Study Desk

The Lord did not give you his love or take you for himself because you were more in number than any other people; for you were the smallest of the nations:

But because of his love for you, and in order to keep his oath to your fathers, the Lord took you out with the strength of his hand, making you free from the prison-house and from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.

Like the nations which the Lord is cutting off before you, so you will be cut off; because you would not give ear to the voice of the Lord your God.

And after the Lord has sent them in flight from before you, say not in your heart, Because of my righteousness the Lord has given me this land; when it is because of their evil-doing that the Lord is driving these nations out before you.

Not for your righteousness or because your hearts are upright are you going in to take their land; but because of the evil-doing of these nations the Lord your God is driving them out from before you, and to give effect to his oath to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

And I went down on my face before the Lord, as at the first, for forty days and forty nights, without taking food or drinking water, because of all your sin, in doing evil in the eyes of the Lord and moving him to wrath.

For I was full of fear because of the wrath of the Lord which was burning against you, with your destruction in view. But again the Lord's ear was open to my prayer.

So I went down on my face in prayer before the Lord for forty days and forty nights as I did at first; because the Lord had said that he would put an end to you.

Or it may be said in the land from which you have taken them, Because the Lord was not able to take them into the land which he said he would give them, and because of his hate for them, he has taken them out to put them to death in the waste land.

There you and all your families are to make a feast before the Lord your God, with joy in everything to which you put your hand, because the Lord has given you his blessing.

And you will be glad before the Lord your God, you and your sons and your daughters, and your men-servants and your women-servants, and the Levite who is with you in your house, because he has no part or heritage among you.

When the Lord your God makes wide the limit of your land, as he has said, and you say, I will take flesh for my food, because you have a desire for it; then you may take whatever flesh you have a desire for.

Let him be stoned with stones till he is dead; because it was his purpose to make you false to the Lord your God, who took you out of the land of Egypt, out of the prison-house.

But even among these, there are some which may not be used for food: such as the camel, the hare, and the coney, which are unclean to you, because, though their food comes back, the horn of their feet is not parted in two.

And the pig is unclean to you, because though it has a division in the horn of its foot, its food does not come back; their flesh may not be used for food or their dead bodies touched by you.

And if the way is so long that you are not able to take these things to the place marked out by the Lord your God for his name, when he has given you his blessing, because it is far away from you;

And the Levite, because he has no part or heritage in the land, and the man from a strange country, and the child who has no father, and the widow, who are living among you, will come and take food and have enough; and so the blessing of the Lord your God will be on you in everything you do.

This is how it is to be done: every creditor is to give up his right to whatever he has let his neighbour have; he is not to make his neighbour, his countryman, give it back; because a general forgiveness has been ordered by the Lord.

But it is right for you to give to him, without grief of heart: for because of this, the blessing of the Lord your God will be on all your work and on everything to which you put your hand.

But if he says to you, I have no desire to go away from you; because you and your family are dear to him and he is happy with you;