Old/New Testament

The Passover Festival^[a]

16 The month Abib is a special month for you.^[b] In this month, you must eat a meal to remember the Passover. Remember what the Lord your God did for you. In that month, he brought you out of Egypt during the night. ² You must go to the special place that the Lord will choose for his people to worship him. There you must kill one of your animals as a sacrifice to remember the Passover. You may kill one of your cows or sheep. ³ At this feast, eat bread that you make without any yeast. For seven days, you must eat bread that you make without yeast. You ate that kind of bread when you had much trouble in Egypt. You had to leave Egypt in a hurry that night. You must eat that bread each year. Then you will always remember the day when you left Egypt. ⁴ During those seven days, no one may keep any yeast in their house. There must not be any yeast in the whole land. On the first day, you will kill your animal to eat in the evening. You must eat all the meat that same night, so that there is no meat left in the morning.

⁵ You must not kill the animal for the Passover sacrifice in any of the towns that the Lord your God gives to you. ⁶ You must go to the place that he will choose as his special home. You must kill the animal there, at sunset. That was the time of day when you came out of Egypt. ⁷ Cook the meat and eat it in the place that the Lord your God will choose. The next morning, you may return to your tents. ⁸ For the next six days, you must eat bread that you make without yeast. On the seventh day, you must all come together to worship the Lord your God. You must not do any work on that day.

The Festival of Weeks^[c]

⁹ Count seven weeks from the first day that you bring in crops of grain from your fields. ¹⁰ Then eat the Feast of Weeks to worship the Lord your God. Bring the gifts that you want to offer to him. Bring gifts that show how much he has blessed you. ¹¹ You and your family will be happy to worship the Lord your God, at the special place that he chooses. Enjoy time together with your children, your servants and the Levites who live in your town. Also join with the foreign people who live among you, with widows, and children who have no family. Worship God happily together. ¹² Remember that you were once slaves in Egypt. So be careful to obey these commands.

The Festival of Huts^[d]

¹³ When you have prepared the grain and the grapes from your fields, eat the Feast of Huts for seven days. ¹⁴ Enjoy your feast with your children, your servants and the Levites. Join with the foreign people who live among you, and also with the widows and the children who have no family. ¹⁵ Eat this feast to worship the Lord your God at the special place that he chooses. Do it for seven days. He will bless you in everything that you do, so that you grow plenty of food. So you should all enjoy this feast!

¹⁶ Three times in every year, all your men must go to the place that the Lord your God will choose. They must go there for the Passover festival, the festival of Weeks and the festival of Huts. Each man must bring with him gifts to offer to the Lord. ¹⁷ Give to the Lord as much as you are able to. Your gifts may be large or small, as much as the Lord has blessed you.

Judges

¹⁸ Each tribe must choose judges and officers in every town that the Lord gives you. They must judge the people in a way that is fair. ¹⁹ Judges must do what is right for every person, rich or poor. They must not accept any bribes. A bribe may hide the truth even from a wise man. It can make honest people tell lies. ²⁰ Make sure that there is justice for everyone in the land that the Lord your God is giving to you. Then the land will belong to you and you will enjoy life in it.

Do not worship other gods

²¹ When you build an altar to offer sacrifices to the Lord your God, do not put any Asherah pole there. ²² Do not put up any stone pillar as an idol. The Lord your God hates everything like that.^[e]

Animals for sacrifice

17 When you offer an animal as a sacrifice to the Lord your God, it must be perfect. Do not bring any sheep or bull that has something wrong with it. The Lord hates any gift like that.

Justice

² The Lord your God will give you towns to live in. You may hear that a man or a woman who lives in one of your towns has done a bad thing. He has done a sin that is against the covenant of the Lord your God. ³ He may have started to worship false gods that I have commanded you not to worship. Perhaps he worships the sun, the moon or the stars. ⁴ If you hear news like that, you must check the report carefully. If it is true that a wicked thing like that has happened in Israel, ⁵ you must punish that person. Take the man or woman who has done that wicked thing to the gate of the town. Then you must throw stones at that person to kill them. ⁶ But two or three people must agree about what the person has done. You must never kill anyone because of the words of only one person. ⁷ The people who saw the wicked act must throw the first stones to kill the person. Then everyone else must also throw stones. In that way, you must remove evil acts from among you.

⁸ It may be difficult for the judges in your towns to decide what is true. This may happen when one person has attacked or killed another person. It may happen when people cannot agree about some land. It may be anything that people in your towns are arguing about. If you do not know who is right, you must take those people to the place that the Lord your God will choose. ⁹ You must go to the Levite priests and to the judge who has authority at that time. Ask them to decide what is right and true. ¹⁰ When they decide, you must do what they tell you to do. ¹¹ Accept their teaching. Agree with what they have decided is right. Obey their words completely. Do not try to do anything that is different. ¹² Someone might be too proud to obey the priest who has authority as the Lord's servant. He may not agree with what the judge says is right. You must punish any proud person like that with death. In that way you will remove evil things from Israel. ¹³ Then all the people will hear what has happened. They will be afraid. They will no longer be too proud to obey the judge.

Rules for a king

¹⁴ You are going into the land that the Lord your God is giving to you. You will take it for yourselves to be your home. Then you may say, ‘The other nations around us have kings. We must also have a king to rule us.’ ¹⁵ If that happens, you must only accept a king that the Lord your God chooses. Choose a king from among your own people. Do not choose anyone who is not an Israelite.

¹⁶ A king must not get a lot of horses for himself. He must not send his people back to Egypt to buy more horses. The Lord has said to you, ‘Never return to Egypt for any reason!’

¹⁷ A king must not marry many wives. They may turn his thoughts away from the Lord. He must not store a lot of silver and gold for himself.

¹⁸ When anyone starts to rule as king, he must copy this Law of God on a scroll. The scroll will be a copy of the one that belongs to the Levite priests. ¹⁹ He must keep this scroll with him all the time. He must continue to read it every day of his life. If he does that, he will learn to respect the Lord his God. He will learn to obey all the rules and commands of this Law. ²⁰ If he does that, he will not become proud. He will not think that he is better than other Israelites. He will continue to obey the Lord's commands. Then he and his descendants will rule Israel as kings for many years.

Priests and Levites^[f]

18 The priests and the whole tribe of Levi will have no land for themselves, as the other Israelite tribes do. Instead, they may eat the meat from the sacrifices that belong to the Lord. ² They will receive no land among the other Israelites. The Lord himself is the one who gives them everything that they need. He has promised to do that for them.

³ When you bring a bull or a sheep as a sacrifice to the Lord, give the priests their part. You must give them the animal's shoulder, the meat from its face, and its stomach. ⁴ You must also give them the first part of your grain, your wine and your olive oil. Give them the first wool that you cut from your sheep. ⁵ Do this because the Lord your God has chosen the Levites to serve him from among all your tribes. He wants them and their descendants to be ready to serve him at all times, for ever.

⁶ Any Levite may choose to go to the place that the Lord will choose. He can leave the town where he lives, wherever it is in Israel. ⁷ He may go to serve the Lord his God. He may join the other Levites who are ready to serve the Lord at his special place. ⁸ A Levite may have sold some of his family's valuable things. He may keep that money and he may receive the same amount of food as the other Levites.

Evil acts

⁹ When you go into the land that the Lord your God is giving you, be careful! Do not learn to do the evil things that the nations who live there are doing. ¹⁰ Nobody among you must ever burn your child in a fire, as an offering. Nobody must use magic or other things to learn about future times. There must not be any magicians or diviners. ¹¹ Never use magic to curse anyone. Never try to speak to the spirits of dead people or other spirits. ¹² The Lord hates anyone who does these things. It is because of those evil things that the Lord will chase the other nations out of the land as you move in. ¹³ You must live in a completely right way that pleases the Lord your God. ¹⁴ The people of the nations that you will chase away get help from magicians and diviners. But the Lord your God has commanded you not to do those things.

Moses speaks about a future prophet

¹⁵ One day, the Lord your God will send to you a prophet like me. He will come from among your own people. You must listen to him. ¹⁶ Remember what happened when you all met together at Sinai mountain. You said to the Lord your God, ‘Please do not let us hear your voice again. Do not let us see this great fire again. If we do, we will die!’

¹⁷ Then the Lord said to me, ‘The people have said the right thing. ¹⁸ I will send them a prophet who will be like you. He will be an Israelite. I will tell him what to say. Then he will tell the people everything that I command him to say. ¹⁹ He will speak on my behalf, so I myself will punish anyone who does not listen to his message.

²⁰ A false prophet may say that he speaks with my authority when that is not true. Or he may say that he has a message from another god. You must punish a false prophet with death.’

²¹ You may say to yourselves, ‘How can we know when a message has not come from the Lord?’ ²² A prophet may say that he speaks with my authority, and he may say what will happen. But if it does not happen, you will know that his message has not come from me. He has not spoken my message. That prophet has spoken his own ideas. So do not be afraid of him!

Jesus talks about future events

13 Then Jesus left the temple. While he was leaving, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Teacher, look at these great buildings! The stones in the walls of God's House are really great!’

² Jesus said to him, ‘Yes, look at all these large buildings! But I tell you, enemies will completely destroy them. Not even one stone will remain on top of another stone.’

³ After that, Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives. He could look across the valley at the temple. Peter, James, John and Andrew went together to talk with him. The crowd was not there. ⁴ They said to Jesus, ‘Please tell us when all these things will happen. What will show us that they will soon happen?’

⁵ Jesus began to say to them, ‘Be careful! Some people will tell you things that are not true. Do not believe those people. ⁶ Many people will say that they have come on my behalf. They will say, “I am the Messiah!” and they will deceive many people. ⁷ You will hear about wars. And there will be reports about wars in other places. Do not be afraid. Those things must happen, but that is not yet the end of everything. ⁸ People in one country will attack the people in another country. Kings and their armies will fight against other kings and their armies. The ground will shake in many different places. In some places, people will be hungry, with no food. Those things are like the first pains that a mother has before her baby is born.

⁹ So be careful! People will be against you. They will take you to stand in front of their leaders. They will punish you with whips in their meeting places. They will take you to stand in front of kings and rulers. This will happen because you are my disciples. You will tell them the good news about me. ¹⁰ Yes, you must first tell the good news about me to people in every country. ¹¹ When people take you to their leaders to show that you have done bad things, do not be afraid. Do not worry about what you should say. You should say the words that God gives you at that time. You will not be speaking your own words. Those words will come from the Holy Spirit.

¹² At that time, a man will let people kill his own brother. A father will let people kill his own child. Children will be against their parents. They will even ask people to kill their parents. ¹³ All people will hate you because you are my disciples. But God will save the person who remains strong until the end.

¹⁴ There will be a time when you will see in the temple a disgusting thing that causes trouble. You will see it in a place where it should not be. (When you read this, you must understand what it means.) At that time, people in Judea must run away to the hills to hide.^{[a] 15} A person who is on the roof of his house must not go down into the house.^[b] He must not stop to get anything from his home. ¹⁶ A person who is outside in his field must not go back to his home. He must not return even to fetch his coat.

¹⁷ That will be a bad time for women who are soon to have a baby. It will also be a bad time for those women who have little babies. ¹⁸ You must pray to God that this time of trouble will not happen in winter. ¹⁹ Very bad troubles will happen to people at that time and cause them a lot of pain. Nothing as bad has ever happened before, since God created the world. Nothing as bad will ever happen again. ²⁰ The Lord God will cause those days of very bad trouble to come to an end. If he did not do that, there would be nobody still alive. But God will cause those days to be not too many. He will do that to help the people that he has chosen.