Moral and Religious Laws
1 The Lord told Moses 2 to say to the community of Israel:
I am the Lord your God. I am holy, and you must be holy too! 3-4 Respect your father and your mother, honor the Sabbath, and don't make idols or images. I am the Lord your God.
5 When you offer a sacrifice to ask my blessing, be sure to follow my instructions. 6 You may eat the meat either on the day of the sacrifice or on the next day, but you must burn anything left over on the third day. 7 If you eat any of it on the third day, the sacrifice will be disgusting to me, and I will reject it. 8 In fact, you will be punished for not respecting what I say is holy, and you will no longer belong to the community of Israel.
9 When you harvest your grain, always leave some of it standing along the edges of your fields and don't pick up what falls on the ground. 10 Don't strip your grapevines clean or gather the grapes that fall off the vines. Leave them for the poor and for those foreigners who live among you. I am the Lord your God.
11 Do not steal or tell lies or cheat others.
12 Do not misuse my name by making promises you don't intend to keep. I am the Lord your God.
13 Do not steal anything or cheat anyone, and don't fail to pay your workers at the end of each day.
14 I am the Lord your God, and I command you not to make fun of the deaf or to cause a blind person to stumble.
15 Be fair, no matter who is on trial—don't favor either the poor or the rich.
16 Don't be a gossip, but never hesitate to speak up in court, especially if your testimony can save someone's life.
17 Don't hold grudges. On the other hand, it's wrong not to correct someone who needs correcting. 18 Don't be angry or try to take revenge. I am the Lord, and I command you to love others as much as you love yourself.
19 Breed your livestock animals only with animals of the same kind, and don't plant two kinds of seed in the same field or wear clothes made of different kinds of material.
20 If a man has sex with a slave woman who is promised in marriage to someone else, he must pay a fine, but they are not to be put to death. After all, she was still a slave at the time. 21-22 The man must bring a ram to the entrance of the sacred tent and give it to a priest, who will then offer it as a sacrifice to me, so the man's sins will be forgiven.
23 After you enter the land, you will plant fruit trees, but you are not to eat any fruit from them for the first three years. 24 In the fourth year the fruit must be set apart, as an expression of thanks 25 to me, the Lord God. Do this, and in the fifth year, those trees will produce an abundant harvest of fruit for you to eat.
26 Don't eat the blood of any animal.
Don't practice any kind of witchcraft.
27-28 I forbid you to shave any part of your head or beard or to cut and tattoo yourself as a way of worshiping the dead.
29 Don't let your daughters serve as temple prostitutes—this would bring disgrace both to them and the land.
30 I command you to respect the Sabbath and the place where I am worshiped.
31 Don't make yourselves disgusting to me by going to people who claim they can talk to the dead.
32 I command you to show respect for older people and to obey me with fear and trembling.
33 Don't mistreat any foreigners who live in your land. 34 Instead, treat them as well as you treat your own people and love them as much as you love yourself. Remember, you were once foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.
35-36 Use honest scales and don't cheat when you weigh or measure anything.
I am the Lord your God. I rescued you from Egypt, 37 and I command you to obey my laws.
1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 2 Speak unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, and say unto them, Ye shall be holy: for I the LORD your God am holy.
3 ¶ Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father, and keep my sabbaths: I am the LORD your God.
4 ¶ Turn ye not unto idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods: I am the LORD your God.
5 ¶ And if ye offer a sacrifice of peace offerings unto the LORD, ye shall offer it at your own will. 6 It shall be eaten the same day ye offer it, and on the morrow: and if ought remain until the third day, it shall be burnt in the fire. 7 And if it be eaten at all on the third day, it is abominable; it shall not be accepted. 8 Therefore every one that eateth it shall bear his iniquity, because he hath profaned the hallowed thing of the LORD: and that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
9 ¶ And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest. 10 And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of thy vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and stranger: I am the LORD your God.
11 ¶ Ye shall not steal, neither deal falsely, neither lie one to another.
12 ¶ And ye shall not swear by my name falsely, neither shalt thou profane the name of thy God: I am the LORD.
13 ¶ Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbour, neither rob him: the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning.
14 ¶ Thou shalt not curse the deaf, nor put a stumblingblock before the blind, but shalt fear thy God: I am the LORD.
15 ¶ Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment: thou shalt not respect the person of the poor, nor honour the person of the mighty: but in righteousness shalt thou judge thy neighbour.
16 ¶ Thou shalt not go up and down as a talebearer among thy people: neither shalt thou stand against the blood of thy neighbour: I am the LORD.
17 ¶ Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him.
18 ¶ Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.
19 ¶ Ye shall keep my statutes. Thou shalt not let thy cattle gender with a diverse kind: thou shalt not sow thy field with mingled seed: neither shall a garment mingled of linen and woollen come upon thee.
20 ¶ And whosoever lieth carnally with a woman, that is a bondmaid, betrothed to an husband, and not at all redeemed, nor freedom given her; she shall be scourged; they shall not be put to death, because she was not free. 21 And he shall bring his trespass offering unto the LORD, unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, even a ram for a trespass offering. 22 And the priest shall make an atonement for him with the ram of the trespass offering before the LORD for his sin which he hath done: and the sin which he hath done shall be forgiven him.
23 ¶ And when ye shall come into the land, and shall have planted all manner of trees for food, then ye shall count the fruit thereof as uncircumcised: three years shall it be as uncircumcised unto you: it shall not be eaten of. 24 But in the fourth year all the fruit thereof shall be holy to praise the LORD withal . 25 And in the fifth year shall ye eat of the fruit thereof, that it may yield unto you the increase thereof: I am the LORD your God.
26 ¶ Ye shall not eat any thing with the blood: neither shall ye use enchantment, nor observe times. 27 Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard. 28 Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD.
29 ¶ Do not prostitute thy daughter, to cause her to be a whore; lest the land fall to whoredom, and the land become full of wickedness.
30 ¶ Ye shall keep my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the LORD.
31 ¶ Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the LORD your God.
32 ¶ Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head, and honour the face of the old man, and fear thy God: I am the LORD.
33 ¶ And if a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him. 34 But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.
35 ¶ Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, in meteyard, in weight, or in measure. 36 Just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a just hin, shall ye have: I am the LORD your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt. 37 Therefore shall ye observe all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do them: I am the LORD.