Deuteronomy 12

⁴⁰so that they may fear You all the days they live in the land that You gave to our fathers.

¹“Is not man consigned to labor on earth? Are not his days like those of a hired hand?

³³I will sing to the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.

⁹Only be on your guard and diligently watch yourselves, so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen, and so that they do not slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and grandchildren.

¹⁰The day you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb, the Lord said to me, “Gather the people before Me to hear My words, so that they may learn to fear Me all the days they live on the earth, and that they may teach them to their children.”

⁵See, I have taught you statutes and ordinances just as the Lord my God has commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land that you are about to enter and possess.

¹⁹When you look to the heavens and see the sun and moon and stars—all the host of heaven—do not be enticed to bow down and worship what the Lord your God has apportioned to all the nations under heaven.

⁵Instead, this is what you are to do to them: tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, cut down their Asherah poles, and burn their idols in the fire.

⁴And he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.

⁵¹“Speak to the Israelites and tell them: When you cross the Jordan into the land of Canaan,

⁵²you must drive out before you all the inhabitants of the land, destroy all their carved images and cast idols, and demolish all their high places.

¹²Be careful not to make a treaty with the inhabitants of the land you are entering, lest they become a snare in your midst.

¹³Rather, you must tear down their altars, smash their sacred stones, and chop down their Asherah poles.

¹⁰They set up for themselves sacred pillars and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.

¹¹They burned incense on all the high places like the nations that the Lord had driven out before them. They did wicked things, provoking the Lord to anger.

²⁵You must burn up the images of their gods; do not covet the silver and gold that is on them or take it for yourselves, or you will be ensnared by it; for it is detestable to the Lord your God.

²⁶And you must not bring any detestable thing into your house, or you, like it, will be set apart for destruction. You are to utterly detest and abhor it, because it is set apart for destruction.

²and you are not to make a covenant with the people of this land, but you shall tear down their altars.’ Yet you have not obeyed My voice. What is this you have done?

⁵²you must drive out before you all the inhabitants of the land, destroy all their carved images and cast idols, and demolish all their high places.

²And on that day, declares the Lord of Hosts, I will erase the names of the idols from the land, and they will no longer be remembered. I will also remove the prophets and the spirit of impurity from the land.

⁴Sorrows will multiply to those who chase other gods. I will not pour out their libations of blood, or speak their names with my lips.

¹³Pay close attention to everything I have said to you. You must not invoke the names of other gods; they must not be heard on your lips.

⁵Instead, this is what you are to do to them: tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, cut down their Asherah poles, and burn their idols in the fire.

²³You must not follow the statutes of the nations I am driving out before you. Because they did all these things, I abhorred them.

¹⁸so that they cannot teach you to do all the detestable things they do for their gods, and so cause you to sin against the Lord your God.

³⁰be careful not to be ensnared by their ways after they have been destroyed before you. Do not inquire about their gods, asking, “How do these nations serve their gods? I will do likewise.”

³¹You must not worship the Lord your God in this way, because they practice for their gods every abomination which the Lord hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in the fire as sacrifices to their gods.

²¹Do not set up any wooden Asherah pole next to the altar you will build for the Lord your God,

²²and do not set up for yourselves a sacred pillar, which the Lord your God hates.

¹¹then the Lord your God will choose a dwelling for His Name. And there you are to bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all the choice offerings you vow to the Lord.

¹²the Lord appeared to him at night and said to him: “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice.

²you are to take some of the firstfruits of all your produce from the soil of the land that the Lord your God is giving you and put them in a basket. Then go to the place the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for His Name,

²You are to offer to the Lord your God the Passover sacrifice from the herd or flock in the place the Lord will choose as a dwelling for His Name.

²⁹May Your eyes be open toward this temple night and day, toward the place of which You said, ‘My Name shall be there,’ so that You may hear the prayer that Your servant prays toward this place.

⁶⁸But He chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion, which He loved.

¹⁹You must set apart to the Lord your God every firstborn male produced by your herds and flocks. You are not to put the firstborn of your oxen to work, nor are you to shear the firstborn of your flock.

²⁰Each year you and your household are to eat it before the Lord your God in the place the Lord will choose.

³‘Anyone from the house of Israel who slaughters an ox, a lamb, or a goat in the camp or outside of it

⁴instead of bringing it to the entrance to the Tent of Meeting to present it as an offering to the Lord before His tabernacle—that man shall incur bloodguilt. He has shed blood and must be cut off from among his people.

⁴⁰For on My holy mountain, the high mountain of Israel, declares the Lord God, there the whole house of Israel, all of them, will serve Me in the land. There I will accept them and will require your offerings and choice gifts, along with all your holy sacrifices.

¹²I fast twice a week and pay tithes of all that I acquire.’

¹⁵The firstborn of every womb, whether man or beast, that is offered to the Lord belongs to you. But you must surely redeem every firstborn son and every firstborn male of unclean animals.

¹⁶You are to pay the redemption price for a month-old male according to your valuation: five shekels of silver, according to the sanctuary shekel, which is twenty gerahs.

⁸Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing Me! But you ask, ‘How do we rob You?’ In tithes and offerings.

¹⁸Instead, you must eat them in the presence of the Lord your God at the place the Lord your God will choose—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates. Rejoice before the Lord your God in all you do,

⁴⁰On the first day you are to gather the fruit of majestic trees, the branches of palm trees, and the boughs of leafy trees and of willows of the brook. And you are to rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days.

²⁶Then you may spend the money on anything you desire: cattle, sheep, wine, strong drink, or anything you wish. You are to feast there in the presence of the Lord your God and rejoice with your household.

¹²And you shall rejoice before the Lord your God—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates, since he has no portion or inheritance among you.

⁴Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

¹A song of ascents. Blessed are all who fear the Lord, who walk in His ways!

²For when you eat the fruit of your labor, blessings and prosperity will be yours.

²⁵In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

⁶In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

²All a man’s ways seem right to him, but the Lord weighs the heart.

⁴²But God turned away from them and gave them over to the worship of the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets: ‘Did you bring Me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

³⁹These will serve as tassels for you to look at, so that you may remember all the commandments of the Lord, that you may obey them and not prostitute yourselves by following your own heart and your own eyes.

²⁵Did you bring Me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

⁵⁶“Blessed be the Lord, who has given rest to His people Israel according to all that He promised. Not one word has failed of all the good promises He made through His servant Moses.

¹¹So I swore on oath in My anger, “They shall never enter My rest.”

¹⁹When the Lord your God gives you rest from the enemies around you in the land that He is giving you to possess as an inheritance, you are to blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget!

⁸For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day.

⁹There remains, then, a Sabbath rest for the people of God.

¹⁰Arise and depart, for this is not your place of rest, because its defilement brings destruction—a grievous destruction!

²⁵For David had said, “The Lord, the God of Israel, has given rest to His people and has come to dwell in Jerusalem forever.

²⁸They will no longer be prey for the nations, and the beasts of the earth will not consume them. They will dwell securely, and no one will frighten them.

¹¹the sounds of joy and gladness, the voices of the bride and bridegroom, and the voices of those bringing thank offerings into the house of the Lord, saying: ‘Give thanks to the Lord of Hosts, for the Lord is good; His loving devotion endures forever.’ For I will restore the land from captivity as in former times, says the Lord.

²⁷Go to the top of Pisgah and look to the west and north and south and east. See the land with your own eyes, for you will not cross this Jordan.

²²For I will not be crossing the Jordan, because I must die in this land. But you shall cross over and take possession of that good land.

³¹For you are about to cross the Jordan to enter and possess the land that the Lord your God is giving you. When you take possession of it and settle in it,

³³But whoever listens to me will dwell in safety, secure from the fear of evil.”

²⁰Each year you and your household are to eat it before the Lord your God in the place the Lord will choose.

⁵Instead, you must seek the place the Lord your God will choose from among all your tribes to establish as a dwelling for His Name, and there you must go.

²You are to offer to the Lord your God the Passover sacrifice from the herd or flock in the place the Lord will choose as a dwelling for His Name.

³You must not eat leavened bread with it; for seven days you are to eat with it unleavened bread, the bread of affliction, because you left the land of Egypt in haste—so that you may remember for the rest of your life the day you left the land of Egypt.

⁶Now if a Levite moves from any town of residence throughout Israel and comes in all earnestness to the place the Lord will choose,

⁸If a case is too difficult for you to judge, whether the controversy within your gates is regarding bloodshed, lawsuits, or assaults, you must go up to the place the Lord your God will choose.

²⁰Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews say that the place where one must worship is in Jerusalem.”

²¹“Believe Me, woman,” Jesus replied, “a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.

⁷There, in the presence of the Lord your God, you and your households shall eat and rejoice in all you do, because the Lord your God has blessed you.

¹²When you have finished laying aside a tenth of all your produce in the third year, the year of the tithe, you are to give it to the Levite, the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, that they may eat and be filled within your gates.

⁹That is why Levi has no portion or inheritance among his brothers; the Lord is his inheritance, as the Lord your God promised him.

²⁹Then the Levite (because he has no portion or inheritance among you), the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow within your gates may come and eat and be satisfied. And the Lord your God will bless you in all the work of your hands.

¹⁹and be careful not to neglect the Levites as long as you live in your land.

¹Hallelujah! How good it is to sing praises to our God, how pleasant and lovely to praise Him!

²“Speak to Aaron, his sons, and all the Israelites and tell them this is what the Lord has commanded:

³‘Anyone from the house of Israel who slaughters an ox, a lamb, or a goat in the camp or outside of it

¹⁷The high places were not removed from Israel, but Asa’s heart was fully devoted all his days.

³⁴And Baasha did evil in the sight of the Lord and walked in the way of Jeroboam and in his sin, which he had caused Israel to commit.

⁶To that place you are to bring your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and heave offerings, your vow offerings and freewill offerings, as well as the firstborn of your herds and flocks.

²⁸After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves and said to the people, “Going up to Jerusalem is too much for you. Here, O Israel, are your gods, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.”

²⁹One calf he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan.

⁵Instead, you must seek the place the Lord your God will choose from among all your tribes to establish as a dwelling for His Name, and there you must go.

¹⁹that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men’s trespasses against them. And He has committed to us the message of reconciliation.

¹¹then the Lord your God will choose a dwelling for His Name. And there you are to bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all the choice offerings you vow to the Lord.

⁷But I will enter Your house by the abundance of Your loving devotion; in reverence I will bow down toward Your holy temple.

¹¹Sing praises to the Lord, who dwells in Zion; proclaim His deeds among the nations.

¹⁵Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise, the fruit of lips that confess His name.

⁵the deer, the gazelle, the roe deer, the wild goat, the ibex, the antelope, and the mountain sheep.

²⁰When the Lord your God expands your territory as He has promised, and you crave meat and say, “I want to eat meat,” you may eat it whenever you want.

²¹If the place where the Lord your God chooses to put His Name is too far from you, then you may slaughter any of the herd or flock He has given you, as I have commanded you, and you may eat it within your gates whenever you want.

²²Eat it within your gates; both the ceremonially unclean and clean may eat it as they would a gazelle or a deer.

²³But you must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

²⁶Then you may spend the money on anything you desire: cattle, sheep, wine, strong drink, or anything you wish. You are to feast there in the presence of the Lord your God and rejoice with your household.

³‘Anyone from the house of Israel who slaughters an ox, a lamb, or a goat in the camp or outside of it

⁴instead of bringing it to the entrance to the Tent of Meeting to present it as an offering to the Lord before His tabernacle—that man shall incur bloodguilt. He has shed blood and must be cut off from among his people.

⁴But you must not eat meat with its lifeblood still in it.

²³But you must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

²⁹You must abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell.

²³Only be sure not to eat the blood, because the blood is the life, and you must not eat the life with the meat.

²⁴You must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

⁴For every creation of God is good, and nothing that is received with thanksgiving should be rejected,

¹⁰If anyone from the house of Israel or a foreigner living among them eats any blood, I will set My face against that person and cut him off from among his people.

¹¹For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for your souls upon the altar; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.

¹⁴I have not eaten any of the sacred portion while in mourning, or removed any of it while unclean, or offered any of it for the dead. I have obeyed the Lord my God; I have done everything You commanded me.

²²You must be sure to set aside a tenth of all the produce brought forth each year from your fields.

²³And you are to eat a tenth of your grain, new wine, and oil, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks, in the presence of the Lord your God at the place He will choose as a dwelling for His Name, so that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always.

⁶To that place you are to bring your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and heave offerings, your vow offerings and freewill offerings, as well as the firstborn of your herds and flocks.

¹¹then the Lord your God will choose a dwelling for His Name. And there you are to bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all the choice offerings you vow to the Lord.

³⁰Thus any tithe from the land, whether from the seed of the land or the fruit of the trees, belongs to the Lord; it is holy to the Lord.

³¹If a man wishes to redeem part of his tithe, he must add a fifth to its value.

²¹Behold, I have given to the Levites all the tithes in Israel as an inheritance in return for the work they do, the service of the Tent of Meeting.

²²No longer may the Israelites come near to the Tent of Meeting, or they will incur guilt and die.

⁷There, in the presence of the Lord your God, you and your households shall eat and rejoice in all you do, because the Lord your God has blessed you.

²³And you are to eat a tenth of your grain, new wine, and oil, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks, in the presence of the Lord your God at the place He will choose as a dwelling for His Name, so that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always.

⁵Instead, you must seek the place the Lord your God will choose from among all your tribes to establish as a dwelling for His Name, and there you must go.

³¹So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God.

⁴⁶With one accord they continued to meet daily in the temple courts and to break bread from house to house, sharing their meals with gladness and sincerity of heart,

¹⁹and be careful not to neglect the Levites as long as you live in your land.

⁴Moreover, he commanded the people living in Jerusalem to make a contribution for the priests and Levites so that they could devote themselves to the Law of the Lord.

⁵As soon as the order went out, the Israelites generously provided the firstfruits of the grain, new wine, oil, and honey, and of all the produce of the field, and they brought in an abundance—a tithe of everything.

³⁴We have cast lots among the priests, Levites, and people for the donation of wood by our families at the appointed times each year. They are to bring it to the house of our God to burn on the altar of the Lord our God, as it is written in the Law.

³⁵We will also bring the firstfruits of our land and of every fruit tree to the house of the Lord year by year.

¹³Moreover, the priests and Levites from all their districts throughout Israel stood with Rehoboam.

¹⁴For the Levites left their pasturelands and their possessions and went to Judah and Jerusalem, because Jeroboam and his sons had rejected them as priests of the Lord.

¹⁰Isn’t He actually speaking on our behalf? Indeed, this was written for us, because when the plowman plows and the thresher threshes, they should also expect to share in the harvest.

¹¹If we have sown spiritual seed among you, is it too much for us to reap a material harvest from you?

²⁷And do not neglect the Levite within your gates, since he has no portion or inheritance among you.

²⁸At the end of every three years, bring a tenth of all your produce for that year and lay it up within your gates.

⁸And if the Lord your God enlarges your territory, as He swore to your fathers, and gives you all the land He promised them,

²⁴Every place where the sole of your foot treads will be yours. Your territory will extend from the wilderness to Lebanon, and from the Euphrates River to the Western Sea.

²⁴For I will drive out the nations before you and enlarge your borders, and no one will covet your land when you go up three times a year to appear before the Lord your God.

¹⁴Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and east and north and south. All the families of the earth will be blessed through you and your offspring.

¹⁰And Jabez called out to the God of Israel, “If only You would bless me and enlarge my territory! May Your hand be with me and keep me from harm, so that I will be free from pain.” And God granted the request of Jabez.

¹A Psalm of David, when he was in the Wilderness of Judah. O God, You are my God. Earnestly I seek You; my soul thirsts for You. My body yearns for You in a dry and weary land without water.

⁵Instead, you must seek the place the Lord your God will choose from among all your tribes to establish as a dwelling for His Name, and there you must go.

¹²May God, who has caused His Name to dwell there, overthrow any king or people who lifts a hand to alter this decree or to destroy this house of God in Jerusalem. I, Darius, have issued the decree. Let it be carried out with diligence.

¹¹and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God in the place He will choose as a dwelling for His Name—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates, as well as the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widows among you.

²⁴You are to make for Me an altar of earth, and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and peace offerings, your sheep and goats and cattle. In every place where I cause My name to be remembered, I will come to you and bless you.

²you are to take some of the firstfruits of all your produce from the soil of the land that the Lord your God is giving you and put them in a basket. Then go to the place the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for His Name,

¹³Thus King Rehoboam established himself in Jerusalem and reigned. He was forty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city the Lord had chosen from all the tribes of Israel in which to put His Name. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite.

¹⁵But whenever you want, you may slaughter and eat meat within any of your gates, according to the blessing the Lord your God has given you. Both the ceremonially clean and unclean may eat it as they would a gazelle or deer,

¹⁶but you must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

¹¹For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for your souls upon the altar; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.

⁴But you must not eat meat with its lifeblood still in it.

¹³And if any Israelite or foreigner living among them hunts down a wild animal or bird that may be eaten, he must drain its blood and cover it with dirt.

¹⁴For the life of all flesh is its blood. Therefore I have told the Israelites, ‘You must not eat the blood of any living thing, because the life of all flesh is its blood; whoever eats it must be cut off.’

¹⁶Then the priest is to burn the food on the altar as a food offering, a pleasing aroma. All the fat is the Lord’s.

¹⁷This is a permanent statute for the generations to come, wherever you live: You must not eat any fat or any blood.”

¹⁶but you must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

¹⁶but you must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

²³But you must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

¹⁰Tell the righteous it will be well with them, for they will enjoy the fruit of their labor.

²⁶saying, “If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in His eyes, and pay attention to His commands, and keep all His statutes, then I will not bring on you any of the diseases I inflicted on the Egyptians. For I am the Lord who heals you.”

³⁸If you listen to all that I command you, walk in My ways, and do what is right in My sight in order to keep My statutes and commandments as My servant David did, then I will be with you. I will build you a lasting dynasty just as I built for David, and I will give Israel to you.

⁴⁰Keep His statutes and commandments, which I am giving you today, so that you and your children after you may prosper, and that you may live long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you for all time.

¹⁸because you obey the Lord your God, keeping all His commandments I am giving you today and doing what is right in the eyes of the Lord your God.

¹⁸Do what is right and good in the sight of the Lord, so that it may be well with you and that you may enter and possess the good land that the Lord your God swore to give your fathers,

¹⁹All the holy offerings that the Israelites present to the Lord I give to you and to your sons and daughters as a permanent statute. It is a permanent covenant of salt before the Lord for you and your offspring.”

⁹Every sacred contribution the Israelites bring to the priest shall belong to him.

¹⁰Each man’s sacred gifts are his own, but whatever he gives to the priest will belong to the priest.”

¹⁷Within your gates you must not eat the tithe of your grain or new wine or oil, the firstborn of your herds or flocks, any of the offerings that you have vowed to give, or your freewill offerings or special gifts.

¹⁸Instead, you must eat them in the presence of the Lord your God at the place the Lord your God will choose—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates. Rejoice before the Lord your God in all you do,

¹¹then the Lord your God will choose a dwelling for His Name. And there you are to bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all the choice offerings you vow to the Lord.

²⁰Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and watch over me on this journey, and if He will provide me with food to eat and clothes to wear,

⁶To that place you are to bring your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and heave offerings, your vow offerings and freewill offerings, as well as the firstborn of your herds and flocks.

¹³The entrails and legs must be washed with water, and the priest shall present all of it and burn it on the altar; it is a burnt offering, a food offering, a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

⁹The entrails and legs must be washed with water, and the priest shall burn all of it on the altar as a burnt offering, a food offering, a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

¹¹For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for your souls upon the altar; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.

⁵And he shall slaughter the young bull before the Lord, and Aaron’s sons the priests are to present the blood and splatter it on all sides of the altar at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.

³⁰Then the priest is to take some of its blood with his finger, put it on the horns of the altar of burnt offering, and pour out the rest of the blood at the base of the altar.

¹⁰If you keep My commandments, you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and remain in His love.

¹⁴You are My friends if you do what I command you.

²⁵Do not eat it, so that it may go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is right in the eyes of the Lord.

⁴⁰Keep His statutes and commandments, which I am giving you today, so that you and your children after you may prosper, and that you may live long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you for all time.

⁵Then I said: “O Lord, God of heaven, the great and awesome God who keeps His covenant of loving devotion with those who love Him and keep His commandments,

³You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.

⁴See, I have allotted as an inheritance to your tribes these remaining nations, including all the nations I have already cut off, from the Jordan westward to the Great Sea.

¹When the Lord your God has cut off the nations whose land He is giving you, and when you have driven them out and settled in their cities and houses,

³But understand that today the Lord your God goes across ahead of you as a consuming fire; He will destroy them and subdue them before you. And you will drive them out and annihilate them swiftly, as the Lord has promised you.

⁵⁵He drove out nations before them and apportioned their inheritance; He settled the tribes of Israel in their tents.

²³For My angel will go before you and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites, and Jebusites, and I will annihilate them.

³²When you say, ‘Let us be like the nations, like the peoples of the lands, serving wood and stone,’ what you have in mind will never come to pass.

²This is what the Lord says: “Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by the signs in the heavens, though the nations themselves are terrified by them.

¹⁶You must destroy all the peoples the Lord your God will deliver to you. Do not look on them with pity. Do not worship their gods, for that will be a snare to you.

³⁴They did not destroy the peoples as the Lord had commanded them,

³⁵but they mingled with the nations and adopted their customs.

²⁸When I brought them into the land that I swore to give them and they saw any high hill or leafy tree, there they offered their sacrifices, presented offerings that provoked Me, sent up their fragrant incense, and poured out their drink offerings.

¹⁷So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking.

³⁵They have built the high places of Baal in the Valley of Ben-hinnom to make their sons and daughters pass through the fire to Molech—something I never commanded them, nor had it ever entered My mind, that they should commit such an abomination and cause Judah to sin.

⁹When you enter the land that the Lord your God is giving you, do not imitate the detestable ways of the nations there.

¹⁰Let no one be found among you who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, practices divination or conjury, interprets omens, practices sorcery,

¹⁵They rejected His statutes and the covenant He had made with their fathers, as well as the decrees He had given them. They pursued worthless idols and became worthless themselves, going after the surrounding nations that the Lord had commanded them not to imitate.

¹⁶They abandoned all the commandments of the Lord their God and made for themselves two cast idols of calves and an Asherah pole. They bowed down to all the host of heaven and served Baal.

³¹They have built the high places of Topheth in the Valley of Ben-hinnom so they could burn their sons and daughters in the fire—something I never commanded, nor did it even enter My mind.

²And he did evil in the sight of the Lord by following the abominations of the nations that the Lord had driven out before the Israelites.

⁵It is not because of your righteousness or uprightness of heart that you are going in to possess their land, but it is because of their wickedness that the Lord your God is driving out these nations before you, to keep the promise He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

²You must not add to or subtract from what I command you, so that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I am giving you.

¹⁸I testify to everyone who hears the words of prophecy in this book: If anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book.

¹⁹And if anyone takes away from the words of this book of prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and the holy city, which are described in this book.

⁷Above all, be strong and very courageous. Be careful to observe all the law that My servant Moses commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right or to the left, so that you may prosper wherever you go.

⁶Do not add to His words, lest He rebuke you and prove you a liar.

¹⁸because you obey the Lord your God, keeping all His commandments I am giving you today and doing what is right in the eyes of the Lord your God.

²⁰and teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”