Leviticus 26; Leviticus 27

Leviticus 26

1 " 'Do not make statues of gods for yourselves. Do not set up a likeness of a god or a sacred stone for yourselves. Do not place a carved stone in your land and bow down in front of it. I am the LORD your God.

2 " 'You must always keep my Sabbath days. Have respect for my sacred tent. I am the Lord.

3 " 'Follow my rules. Be careful to obey my commands.

4 Then I will send you rain at the right time. The ground will produce its crops. The trees of the field will bear their fruit.

5 You will continue to thresh your grain until you gather your grapes. You will continue to gather your grapes until you plant your crops. You will have all you want to eat. And you will live in safety in your land.

6 " 'I will give you peace in the land. You will sleep, and no one will make you afraid. I will remove wild animals from the land. There will not be any war in your country.

7 You will hunt down your enemies. You will kill them with your swords.

8 Five of you will chase 100. And 100 of you will chase 10,000. You will kill your enemies with your swords.

9 " 'I will look with favor on you. I will give you many children and increase your numbers. And I will keep my covenant with you.

10 You will still be eating last year's crops when you have to move them out to make room for new crops.

11 " 'I will live among you. I will not turn away from you.

12 I will walk among you. I will be your God. And you will be my people.

13 I am the LORD your God. I brought you out of Egypt. I did not want you to be slaves in Egypt anymore. I threw off your heavy load. I helped you walk with your heads held high.

14 " 'But suppose you will not listen to me. You will not carry out all of my commands.

15 You will say no to my rules and turn away from my laws. And you will break my covenant by failing to carry out all of my commands.

16 Then here is what I will do to you. All at once I will bring terror on you. I will send sicknesses that will make you weak. I will send fever that will destroy your sight. It will slowly take your life away. When you plant seeds, it will not do you any good. Instead, your enemies will eat what you have planted.

17 I will turn against you. Then your enemies will win the battle over you. Those who hate you will rule over you. You will run away even when no one is chasing you.

18 " 'After all of that, suppose you still will not listen to me. Then I will punish you for your sins seven times.

19 I will break down your stubborn pride. I will make the sky above you like iron, and it will not rain. I will make the ground under you like bronze, and you will not be able to farm it.

20 You will work with all of your strength, but it will not do you any good. That is because your soil will not produce any crops. The trees of the land will not bear any fruit.

21 " 'Suppose you continue to be my enemy. And suppose you still refuse to listen to me. Then I will multiply your troubles many times because of your sins.

22 I will send wild animals against you. They will kill your children. They will destroy your cattle. There will be so few of you left that your roads will be deserted.

23 " 'After all of those things, suppose you still do not accept my warnings. And suppose you continue to be my enemy.

24 Then I myself will be your enemy. I will make you suffer for your sins again and again.

25 I will send war against you to punish you for breaking my covenant. When you go back into your cities, I will send a plague among you. You will be handed over to your enemies.

26 I will cut off your supply of bread. Ten women will need only one oven to bake your bread. They will weigh out the bread piece by piece. Even when you eat all of it, it will not be enough to satisfy you.

27 " 'After all of that, suppose you still do not listen to me. And suppose you continue to be my enemy.

28 Then I will be angry with you. I will be your enemy. I myself will again punish you for your sins over and over.

29 You will eat the dead bodies of your sons. You will also eat the dead bodies of your daughters.

30 " 'I will destroy the high places where you worship other gods. I will pull down your incense altars. I will pile up your dead bodies on the lifeless statues of your gods. And I will turn away from you.

31 I will completely destroy your cities. I will destroy your places of worship. The pleasant smell of your offerings will not give me any delight.

32 " 'I will destroy your land so completely that your enemies who live there will be shocked.

33 I will scatter you among the nations. I will pull out my sword and hunt you down. Your land and your cities will be completely destroyed.

34 " 'Then the deserted land will enjoy its sabbath years. It will rest. It will not be farmed. It will enjoy its sabbaths. But you will become prisoners in the country of your enemies.

35 The land will rest the whole time it is deserted. It was not able to rest during the sabbaths you lived in it.

36 " 'Some of you will be left in the lands of your enemies. I will fill your hearts with fear. The sound of a leaf that is blown by the wind will scare you away. You will run as if you were escaping from swords. You will fall down, even though no one is chasing you.

37 You will trip over one another as if you were running away from the battle. You will run away, even though no one is chasing you. You will not be able to stand and fight against your enemies.

38 " 'While you are still scattered among the nations, you will die. The lands of your enemies will destroy you.

39 You who are left in those lands will become weaker and weaker. You will die because of your sins and the sins of your parents.

40 " 'But suppose you admit that you and your parents have sinned. You admit the evil and dishonest things you have done against me. And you admit you have become my enemy.

41 What you did made me become your enemy. I let your enemies take you into their land. But suppose you stop being stubborn. You stop being proud. And you pay for your sin.

42 Then I will remember my covenant with Jacob. I will remember my covenant with Isaac. I will remember my covenant with Abraham. I will remember what I said to them about the land.

43 " 'You will leave the land. It will enjoy its sabbaths while it lies deserted because you are not there. You will pay for your sins because you said no to my laws. You turned away from my rules.

44 " 'But even after all of that, I will not say no to you or turn away from you. I will not destroy you completely in the land of your enemies. I will not break my covenant with you. I am the LORD your God.

45 Because of you, I will remember the covenant I made with the people of Israel who lived before you. I brought them out of Egypt to be their God. The nations saw me do it. I am the Lord.' "

46 Those are the orders, the laws and the rules of the covenant the LORD made on Mount Sinai. He made it between himself and the people of Israel through Moses.

Leviticus 27

1 The LORD spoke to Moses. He said,

2 "Speak to the people of Israel. Tell them, 'Suppose someone makes a special promise to set a person apart to serve me. Here is how much it will cost to set that person free from the promise to serve.

3 " 'The cost for a male between the ages of 20 and 60 is 20 ounces of silver. It must be weighed out in keeping with the standard weights that are used in the sacred tent.

4 The cost for a female of the same age is 12 ounces of silver.

5 " 'The cost for a male between the ages of five and 20 is eight ounces of silver. The cost for a female of the same age is four ounces of silver.

6 " 'The cost for a male between the ages of one month and five years is two ounces of silver. The cost for a female of the same age is one and a fourth ounces of silver.

7 " 'The cost for a male who is 60 years old or more is six ounces of silver. The cost for a female of the same age is four ounces of silver.

8 " 'But suppose the one who makes the special promise is too poor to pay the required amount. Then he must bring to the priest the person who will be set free. The priest will decide the right value for that person. It will be based on how much the one who makes the promise can afford.

9 " 'Suppose what he promised is an animal that I will accept as an offering. Then the animal that is given to me becomes holy.

10 The one who makes the promise must not trade it. He must not trade a good animal for a bad one. And he must not trade a bad animal for a good one. Suppose he chooses one animal instead of another. Then both animals become holy.

11 " 'Suppose the animal he promised is not "clean." Suppose I will not accept it as an offering. Then the animal must be brought to the priest.

12 He will decide whether it is good or bad. Its value will be what he decides it will be.

13 Suppose the owner wants to buy the animal back. Then he must add a fifth to its cost.

14 " 'Suppose a man sets his house apart as something that is holy to me. Then the priest will decide whether it is good or bad. Its value will remain what he decides it will be.

15 Suppose the man sets his house apart. And suppose later he wants to buy it back. Then he must add a fifth to its value. The house will belong to him again.

16 " 'Suppose a man sets apart a piece of his family's land to me. Then its value must be decided based on the number of seeds that are required to grow a full crop on it. That value will be 20 ounces of silver for every six bushels of barley seeds.

17 " 'Suppose he sets his field apart during the Year of Jubilee. Then the value that has been decided will not be changed.

18 But suppose he sets his field apart after the Year of Jubilee. Then the priest will decide its value based on the number of years that are left until the next Year of Jubilee. The value that was decided will be reduced.

19 " 'Suppose the man who sets his field apart wants to buy it back. Then he must add a fifth to its value. The field will belong to him again.

20 But suppose he does not buy the field back. Instead, suppose he sells it to someone else. Then he can never buy it back.

21 " 'When the field is set free in the Year of Jubilee, it will become holy. It will be like a field that is set apart to me. It will become the property of the priests.

22 " 'Suppose a man sets apart to me a field he has bought. And suppose it is not part of his family's land.

23 Then the priest will decide its value based on the number of years that are left until the Year of Jubilee. The man must pay that value on the day it is decided. The money is holy. It is set apart for me.

24 " 'In the Year of Jubilee the field will go back to the person the man bought it from. That person is the one who had owned the land before.

25 " 'Every amount of money must be weighed out in keeping with the standard weights that are used in the sacred tent.

26 " 'But no one can set apart the first male animal that is born to its mother. That animal already belongs to me. It does not matter whether it is an ox or a sheep. It belongs to me.

27 " 'Suppose it is an animal that is not "clean." Then the owner may buy it back at the value that has been decided. And he must add a fifth to its value. But suppose he does not buy it back. Then it must be sold at the value that has been decided.

28 " 'But nothing a man owns and sets apart to me can be sold or bought back. It does not matter whether it is a person or an animal or a family's land. Everything that is set apart to me is very holy to me.

29 " 'No one who is set apart in a special way to be destroyed can be bought back. He must be put to death.

30 " 'A tenth of everything the land produces belongs to me. That includes grain from the soil and fruit from the trees. It is holy. It is set apart for me.

31 Suppose a man buys back some of his tenth. Then he must add a fifth of the cost to it.

32 " 'The whole tenth of his herds and flocks will be holy. They will be set apart for me. That includes every tenth animal that its shepherd marks with his wooden staff.

33 The owner must not pick out the good animals from the bad. He must not choose one animal instead of another. But if he does, both animals become holy. They can't be bought back.' "

34 The LORD gave Moses all of those commands on Mount Sinai for the people of Israel.