Old/New Testament
False Prophets and Fortune Tellers
13 If a prophet or an interpreter of dreams arises among you, and he predicts a sign or wonder for you,[a] 2 and the sign or wonder that he promised you comes true, and he says, “Let’s go after other gods that you do not know, and let’s serve them,” 3 do not listen to the words of that prophet or that interpreter of dreams, because the Lord your God is testing you to see whether you really love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.
4 Follow the Lord your God, fear him, keep his commandments, listen to his voice, serve him, and cling to him.
5 That prophet or that interpreter of dreams is to be put to death because he advised you to turn against the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery, in order to draw you away from the path on which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. Purge the evil from among you.
The Penalty for Idolatry
6 If your full brother or your mother’s son, your son or your daughter, the wife you embrace, or your closest friend tempts you by saying secretly, “Let’s go and serve other gods,”—gods that neither you nor your fathers have known, 7 from among the gods of the peoples around you, either near or far from you, anywhere from one end of the land to the other— 8 do not be influenced by him and do not listen to him. Your eye is not to look on him with compassion. Do not spare him and do not pardon him, 9 but kill him. Your hand is to be the first one on him when putting him to death, and afterward the hands of all the other people. 10 Stone him to death, because he tried to pull you away from the Lord your God, who led you out of the land of Egypt, where you were slaves. 11 Then all of Israel will hear and fear, and such an evil thing as this will not be done among you again.
12 If you hear in one of your cities, which the Lord your God is giving you so that you can live in them, 13 men of worthless character have gone out from among you and have pulled the inhabitants of their city away from the Lord, saying, “Let’s go and serve other gods,” gods whom you have not known, 14 then investigate, search out the truth, and inquire diligently. If it becomes established truth that this abomination has been done among you, 15 you are to strike down the inhabitants of that city with the blade of the sword. Devote it and everything in it to complete destruction by the blade of the sword, including its cattle. 16 Gather all its plunder at the center of its town square. Then burn the city and all its plunder as a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. It is to be a permanent mound of ruins, never to be rebuilt.
17 Let nothing that has been devoted to destruction stick to your hands, so that the Lord will turn away from his anger and show you compassion. In his compassion he will increase your population, as he swore to your fathers, 18 if you obey the voice of the Lord your God by keeping all of his commandments that I am commanding you today, by doing what is right in the eyes of the Lord your God.
14 You are the children of the Lord your God.
Do not cut yourselves or make a bald spot on your forehead for a dead person, 2 because you are set apart as holy people for the Lord your God, and the Lord your God has chosen you out of all the people that are on the face of the earth, to be his people that are his treasured possession.
Clean and Unclean Foods
3 Do not eat any detestable thing.
4 These are the animals that you may eat: cattle, sheep, and goats; 5 deer, gazelle, roebuck, wild goat, ibex, antelope, and mountain sheep. 6 Every animal that has divided hoofs with splits in the middle and that rechews its food[b] among the animals—you may eat them.
7 But these you are not to eat from among those that either rechew their food or have divided hoofs with splits in the middle: the camel, the hare, and the rock badger, because even though they rechew their food, their hoofs are not divided. They are unclean for you. 8 The pig, because it has divided hoofs but does not rechew its food, is unclean for you. You are not to eat their flesh and you are not to touch their carcasses.
9 These you may eat of all the creatures that live in the water: Any that have fins and scales you may eat. 10 Any that do not have fins and scales you are not to eat. They are unclean for you.
11 Any clean bird you may eat. 12 But you are not to eat the following: the eagle, the black vulture, and the bearded vulture, 13 the red kite, the black kite, and falcons of every kind, 14 ravens and crows of every kind, 15 the eagle owl, the short-eared owl, the long-eared owl, all species of hawks, 16 the tawny owl, the fisher owl, the screech owl, 17 the white owl, and the scops owl, the osprey, 18 the stork and herons of every kind, the hoopoe, and the bat.[c] 19 Any swarming insect that flies is unclean for you. None of them are to be eaten. 20 Any clean winged creature you may eat.
21 Do not eat the carcass of any animal that is found dead. You may give it to the alien who resides in your town, and he may eat it or sell it to a foreigner, but you are a people who are set apart as holy for the Lord your God.
Do not boil a baby goat in its mother’s milk.
Tithes
22 Give a tenth of all the yield from your seed that comes out of the field every year.
23 Eat the tithe in the presence of the Lord your God in the place that he will choose to establish his name—the tenth of your grain, your new wine, and your fresh oil, as well as the firstborn of your herd and flock, so that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always.
24 When the Lord your God blesses you, if the distance of your journey is so long that you cannot carry the tithe with you, because the place that the Lord your God will choose to establish his name is far away from you, 25 then you may exchange the tithe for silver and take the silver in your hand and travel to the place that the Lord your God will choose for himself. 26 There exchange the silver for anything that you desire—animals from the herd or the flock, or wine or beer, or anything that you may want. Then eat it there before the Lord your God and rejoice, both you and your household.
27 But you must not neglect the Levites who reside within the gates of your cities, because they do not have an allotted inheritance among you. 28 At the end of every third year, bring out the entire tithe of your produce from that year and store it in your towns. 29 Then the Levites may come, because they do not have an allotted inheritance among you, and also the aliens and the fatherless and the widows within your towns, and they may eat and be satisfied, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work that your hands perform.
The Sabbatical Year
15 At the end of seven years grant a release.[d]
2 This is how the release is to be done: Every creditor is to release[e] what he has loaned to his neighbor. He must not exact it from his neighbor or from his brother Israelite, because the Lord’s release has been proclaimed. 3 You may exact it from a foreigner, but your hand is to release whatever your brother Israelite owes you.[f]
4 However, there should be no poor people among you, because the Lord will greatly bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance for you to possess, 5 if you obey the voice of the Lord your God by carefully carrying out all of this command that I am giving you today. 6 For the Lord your God will bless you, just as he has promised you, and you will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow; you will rule over many nations, but they will not rule over you.
7 However, if there is a poor person among you, any one of your fellow Israelites within the gates of your towns in the land that the Lord your God is giving you, do not harden your heart and shut your hand against your poor brother. 8 Rather, open up your hand to him and freely lend him enough of whatever he needs for himself. 9 Be careful that you do not harbor this wicked thought: Year seven, the year of release, is near! So as a result you have a harsh attitude toward your poor brother and do not give him anything. Then he will cry out to the Lord against you, and you will be guilty of sin. 10 Give freely to him, and do not feel resentful about giving to him, because on account of your giving, the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and whatever you put your hand to. 11 Since there will never cease to be poor people in the land, I command you, open up your hand to your brother in your land, to the afflicted and the poor among you.
The Release of Servants
12 If your brother, that is, a Hebrew man or woman, sells himself to you, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year you are to set him free. 13 When you set him free, do not send him out empty-handed. 14 Provide for him generously from your flock and from your threshing floor and from your winepress. Give to him from the blessings that the Lord your God has given to you. 15 You should remember that you yourself were a slave in the land of Egypt, but the Lord your God redeemed you. Therefore I am commanding this procedure to you today.
16 But he might say to you, “I don’t want to leave you,” because he loves you and your household, and he is well off with you. 17 In that case you are to take an awl and bore through his ear into the door, and he will be a slave to you permanently. Do the same in the case of your female slave. 18 When you do set a servant free, it should not seem like a hardship to you, because for six years he has earned for you double the income that a hired worker would. The Lord your God will bless you in everything that you do.
The Firstborn
19 Set apart for the Lord your God every firstborn male from your herd and your flock. Do not work the firstborn of your oxen, and do not shear the firstborn of your flock. 20 You and your household are to eat the firstborn in the presence of the Lord each year, in the place that the Lord will choose. 21 But if it has a defect (if it is lame or blind, or if it has any other serious defect), you must not sacrifice it to the Lord your God. 22 You may eat it within the gates of your towns. The unclean and the clean person alike may eat it, as you would a gazelle or a deer. 23 But you must not eat its blood. You are to pour it out on the ground like water.
Love God and Your Neighbor
28 One of the experts in the law approached after he heard their discussion. When he saw that Jesus had answered them well, he asked Jesus, “Which commandment is the greatest of all?”
29 Jesus answered, “The most important is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord, our God, the Lord is one. 30 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’[a] 31 The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’[b] There is no other commandment greater than these.”
32 The expert in the law said to him, “Well said, teacher. You have spoken correctly on the basis of the truth that he is one, and there is no other besides him.[c] 33 To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding, and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself, is more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”[d]
34 When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” After that, no one dared to ask him any more questions.
David’s Son and David’s Lord
35 While Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, he responded by saying, “How is it that the experts in the law say that the Christ is the Son of David? 36 David himself said by the Holy Spirit:
The Lord said to my Lord, ‘Sit at my right hand,
until I make your enemies a footstool under your feet.’[e]
37 “David himself calls him Lord, so how can he be his son?” The large crowd listened to him with delight.
Do Not Do What They Do
38 He also said to them in his teaching, “Beware of the experts in the law who like to walk around in long robes and receive greetings in the marketplaces. 39 They love the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. 40 They devour widows’ houses and offer long prayers to look good. These men will receive greater condemnation.”
The Poor Widow’s Offering
41 Jesus sat down opposite the offering box and was watching how the crowd put money into it. Many rich people put in large amounts. 42 One poor widow came and put in two small bronze coins,[f] worth less than a penny.[g] 43 He called his disciples together and said to them, “Amen I tell you: This poor widow put more into the offering box than all the others. 44 For they all gave out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all that she had to live on.”
The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved.