Deuteronomy 16-18

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Deuteronomy 16

Observe the month of Abib, and keep the passover to Yahweh your Elohim; for in the month of Abib Yahweh your Elohim brought you forth out of Egypt by night. 2 And you shall sacrifice the passover to Yahweh your Elohim, of the flock and the herd, in the place which Yahweh shall choose, to cause his name to dwell there. 3 You shall eat no leavened bread with it; seven days you shall eat unleavened bread with it, even the bread of affliction; for you came forth out of the land of Egypt in haste: that you may remember the day when you came forth out of the land of Egypt all the days of your life. 4 And there shall no leaven be seen with you in all your borders seven days; neither shall any of the flesh, which you sacrifice the first day at evening, remain all night until the morning. 5 You may not sacrifice the passover within any of your gates, which Yahweh your Elohim gives you; 6 but at the place which Yahweh your Elohim shall choose, to cause his name to dwell in, there you shall sacrifice the passover at evening, at the going down of the sun, at the season that you came forth out of Egypt. 7 And you shall roast and eat it in the place which Yahweh your Elohim shall choose: and you shall turn in the morning, and go to your tents. 8 Six days you shall eat unleavened bread; and on the seventh day shall be a solemn assembly to Yahweh your Elohim; you shall do no work in it.

9 Seven weeks shall you number to yourself: from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain shall you begin to number seven weeks. 10 And you shall keep the feast of weeks to Yahweh your Elohim with a tribute of a freewill-offering of your hand, which you shall give, according as Yahweh your Elohim blesses you: 11 and you shall rejoice before Yahweh your Elohim, you, and your son, and your daughter, and your manservant, and your maidservant, and the Levite that is within your gates, and the sojourner, and the fatherless, and the widow, that are in the middle of you, in the place which Yahweh your Elohim shall choose, to cause his name to dwell there. 12 And you shall remember that you were a bondman in Egypt: and you shall observe and do these statutes.

13 You shall keep the feast of tabernacles seven days, after you have gathered in from your threshing-floor and from your winepress: 14 and you shall rejoice in your feast, you, and your son, and your daughter, and your manservant, and your maid-servant, and the Levite, and the sojourner, and the fatherless, and the widow, that are within your gates. 15 Seven days shall you keep a feast to Yahweh your Elohim in the place which Yahweh shall choose; because Yahweh your Elohim will bless you in all your increase, and in all the work of your hands, and you shall be altogether joyful. 16 Three times in a year shall all your males appear before Yahweh your Elohim in the place which he shall choose: in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles; and they shall not appear before Yahweh empty: 17 every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of Yahweh your Elohim which he has given you.

18 Judges and officers shall you make yourselves in all your gates, which Yahweh your Elohim gives you, according to your tribes; and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment. 19 You shall not wrest justice: you shall not respect persons; neither shall you take a bribe; for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise, and perverts the words of the righteous. 20 That which is altogether just shall you follow, that you may live, and inherit the land which Yahweh your Elohim is giving you.

21 You shall not plant an Asherah of any kind of tree beside the altar of Yahweh your Elohim, which you shall make for yourself. Neither shall you set up a pillar for yourself; which Yahweh your Elohim hates.

Deuteronomy 17

You shall not sacrifice to Yahweh your Elohim an ox, or a sheep, in which is a blemish, or anything evil; for that is an abomination to Yahweh your Elohim.

2 If there is found among you, within any of your gates which Yahweh your Elohim gives you, man or woman, that does that which is evil in the sight of Yahweh your Elohim, in transgressing his covenant, 3 and has gone and served other elohim, and worshiped them, or the sun, or the moon, or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded; 4 and it is told to you, and you have heard of it, then shall you inquire diligently; and, behold, if it is true, and the thing is certain, that such abomination is wrought in Israel, 5 then you shall bring forth that man or that woman, who has done this evil thing, to your gates, even the man or the woman; and you shall stone them to death with stones. 6 At the mouth of two witnesses, or three witnesses, shall he that is to die be put to death; at the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death. 7 The hand of the witnesses shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. So you shall put away the evil from the middle of you.

8 If there arises a matter too hard for you in judgment, between blood and blood, between plea and plea, and between stroke and stroke, being matters of controversy within your gates; then you shall arise, and go up to the place which Yahweh your Elohim shall choose; 9 and you shall come to the priests the Levites, and to the judge that shall be in those days: and you shall inquire; and they shall show you the sentence of judgment. 10 And you shall do according to the tenor of the sentence which they shall show you from that place which Yahweh shall choose; and you shall observe to do according to all that they shall teach you: 11 according to the tenor of the law which they shall teach you, and according to the judgment which they shall tell you, you shall do; you shall not turn aside from the sentence which they shall show you, to the right hand, or to the left. 12 And the man that does presumptuously, in not listening to the priest that stands to minister there before Yahweh your Elohim, or to the judge, that man shall die: and you shall put away the evil from Israel. 13 And all the people shall hear, and fear, and do no more presumptuously.

14 When you come to the land which Yahweh your Elohim gives you, and shall possess it, and shall dwell in it, and shall say, I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me; 15 you shall surely set him king over you, whom Yahweh your Elohim shall choose: one from among your brethren shall you set king over yourselves; you may not put a foreigner over yourselves, who is not your brother. 16 Only he shall not multiply horses to himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt, to the end that he may multiply horses; forasmuch as Yahweh has said to you, You shall from now on return no more that way. 17 Neither shall he multiply wives to himself, that his heart turns not away: neither shall he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold.

18 And it shall be, when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write a copy of this law in a book, out of that which is before the priests the Levites: 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 Yahweh his Elohim, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them; 20 that his heart is not lifted up above his brethren, and that he turns not aside from the commandment, to the right hand, or to the left: to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel.

Deuteronomy 18

The priests the Levites, even all the tribe of Levi, shall have no portion or inheritance with Israel: they shall eat the offerings of Yahweh made by fire, and his inheritance. 2 And they shall have no inheritance among their brethren: Yahweh is their inheritance, as he has spoken to them. 3 And this shall be the priests due from the people, from them that offer a sacrifice, whether it be ox or sheep, that they shall give to the priest the shoulder, and the two cheeks, and the stomach. 4 The first-fruits of your grain, of your new wine, and of your oil, and the first of the fleece of your sheep, you shall give him. 5 For Yahweh your Elohim has chosen him out of all your tribes, to stand to minister in the name of Yahweh, he and his sons forever.

6 And if a Levite comes from any of your gates out of all Israel, where he sojourns, and comes with all the desire of his soul to the place which Yahweh shall choose; 7 then he shall minister in the name of Yahweh his Elohim, as all his brethren the Levites do, who stand there before Yahweh. 8 They shall have like portions to eat, besides that which comes of the sale of his patrimony.

9 When you have come into the land which Yahweh your Elohim gives you, you shall not learn to do after the abominations of those nations. 10 There shall not be found with you anyone that makes his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, one that uses divination, one that practices augury, or an enchanter, or a sorcerer, 11 or a charmer, or a consulter with a familiar spirit, or a wizard, or a necromancer. 12 For whoever does these things is an abomination to Yahweh: and because of these abominations Yahweh your Elohim does drive them out from before you. 13 You shall be perfect with Yahweh your Elohim. 14 For these nations, that you shall dispossess, listen to them that practice augury, and to diviners; but as for you, Yahweh your Elohim has not permitted you to do so.

15 Yahweh your Elohim will raise up to you a prophet from among you, of your brethren, like to me; to him you shall listen; 16 according to all that you desired of Yahweh your Elohim in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, Let me not hear again the voice of Yahweh my Elohim, neither let me see this great fire any more, that I do not die, 17 And Yahweh said to me, They have well said that which they have spoken. 18 I will raise them up a prophet from among their brethren, like you; and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I shall command him. 19 And it shall come to pass, that whoever will not listen to my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.

20 But the prophet, that shall speak a word arrogantly in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other elohim, that same prophet shall die. 21 And if you say in your heart, How shall we know the word which Yahweh has not spoken? 22 When a prophet speaks in the name of Yahweh, if the thing does not follow, nor come to pass, that is the thing which Yahweh has not spoken: the prophet has spoken it arrogantly, you shall not be afraid of him.

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