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Deuteronomy 16; Deuteronomy 17; Deuteronomy 18; Deuteronomy 19; Deuteronomy 20; Deuteronomy 21; Deuteronomy 22; Deuteronomy 23; Deuteronomy 24; Deuteronomy 25; Deuteronomy 26; Deuteronomy 27; Deuteronomy 28; Deuteronomy 29

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Deuteronomy 16

1 "Observe the month of Abib and keep the Passover to the LORD your God, for in the month of Abib the LORD your God brought you out of Egypt by night.
2 And you shall offer the Passover sacrifice to the LORD your God, from the flock or the herd, at the place that the LORD will choose, to make his name dwell there.
3 You shall eat no leavened bread with it. Seven days you shall eat it with unleavened bread, the bread of affliction--for you came out of the land of Egypt in haste--that all the days of your life you may remember the day when you came out of the land of Egypt.
4 No leaven shall be seen with you in all your territory for seven days, nor shall any of the flesh that you sacrifice on the evening of the first day remain all night until morning.
5 You may not offer the Passover sacrifice within any of your towns that the LORD your God is giving you,
6 but at the place that the LORD your God will choose, to make his name dwell in it, there you shall offer the Passover sacrifice, in the evening at sunset, at the time you came out of Egypt.
7 And you shall cook it and eat it at the place that the LORD your God will choose. And in the morning you shall turn and go to your tents.
8 For six days you shall eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day there shall be a solemn assembly to the LORD your God. You shall do no work on it.
9 "You shall count seven weeks. Begin to count the seven weeks from the time the sickle is first put to the standing grain.
10 Then you shall keep the Feast of Weeks to the LORD your God with the tribute of a freewill offering from your hand, which you shall give as the LORD your God blesses you.
11 And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite who is within your towns, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are among you, at the place that the LORD your God will choose, to make his name dwell there.
12 You shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt; and you shall be careful to observe these statutes.
13 "You shall keep the Feast of Booths seven days, when you have gathered in the produce from your threshing floor and your winepress.
14 You shall rejoice in your feast, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your towns.
15 For seven days you shall keep the feast to the LORD your God at the place that the LORD will choose, because the LORD your God will bless you in all your produce and in all the work of your hands, so that you will be altogether joyful.
16 "Three times a year all your males shall appear before the LORD your God at the place that he will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Booths. They shall not appear before the LORD empty-handed.
17 Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the LORD your God that he has given you.
18 "You shall appoint judges and officers in all your towns that the LORD your God is giving you, according to your tribes, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment.
19 You shall not pervert justice. You shall not show partiality, and you shall not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of the righteous.
20 Justice, and only justice, you shall follow, that you may live and inherit the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
21 "You shall not plant any tree as an Asherah beside the altar of the LORD your God that you shall make.
22 And you shall not set up a pillar, which the LORD your God hates.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 17

1 "You shall not sacrifice to the LORD your God an ox or a sheep in which is a blemish, any defect whatever, for that is an abomination to the LORD your God.
2 "If there is found among you, within any of your towns that the LORD your God is giving you, a man or woman who does what is evil in the sight of the LORD your God, in transgressing his covenant,
3 and has gone and served other gods and worshiped them, or the sun or the moon or any of the host of heaven, which I have forbidden,
4 and it is told you and you hear of it, then you shall inquire diligently, and if it is true and certain that such an abomination has been done in Israel,
5 then you shall bring out to your gates that man or woman who has done this evil thing, and you shall stone that man or woman to death with stones.
6 On the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses the one who is to die shall be put to death; a person shall not be put to death on the evidence of one witness.
7 The hand of the witnesses shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.
8 "If any case arises requiring decision between one kind of homicide and another, one kind of legal right and another, or one kind of assault and another, any case within your towns that is too difficult for you, then you shall arise and go up to the place that the LORD your God will choose.
9 And you shall come to the Levitical priests and to the judge who is in office in those days, and you shall consult them, and they shall declare to you the decision.
10 Then you shall do according to what they declare to you from that place that the LORD will choose. And you shall be careful to do according to all that they direct you.
11 According to the instructions that they give you, and according to the decision which they pronounce to you, you shall do. You shall not turn aside from the verdict that they declare to you, either to the right hand or to the left.
12 The man who acts presumptuously by not obeying the priest who stands to minister there before the LORD your God, or the judge, that man shall die. So you shall purge the evil from Israel.
13 And all the people shall hear and fear and not act presumptuously again.
14 "When you come to the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you possess it and dwell in it and then say, 'I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,'
15 you may indeed set a king over you whom the LORD your God will choose. One from among your brothers you shall set as king over you. You may not put a foreigner over you, who is not your brother.
16 Only he must not acquire many horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt in order to acquire many horses, since the LORD has said to you, 'You shall never return that way again.'
17 And he shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away, nor shall he acquire for himself excessive silver and gold.
18 "And when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests.
19 And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes, and doing them,
20 that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 18

1 "The Levitical priests, all the tribe of Levi, shall have no portion or inheritance with Israel. They shall eat the LORD's food offerings as their inheritance.
2 They shall have no inheritance among their brothers; the LORD is their inheritance, as he promised them.
3 And this shall be the priests' due from the people, from those offering a sacrifice, whether an ox or a sheep: they shall give to the priest the shoulder and the two cheeks and the stomach.
4 The firstfruits of your grain, of your wine and of your oil, and the first fleece of your sheep, you shall give him.
5 For the LORD your God has chosen him out of all your tribes to stand and minister in the name of the LORD, him and his sons for all time.
6 "And if a Levite comes from any of your towns out of all Israel, where he lives--and he may come when he desires--to the place that the LORD will choose,
7 and ministers in the name of the LORD his God, like all his fellow Levites who stand to minister there before the LORD,
8 then he may have equal portions to eat, besides what he receives from the sale of his patrimony.
9 "When you come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations.
10 There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer
11 or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead,
12 for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD. And because of these abominations the LORD your God is driving them out before you.
13 You shall be blameless before the LORD your God,
14 for these nations, which you are about to dispossess, listen to fortune-tellers and to diviners. But as for you, the LORD your God has not allowed you to do this.
15 "The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers--it is to him you shall listen--
16 just as you desired of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, 'Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.'
17 And the LORD said to me, 'They are right in what they have spoken.
18 I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.
19 And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him.
20 But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.'
21 And if you say in your heart, 'How may we know the word that the LORD has not spoken?'--
22 when a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the LORD has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 19

1 "When the LORD your God cuts 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 land that the LORD your God is giving you to possess.
3 You shall measure the distances and divide into three parts the area of the land that the LORD your God gives you as a possession, so that any manslayer can flee to them.
4 "This is the provision for the manslayer, who by fleeing there may save his life. If anyone kills his neighbor unintentionally without having hated him in the past--
5 as when someone goes into the forest with his neighbor to cut wood, and his hand swings the axe to cut down a tree, and the head slips from the handle and strikes his neighbor so that he dies--he may flee to one of these cities and live,
6 lest the avenger of blood in hot anger pursue the manslayer and overtake him, because the way is long, and strike him fatally, though the man did not deserve to die, since he had not hated his neighbor in the past.
7 Therefore I command you, You shall set apart three cities.
8 And if the LORD your God enlarges your territory, as he has sworn to your fathers, and gives you all the land that he promised to give to your fathers--
9 provided you are careful to keep all this commandment, which I command you today, by loving the LORD your God and by walking ever in his ways--then you shall add three other cities to these three,
10 lest innocent blood be shed in your land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance, and so the guilt of bloodshed be upon you.
11 "But if anyone hates his neighbor and lies in wait for him and attacks him and strikes him fatally so that he dies, and he flees into one of these cities,
12 then the elders of his city shall send and take him from there, and hand him over to the avenger of blood, so that he may die.
13 Your eye shall not pity him, but you shall purge the guilt of innocent blood from Israel, so that it may be well with you.
14 "You shall not move your neighbor's landmark, which the men of old have set, in the inheritance that you will hold in the land that the LORD your God is giving you to possess.
15 "A single witness shall not suffice against a person for any crime or for any wrong in connection with any offense that he has committed. Only on the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses shall a charge be established.
16 If a malicious witness arises to accuse a person of wrongdoing,
17 then both parties to the dispute shall appear before the LORD, before the priests and the judges who are in office in those days.
18 The judges shall inquire diligently, and if the witness is a false witness and has accused his brother falsely,
19 then you shall do to him as he had meant to do to his brother. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.
20 And the rest shall hear and fear, and shall never again commit any such evil among you.
21 Your eye shall not pity. It shall be life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 20

1 "When you go out to war against your enemies, and see horses and chariots and an army larger than your own, you shall not be afraid of them, for the LORD your God is with you, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.
2 And when you draw near to the battle, the priest shall come forward and speak to the people
3 and shall say to them, 'Hear, O Israel, today you are drawing near for battle against your enemies: let not your heart faint. Do not fear or panic or be in dread of them,
4 for the LORD your God is he who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies, to give you the victory.'
5 Then the officers shall speak to the people, saying, 'Is there any man who has built a new house and has not dedicated it? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man dedicate it.
6 And is there any man who has planted a vineyard and has not enjoyed its fruit? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man enjoy its fruit.
7 And is there any man who has betrothed a wife and has not taken her? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man take her.'
8 And the officers shall speak further to the people, and say, 'Is there any man who is fearful and fainthearted? Let him go back to his house, lest he make the heart of his fellows melt like his own.'
9 And when the officers have finished speaking to the people, then commanders shall be appointed at the head of the people.
10 "When you draw near to a city to fight against it, offer terms of peace to it.
11 And if it responds to you peaceably and it opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall do forced labor for you and shall serve you.
12 But if it makes no peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it.
13 And when the LORD your God gives it into your hand, you shall put all its males to the sword,
14 but the women and the little ones, the livestock, and everything else in the city, all its spoil, you shall take as plunder for yourselves. And you shall enjoy the spoil of your enemies, which the LORD your God has given you.
15 Thus you shall do to all the cities that are very far from you, which are not cities of the nations here.
16 But in the cities of these peoples that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes,
17 but you shall devote them to complete destruction, the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the LORD your God has commanded,
18 that they may not teach you to do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods, and so you sin against the LORD your God.
19 "When you besiege a city for a long time, making war against it in order to take it, you shall not destroy its trees by wielding an axe against them. You may eat from them, but you shall not cut them down. Are the trees in the field human, that they should be besieged by you?
20 Only the trees that you know are not trees for food you may destroy and cut down, that you may build siegeworks against the city that makes war with you, until it falls.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 21

1 "If in the land that the LORD your God is giving you to possess someone is found slain, lying in the open country, and it is not known who killed him,
2 then your elders and your judges shall come out, and they shall measure the distance to the surrounding cities.
3 And the elders of the city that is nearest to the slain man shall take a heifer that has never been worked and that has not pulled in a yoke.
4 And the elders of that city shall bring the heifer down to a valley with running 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, shall come forward, 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 dispute and every assault shall be settled.
6 And all the elders of that city nearest to the slain man shall wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley,
7 and they shall testify, 'Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it shed.
8 Accept atonement, O LORD, for your people Israel, whom you have redeemed, and do not set the guilt of innocent blood in the midst of your people Israel, so that their blood guilt be atoned for.'
9 So you shall purge the guilt of innocent blood from your midst, when you do what is right in the sight of the LORD.
10 "When you go out to war against your enemies, and the LORD your God gives them into your hand and you take them captive,
11 and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and you desire to take her to be your wife,
12 and you bring her home to your house, she shall shave her head and pare her nails.
13 And she shall take off the clothes in which she was captured and shall remain in your house and lament her father and her mother a full month. After that you may go in to her and be her husband, and she shall be your wife.
14 But if you no longer delight in her, you shall let her go where she wants. But you shall not sell her for money, nor shall you treat her as a slave, since you have humiliated her.
15 "If a man has two wives, the one loved and the other unloved, and both the loved and the unloved have borne him children, and if the firstborn son belongs to the unloved,
16 then on the day when he assigns his possessions as an inheritance to his sons, he may not treat the son of the loved as the firstborn in preference to the son of the unloved, who is the firstborn,
17 but he shall acknowledge the firstborn, the son of the unloved, by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the firstfruits of his strength. The right of the firstborn is his.
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, though they discipline him, will not listen to them,
19 then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives,
20 and they shall say to the elders of his city, 'This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.'
21 Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear.
22 "And if a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree,
23 his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile your land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 22

1 "You shall not see your brother's ox or his sheep going astray and ignore them. You shall take them back to your brother.
2 And if he does not live near you and you do not know who he is, you shall bring it home to your house, and it shall stay with you until your brother seeks it. Then you shall restore it to him.
3 And you shall do the same with his donkey or with his garment, or with any lost thing of your brother's, which he loses and you find; you may not ignore it.
4 You shall not see your brother's donkey or his ox fallen down by the way and ignore them. You shall help him to lift them up again.
5 "A woman shall not wear a man's garment, nor shall a man put on a woman's cloak, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD your God.
6 "If you come across a bird's nest in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs and the mother sitting on the young or on the eggs, you shall not take the mother with the young.
7 You shall let the mother go, but the young you may take for yourself, that it may go well with you, and that you may live long.
8 "When you build a new house, you shall make a parapet for your roof, that you may not bring the guilt of blood upon your house, if anyone should fall from it.
9 "You shall not sow your vineyard with two kinds of seed, lest the whole yield be forfeited, the crop that you have sown and the yield of the vineyard.
10 You shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together.
11 You shall not wear cloth of wool and linen mixed together.
12 "You shall make yourself tassels on the four corners of the garment with which you cover yourself.
13 "If any man takes a wife and goes in to her and then hates her
14 and accuses her of misconduct and brings a bad name upon her, saying, 'I took this woman, and when I came near her, I did not find in her evidence of virginity,'
15 then the father of the young woman and her mother shall take and bring out the evidence of her virginity to the elders of the city in the gate.
16 And the father of the young woman shall say to the elders, 'I gave my daughter to this man to marry, and he hates her;
17 and behold, he has accused her of misconduct, saying, "I did not find in your daughter evidence of virginity." And yet this is the evidence of my daughter's virginity.' And they shall spread the cloak before the elders of the city.
18 Then the elders of that city shall take the man and whip him,
19 and they shall fine him a hundred shekels of silver and give them to the father of the young woman, because he has brought a bad name upon a virgin of Israel. And she shall be his wife. He may not divorce her all his days.
20 But if the thing is true, that evidence of virginity was not found in the young woman,
21 then they shall bring out the young woman to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones, because she has done an outrageous thing in Israel by whoring in her father's house. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.
22 "If a man is found lying with the wife of another man, both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman. So you shall purge the evil from Israel.
23 "If there is a betrothed virgin, and a man meets her in the city and lies with her,
24 then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them to death with stones, the young woman because she did not cry for help though she was in the city, and the man because he violated his neighbor's wife. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.
25 "But if in the open country a man meets a young woman who is betrothed, and the man seizes her and lies with her, then only the man who lay with her shall die.
26 But you shall do nothing to the young woman; she has committed no offense punishable by death. For this case is like that of a man attacking and murdering his neighbor,
27 because he met her in the open country, and though the betrothed young woman cried for help there was no one to rescue her.
28 "If a man meets a virgin who is not betrothed, and seizes her and lies with her, and they are found,
29 then the man who lay with her shall give to the father of the young woman fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife, because he has violated her. He may not divorce her all his days.
30 "A man shall not take his father's wife, so that he does not uncover his father's nakedness.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 23

1 "No one whose testicles are crushed or whose male organ is cut off shall enter the assembly of the LORD.
2 "No one born of a forbidden union may enter the assembly of the LORD. Even to the tenth generation, none of his descendants may enter the assembly of the LORD.
3 "No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the LORD. Even to the tenth generation, none of them may enter the assembly of the LORD forever,
4 because they did not meet you with bread and with water on the way, when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you
5 But the LORD your God would not listen to Balaam; instead the LORD your God turned the curse into a blessing for you, because the LORD your God loved you.
6 You shall not seek their peace or their prosperity all your days forever.
7 "You shall not abhor an Edomite, for he is your brother. You shall not abhor an Egyptian, because you were a sojourner in his land.
8 Children born to them in the third generation may enter the assembly of the LORD.
9 "When you are encamped against your enemies, then you shall keep yourself from every evil thing.
10 "If any man among you becomes unclean because of a nocturnal emission, then he shall go outside the camp. He shall not come inside the camp,
11 but when evening comes, he shall bathe himself in water, and as the sun sets, he may come inside the camp.
12 "You shall have a place outside the camp, and you shall go out to it.
13 And you shall have a trowel with your tools, and when you sit down outside, you shall dig a hole with it and turn back and cover up your excrement.
14 Because the LORD your God walks in the midst of your camp, to deliver you and to give up your enemies before you, therefore your camp must be holy, so that he may not see anything indecent among you and turn away from you
15 "You shall not give up to his master a slave who has escaped from his master to you.
16 He shall dwell with you, in your midst, in the place that he shall choose within one of your towns, wherever it suits him. You shall not wrong him.
17 "None of the daughters of Israel shall be a cult prostitute, and none of the sons of Israel shall be a cult prostitute.
18 You shall not bring the fee of a prostitute or the wages of a dog into the house of the LORD your God in payment for any vow, for both of these are an abomination to the LORD your God.
19 "You shall not charge interest on loans to your brother, interest on money, interest on food, interest on anything that is lent for interest
20 You may charge a foreigner interest, but you may not charge your brother interest, that the LORD your God may bless you in all that you undertake in the land that you are entering to take possession of it.
21 "If you make a vow to the LORD your God, you shall not delay fulfilling it, for the LORD your God will surely require it of you, and you will be guilty of sin
22 But if you refrain from vowing, you will not be guilty of sin.
23 You shall be careful to do what has passed your lips, for you have voluntarily vowed to the LORD your God what you have promised with your mouth.
24 "If you go into your neighbor's vineyard, you may eat your fill of grapes, as many as you wish, but you shall not put any in your bag.
25 If you go into your neighbor's standing grain, you may pluck the ears with your hand, but you shall not put a sickle to your neighbor's standing grain.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 24

1 "When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, and she departs out of his house,
2 and if she goes and becomes another man's wife,
3 and the latter man hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter man dies, who took her to be his wife,
4 then her former husband, who sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after she has been defiled, for that is an abomination before the LORD. And you shall not bring sin upon the land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance.
5 "When a man is newly married, he shall not go out with the army or be liable for any other public duty. He shall be free at home one year to be happy with his wife whom he has taken.
6 "No one shall take a mill or an upper millstone in pledge, for that would be taking a life in pledge.
7 "If a man is found stealing one of his brothers of the people of Israel, and if he treats him as a slave or sells him, then that thief shall die. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.
8 "Take care, in a case of leprous disease, to be very careful to do according to all that the Levitical priests shall direct you. As I commanded them, so you shall be careful to do.
9 Remember what the LORD your God did to Miriam on the way as you came out of Egypt.
10 "When you make your neighbor a loan of any sort, you shall not go into his house to collect his pledge.
11 You shall stand outside, and the man to whom you make the loan shall bring the pledge out to you.
12 And if he is a poor man, you shall not sleep in his pledge.
13 You shall restore to him the pledge as the sun sets, that he may sleep in his cloak and bless you. And it shall be righteousness for you before the LORD your God.
14 "You shall not oppress a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brothers or one of the sojourners who are in your land within your towns.
15 You shall give him his wages on the same day, before the sun sets (for he is poor and counts on it), lest he cry against you to the LORD, and you be guilty of sin.
16 "Fathers shall not be put to death because of their children, nor shall children be put to death because of their fathers. Each one shall be put to death for his own sin.
17 "You shall not pervert the justice due to the sojourner or to the fatherless, or take a widow's garment in pledge,
18 but you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the LORD your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this.
19 "When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.
20 When you beat your olive trees, you shall not go over them again. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.
21 When you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you shall not strip it afterward. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.
22 You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt; therefore I command you to do this.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 25

1 "If there is a dispute between men and they come into court and the judges decide between them, acquitting the innocent and condemning the guilty,
2 then if the guilty man deserves to be beaten, the judge shall cause him to lie down and be beaten in his presence with a number of stripes in proportion to his offense.
3 Forty stripes may be given him, but not more, lest, if one should go on to beat him with more stripes than these, your brother be degraded in your sight.
4 "You shall not muzzle an ox when it is treading out the grain.
5 "If brothers dwell together, and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the dead man shall not be married outside the family to a stranger. Her husband's brother shall go in to her and take her as his wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her.
6 And the first son whom she bears shall succeed to the name of his dead brother, that his name may not be blotted out of Israel.
7 And if the man does not wish to take his brother's wife, then his brother's wife shall go up to the gate to the elders and say, 'My husband's brother refuses to perpetuate his brother's name in Israel; he will not perform the duty of a husband's brother to me.'
8 Then the elders of his city shall call him and speak to him, and if he persists, saying, 'I do not wish to take her,'
9 then his brother's wife shall go up to him in the presence of the elders and pull his sandal off his foot and spit in his face. And she shall answer and say, 'So shall it be done to the man who does not build up his brother's house.'
10 And the name of his house shall be called in Israel, 'The house of him who had his sandal pulled off.'
11 "When men fight with one another and the wife of the one draws near to rescue her husband from the hand of him who is beating him and puts out her hand and seizes him by the private parts,
12 then you shall cut off her hand. Your eye shall have no pity.
13 "You shall not have in your bag two kinds of weights, a large and a small.
14 You shall not have in your house two kinds of measures, a large and a small.
15 A full and fair weight you shall have, a full and fair measure you shall have, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
16 For all who do such things, all who act dishonestly, are an abomination to the LORD your God.
17 "Remember what Amalek did to you on the way as you came out of Egypt,
18 how he attacked you on the way when you were faint and weary, and cut off your tail, those who were lagging behind you, and he did not fear God.
19 Therefore when the LORD your God has given you rest from all your enemies around you, in the land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance to possess, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven; you shall not forget.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 26

1 "When you come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance and have taken possession of it and live in it,
2 you shall take some of the first of all the fruit of the ground, which you harvest from your land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you shall put it in a basket, and you shall go to the place that the LORD your God will choose, to make his name to dwell there.
3 And you shall go to the priest who is in office at that time and say to him, 'I declare today to the LORD your God that I have come into the land that the LORD swore to our fathers to give us.'
4 Then the priest shall take the basket from your hand and set it down before the altar of the LORD your God.
5 "And you shall make response before the LORD your God, 'A wandering Aramean was my father. And he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, few in number, and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous.
6 And the Egyptians treated us harshly and humiliated us and laid on us hard labor.
7 Then we cried to the LORD, the God of our fathers, and the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression.
8 And the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great deeds of terror, with signs and wonders.
9 And he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey.
10 And behold, now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground, which you, O LORD, have given me.' And you shall set it down before the LORD your God and worship before the LORD your God.
11 And you shall rejoice in all the good that the LORD your God has given to you and to your house, you, and the Levite, and the sojourner who is among you.
12 "When you have finished paying all the tithe of your produce in the third year, which is the year of tithing, giving it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, so that they may eat within your towns and be filled,
13 then you shall say before the LORD your God, 'I have removed the sacred portion out of my house, and moreover, I have given it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, according to all your commandment that you have commanded me. I have not transgressed any of your commandments, nor have I forgotten them.
14 I have not eaten of the tithe while I was mourning, or removed any of it while I was unclean, or offered any of it to the dead. I have obeyed the voice of the LORD my God. I have done according to all that you have commanded me.
15 Look down from your holy habitation, from heaven, and bless your people Israel and the ground that you have given us, as you swore to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.'
16 "This day the LORD your God commands you to do these statutes and rules. You shall therefore be careful to do them with all your heart and with all your soul.
17 You have declared today that the LORD is your God, and that you will walk in his ways, and keep his statutes and his commandments and his rules, and will obey his voice.
18 And the LORD has declared today that you are a people for his treasured possession, as he has promised you, and that you are to keep all his commandments,
19 and that he will set you in praise and in fame and in honor high above all nations that he has made, and that you shall be a people holy to the LORD your God, as he promised."
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 27

1 Now Moses and the elders of Israel commanded the people, saying, "Keep the whole commandment that I command you today.
2 And on the day you cross over the Jordan to the land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall set up large stones and plaster them with plaster.
3 And you shall write on them all the words of this law, when you cross over to enter the land that the LORD your God is giving you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you.
4 And when you have crossed over the Jordan, you shall set up these stones, concerning which I command you today, on Mount Ebal, and you shall plaster them with plaster.
5 And there you shall build an altar to the LORD your God, an altar of stones. You shall wield no iron tool on them;
6 you shall build an altar to the LORD your God of uncut stones. And you shall offer burnt offerings on it to the LORD your God,
7 and you shall sacrifice peace offerings and shall eat there, and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God.
8 And you shall write on the stones all the words of this law very plainly."
9 Then Moses and the Levitical priests said to all Israel, "Keep silence and hear, O Israel: this day you have become the people of the LORD your God.
10 You shall therefore obey the voice of the LORD your God, keeping his commandments and his statutes, which I command you today."
11 That day Moses charged the people, saying,
12 "When you have crossed over the Jordan, these shall stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people: Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph, and Benjamin.
13 And these shall stand on Mount Ebal for the curse: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali.
14 And the Levites shall declare to all the men of Israel in a loud voice:
15 "'Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image, an abomination to the LORD, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret.'And all the people shall answer and say, 'Amen.'
16 "'Cursed be anyone who dishonors his father or his mother.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
17 "'Cursed be anyone who moves his neighbor's landmark.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
18 "'Cursed be anyone who misleads a blind man on the road.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
19 "'Cursed be anyone who perverts the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
20 "'Cursed be anyone who lies with his father's wife, because he has uncovered his father's nakedness.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
21 "'Cursed be anyone who lies with any kind of animal.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
22 "'Cursed be anyone who lies with his sister, whether the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
23 "'Cursed be anyone who lies with his mother-in-law.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
24 "'Cursed be anyone who strikes down his neighbor in secret.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
25 "'Cursed be anyone who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
26 "'Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 28

1 "And if you faithfully obey the voice of the LORD your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I command you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.
2 And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of the LORD your God.
3 Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field.
4 Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground and the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock.
5 Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
6 Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
7 "The LORD will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways.
8 The LORD will command the blessing on you in your barns and in all that you undertake. And he will bless you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
9 The LORD will establish you as a people holy to himself, as he has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the LORD your God and walk in his ways.
10 And all the peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the LORD, and they shall be afraid of you.
11 And the LORD will make you abound in prosperity, in the fruit of your womb and in the fruit of your livestock and in the fruit of your ground, within the land that the LORD swore to your fathers to give you.
12 The LORD will open to you his good treasury, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. And you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow.
13 And the LORD will make you the head and not the tail, and you shall only go up and not down, if you obey the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you today, being careful to do them,
14 and if you do not turn aside from any of the words that I command you today, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
15 "But if you will not obey the voice of the LORD your God or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you.
16 Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field.
17 Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
18 Cursed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock.
19 Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.
20 "The LORD will send on you curses, confusion, and frustration in all that you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and perish quickly on account of the evil of your deeds, because you have forsaken me.
21 The LORD will make the pestilence stick to you until he has consumed you off the land that you are entering to take possession of it.
22 The LORD will strike you with wasting disease and with fever, inflammation and fiery heat, and with drought and with blight and with mildew. They shall pursue you until you perish.
23 And the heavens over your head shall be bronze, and the earth under you shall be iron.
24 The LORD will make the rain of your land powder. From heaven dust shall come down on you until you are destroyed.
25 "The LORD will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You shall go out one way against them and flee seven ways before them. And you shall be a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.
26 And your dead body shall be food for all birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth, and there shall be no one to frighten them away.
27 The LORD will strike you with the boils of Egypt, and with tumors and scabs and itch, of which you cannot be healed.
28 The LORD will strike you with madness and blindness and confusion of mind,
29 and you shall grope at noonday, as the blind grope in darkness, and you shall not prosper in your ways. And you shall be only oppressed and robbed continually, and there shall be no one to help you.
30 You shall betroth a wife, but another man shall ravish her. You shall build a house, but you shall not dwell in it. You shall plant a vineyard, but you shall not enjoy its fruit.
31 Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you shall not eat any of it. Your donkey shall be seized before your face, but shall not be restored to you. Your sheep shall be given to your enemies, but there shall be no one to help you.
32 Your sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, while your eyes look on and fail with longing for them all day long, but you shall be helpless.
33 A nation that you have not known shall eat up the fruit of your ground and of all your labors, and you shall be only oppressed and crushed continually,
34 so that you are driven mad by the sights that your eyes see.
35 The LORD will strike you on the knees and on the legs with grievous boils of which you cannot be healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.
36 "The LORD will bring you and your king whom you set over you to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known. And there you shall serve other gods of wood and stone.
37 And you shall become a horror, a proverb, and a byword among all the peoples where the LORD will lead you away.
38 You shall carry much seed into the field and shall gather in little, for the locust shall consume it.
39 You shall plant vineyards and dress them, but you shall neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes, for the worm shall eat them.
40 You shall have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you shall not anoint yourself with the oil, for your olives shall drop off.
41 You shall father sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours, for they shall go into captivity.
42 The cricket shall possess all your trees and the fruit of your ground.
43 The sojourner who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower.
44 He shall lend to you, and you shall not lend to him. He shall be the head, and you shall be the tail.
45 "All these curses shall come upon you and pursue you and overtake you till you are destroyed, because you did not obey the voice of the LORD your God, to keep his commandments and his statutes that he commanded you.
46 They shall be a sign and a wonder against you and your offspring forever.
47 Because you did not serve the LORD your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things,
48 therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything. And he will put a yoke of iron on your neck until he has destroyed you.
49 The LORD will bring a nation against you from far away, from the end of the earth, swooping down like the eagle, a nation whose language you do not understand,
50 a hard-faced nation who shall not respect the old or show mercy to the young.
51 It shall eat the offspring of your cattle and the fruit of your ground, until you are destroyed; it also shall not leave you grain, wine, or oil, the increase of your herds or the young of your flock, until they have caused you to perish.
52 "They shall besiege you in all your towns, until your high and fortified walls, in which you trusted, come down throughout all your land. And they shall besiege you in all your towns throughout all your land, which the LORD your God has given you.
53 And you shall eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your sons and daughters, whom the LORD your God has given you, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemies shall distress you.
54 The man who is the most tender and refined among you will begrudge food to his brother, to the wife he embraces, and to the last of the children whom he has left,
55 so that he will not give to any of them any of the flesh of his children whom he is eating, because he has nothing else left, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in all your towns.
56 The most tender and refined woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground because she is so delicate and tender, will begrudge to the husband she embraces, to her son and to her daughter,
57 her afterbirth that comes out from between her feet and her children whom she bears, because lacking everything she will eat them secretly, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in your towns.
58 "If you are not careful to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that you may fear this glorious and awesome name, the LORD your God,
59 then the LORD will bring on you and your offspring extraordinary afflictions, afflictions severe and lasting, and sicknesses grievous and lasting.
60 And he will bring upon you again all the diseases of Egypt, of which you were afraid, and they shall cling to you.
61 Every sickness also and every affliction that is not recorded in the book of this law, the LORD will bring upon you, until you are destroyed.
62 Whereas you were as numerous as the stars of heaven, you shall be left few in number, because you did not obey the voice of the LORD your God.
63 And as the LORD took delight in doing you good and multiplying you, so the LORD will take delight in bringing ruin upon you and destroying you. And you shall be plucked off the land that you are entering to take possession of it.
64 "And the LORD will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you shall serve other gods of wood and stone, which neither you nor your fathers have known.
65 And among these nations you shall find no respite, and there shall be no resting place for the sole of your foot, but the LORD will give you there a trembling heart and failing eyes and a languishing soul.
66 Your life shall hang in doubt before you. Night and day you shall be in dread and have no assurance of your life.
67 In the morning you shall say, 'If only it were evening!' and at evening you shall say, 'If only it were morning!' because of the dread that your heart shall feel, and the sights that your eyes shall see.
68 And the LORD will bring you back in ships to Egypt, a journey that I promised that you should never make again; and there you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no buyer."
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.

Deuteronomy 29

1 These are the words of the covenant that the LORD commanded Moses to make with the people of Israel in the land of Moab, besides the covenant that he had made with them at Horeb.
2 And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them: "You have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt, to Pharaoh and to all his servants and to all his land,
3 the great trials that your eyes saw, the signs, and those great wonders.
4 But to this day the LORD has not given you a heart to understand or eyes to see or ears to hear.
5 I have led you forty years in the wilderness. Your clothes have not worn out on you, and your sandals have not worn off your feet.
6 You have not eaten bread, and you have not drunk wine or strong drink, that you may know that I am the LORD your God.
7 And when you came to this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon and Og the king of Bashan came out against us to battle, but we defeated them.
8 We took their land and gave it for an inheritance to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of the Manassites.
9 Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do.
10 "You are standing today all of you before the LORD your God: the heads of your tribes, your elders, and your officers, all the men of Israel,
11 your little ones, your wives, and the sojourner who is in your camp, from the one who chops your wood to the one who draws your water,
12 so that you may enter into the sworn covenant of the LORD your God, which the LORD your God is making with you today,
13 that he may establish you today as his people, and that he may be your God, as he promised you, and as he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
14 It is not with you alone that I am making this sworn covenant,
15 but with whoever is standing here with us today before the LORD our God, and with whoever is not here with us today.
16 "You know how we lived in the land of Egypt, and how we came through the midst of the nations through which you passed.
17 And you have seen their detestable things, their idols of wood and stone, of silver and gold, which were among them.
18 Beware lest there be among you a man or woman or clan or tribe whose heart is turning away today from the LORD our God to go and serve the gods of those nations. Beware lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit,
19 one who, when he hears the words of this sworn covenant, blesses himself in his heart, saying, 'I shall be safe, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart.' This will lead to the sweeping away of moist and dry alike.
20 The LORD will not be willing to forgive him, but rather the anger of the LORD and his jealousy will smoke against that man, and the curses written in this book will settle upon him, and the LORD will blot out his name from under heaven.
21 And the LORD will single him out from all the tribes of Israel for calamity, in accordance with all the curses of the covenant written in this Book of the Law.
22 And the next generation, your children who rise up after you, and the foreigner who comes from a far land, will say, when they see the afflictions of that land and the sicknesses with which the LORD has made it sick--
23 the whole land burned out with brimstone and salt, nothing sown and nothing growing, where no plant can sprout, an overthrow like that of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger and wrath--
24 all the nations will say, 'Why has the LORD done thus to this land? What caused the heat of this great anger?'
25 Then people will say, 'It is because they abandoned the covenant of the LORD, the God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt,
26 and went and served other gods and worshiped them, gods whom they had not known and whom he had not allotted to them.
27 Therefore the anger of the LORD was kindled against this land, bringing upon it all the curses written in this book,
28 and the LORD uprooted them from their land in anger and fury and great wrath, and cast them into another land, as they are this day.'
29 "The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.