¹⁴ It will be, if you are not pleased with her, then you must let her go wherever she pleases, but you may not sell her at all for money, nor are you to make merchandise of her, because you have humbled her.

The Right of the Firstborn

¹⁵ If a man has two wives, one beloved and another unloved, and both have borne him children, both the loved one and the unloved one, and if the firstborn son is hers that is unloved, ¹⁶ then it must be, when he gives his sons the inheritance which he has, that he may not make the firstborn son of the loved come before the son of the unloved, who was indeed the firstborn. ¹⁷ On the contrary, he must acknowledge the son of the unloved for the firstborn, by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the beginning of his strength. The right of the firstborn is his.

Dealing With a Rebellious Son

¹⁸ If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son, who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and who, when they have disciplined him, will not listen to them, ¹⁹ then his father and his mother are to lay hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city, to the gate of his city. ²⁰ They shall say to the elders of his city, “This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not listen to us. He is a glutton and a drunkard.” ²¹ Then all the men of his city must stone him with stones, until he dies. In this way you are to remove the evil from among you, and all Israel shall hear and fear.

Various Laws

²² If a man has committed a sin worthy of death and is executed, and you hang him on a tree, ²³ then his body must not remain all night on the tree, but you must bury him that day (for he that is hanged is accursed of God) so that your land may not be defiled, which the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance.

22 You must not see your brother’s ox or his sheep go astray and hide yourself from them. You must certainly bring them back to your brother. ² If your brother is not near you or if you do not know him, then you are to bring it to your own house, and it will be with you until your brother seeks after it. Then you must return it to him. ³ In the same way, you must do so with his donkey, with his clothing, and with anything lost by your brother which he has lost and you have found. You must not hide yourself from him.

⁴ You are not to see your brother’s donkey or his ox fall down by the way and hide yourself from them. You certainly must help him to lift them up.

⁵ A woman must not wear man’s clothing, nor is a man to put on a woman’s clothing. For all that do so are abominations to the Lord your God.

⁶ If you happen to notice a bird’s nest along the way, in any tree or on the ground, whether they be young ones or eggs, and the mother is sitting on the young or on the eggs, you are not to take the mother from the young. ⁷ You must certainly let the mother go, but you may take the young for yourself, so that it may be well with you, and that you may prolong your days.

⁸ When you build a new house, you must make a guard rail for your roof so that you bring no blood guilt on your house, should anyone fall from there.

⁹ You must not sow your vineyard with two kinds of seeds, or the fruit of your seed which you have sown and the fruit of your vineyard will be defiled.

¹⁰ You must not plow with an ox and a donkey together.

¹¹ You must not wear clothing made of a material of wool and linen together.

¹² You must make tassels on the four quarters of your clothing with which you cover yourself.

Laws About Marriage

¹³ If any man takes a wife and has sexual relations with her and then rejects her, ¹⁴ and accuses her of impropriety and publicly defames her, saying, “I married this woman, but when I had sexual relations with her, I found her not to be a virgin,” ¹⁵ then the father and mother of the girl must produce evidence of the girl’s virginity to the elders of the city at the gate. ¹⁶ The girl’s father must say to the elders, “I gave my daughter to this man to wife, and he has rejected her. ¹⁷ What is more, he has accused her of impropriety, saying, ‘I did not find your daughter to be a virgin.’ However, this is the evidence of my daughter’s virginity.” And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. ¹⁸ The elders of that city must take that man and punish him, ¹⁹ and they must fine him a hundred shekels^[e] of silver and give them to the father of the girl, because he has publicly humiliated a virgin of Israel. Then she is to remain his wife. He may not divorce her all his days.

²⁰ But if the accusation is true, and the evidence of virginity does not exist for the girl, ²¹ then they shall bring the girl out to the door of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones until she dies, because she has brought disgrace into Israel, to act like a whore in her father’s house. In this way you may purge the evil from among you.

²² If a man is discovered lying with a married woman, then both of them must die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman. In this way you may purge the evil from Israel.

²³ If a girl who is a virgin is engaged to a man, and another man finds her in the city and has sexual relations with her, ²⁴ then you must bring them both out to the gate of that city and you must stone them with stones until they die, the girl because she did not cry out even though in the city, and the man because he has violated his neighbor’s wife. In this way you may purge the evil from among you.

²⁵ But if a man finds an engaged girl in the field, and the man forces her and rapes her, then only the man that raped her shall die. ²⁶ However, you are to do nothing to the girl. There is no sin worthy of death in the girl, for just as when a man rises against his neighbor and murders him, so is this matter. ²⁷ For he found her in the field, the engaged girl cried out, but there was no one to save her.

²⁸ If a man finds a girl who is a virgin who is not engaged and seizes her and lies with her and they are discovered, ²⁹ then the man who lay with her must give fifty shekels^[f] of silver to the girl’s father, and she shall be his wife because he has violated her. He may not divorce her all his days.

³⁰ A man must not marry his father’s wife and in this way dishonor his father.

Exclusion From the Assembly

23 No one who is emasculated or has his male organ cut off may enter the assembly of the Lord.

² No one of illegitimate birth may enter the assembly of the Lord. Even to his tenth generation no one related to him may enter the assembly of the Lord.

³ No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord. Even to their tenth generation they may not enter the assembly of the Lord forever, ⁴ because they refused you bread and water on the way, when you came from out of Egypt and because they hired Balaam, the son of Beor of Pethor of Mesopotamia, against you to curse you. ⁵ Nevertheless, the Lord your God would not listen to Balaam. Instead the Lord your God turned the curse into a blessing on you because the Lord your God loves you. ⁶ You are not ever to seek their peace nor their prosperity all your days.

⁷ You are not to abhor an Edomite, for he is your brother. You shall not abhor an Egyptian, because you were a foreigner in his land. ⁸ The children who are born of them may enter the assembly of the Lord in their third generation.

Uncleanness in the Camp

⁹ When the army goes out against your enemies, then keep yourself from every wicked thing. ¹⁰ If there be among you any man who is not clean because of a nocturnal emission, then he must leave the camp. He may not re-enter the camp. ¹¹ And it must be that when evening comes, he must wash himself with water, and at sunset he may re-enter the camp.