Deuteronomy 12:8

THE MESSAGE

Don't continue doing things the way we're doing them at present, each of us doing as we wish. Until now you haven't arrived at the goal, the resting place, the inheritance that God , your God, is giving you. But the minute you cross the Jordan River and settle into the land God , your God, is enabling you to inherit, he'll give you rest from all your surrounding enemies. You'll be able to settle down and live in safety.

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
“You are not to do as we are doing here today; everyone is doing whatever seems right in his own sight.

Hebrew Names Version
You shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatever is right in his own eyes;

King James Version
Ye shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes.

Lexham English Bible
"You must not do just as we are doing here today, each according to all that is right in his eyes.

English Standard Version
"You shall not do according to all that we are doing here today, everyone doing whatever is right in his own eyes,

New Century Version
Do not worship the way we have been doing today, each person doing what he thinks is right.

New English Translation
You must not do like we are doing here today, with everyone doing what seems best to him,

Amplified Bible
"You shall not do at all what we are doing here [in the camp] today, every man doing whatever is right in his [own] eyes.

New American Standard Bible
"You shall not do at all what we are doing here today, everyone doing whatever is right in his own eyes;

Geneva Bible (1587)
Ye shall not doe after all these things that we doe here this day: that is, euery man whatsoeuer seemeth him good in his owne eyes.

Legacy Standard Bible
"You shall not do at all what we are doing here today, every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes;

Complete Jewish Bible
You will not do things the way we do them here today, where everyone does whatever in his own opinion seems right;

Darby Translation
Ye shall not do after all that we do here this day, each one whatever is right in his own eyes.

Easy-to-Read Version
"You must not continue to worship the way we have been worshiping. Until now each of us has been worshiping God any way we wanted.

George Lamsa Translation
You shall not do according to all the things that we are doing here this day, every man whatever is right in his own eyes.

Good News Translation
"When that time comes, you must not do as you have been doing. Until now you have all been worshiping as you please,

Literal Translation
You shall not do according to all that we are doing here today, each doing all that is right in his own eyes.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Ye shall do none of the thinges, yt we do here this daye, euery man what semeth him good in his awne eyes.

American Standard Version
Ye shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes;

Bible in Basic English
You are not to do things then in the way in which we now do them here, every man as it seems right to him:

Bishop's Bible (1568)
Ye shall not do after all the thinges that we do here this day, euery man what seemeth hym good in his owne eyes.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
Ye shall not do after all that we do here this day, every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes;

King James Version (1611)
Ye shall not do after all the things that we doe here this day, euery man whatsoeuer is right in his owne eyes.

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Ye shall not do altogether as we do here to-day, every man that which is pleasing in his own sight.

English Revised Version
Ye shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes:

Berean Standard Bible
You are not to do as we are doing here today, where everyone does what seems right in his own eyes.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Ye schulen not do there tho thingis whiche we don here to dai, ech man that semeth riytful to `hym silf.

Young's Literal Translation
`Ye do not do according to all that we are doing here to-day, each anything that is right in his own eyes,

Update Bible Version
You shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatever is right in his own eyes;

Webster's Bible Translation
Ye shall not do after all [the things] that we do here this day, every man whatever [is] right in his own eyes.

World English Bible
You shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatever is right in his own eyes;

New King James Version
"You shall not at all do as we are doing here today--every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes--

New Living Translation
"Your pattern of worship will change. Today all of you are doing as you please,

New Life Bible
You will not do at all the things we are doing here today, for every man is doing whatever is right in his own eyes.

New Revised Standard
You shall not act as we are acting here today, all of us according to our own desires,

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Ye must not do according to all that we are doing here to-day, - every man, whatsoever is right in his own eyes.

Douay-Rheims Bible
You shall not do there the things we do here this day, every man that which seemeth good to himself.

Revised Standard Version
You shall not do according to all that we are doing here this day, every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes;

New American Standard Bible (1995)
"You shall not do at all what we are doing here today, every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes;

Contextual Overview

⁵Instead find the site that God , your God, will choose and mark it with his name as a common center for all the tribes of Israel. Assemble there. Bring to that place your Absolution-Offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and Tribute-Offerings, your Vow-Offerings, your Freewill-Offerings, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks. Feast there in the Presence of God , your God. Celebrate everything that you and your families have accomplished under the blessing of God , your God. ⁸Don't continue doing things the way we're doing them at present, each of us doing as we wish. Until now you haven't arrived at the goal, the resting place, the inheritance that God , your God, is giving you. But the minute you cross the Jordan River and settle into the land God , your God, is enabling you to inherit, he'll give you rest from all your surrounding enemies. You'll be able to settle down and live in safety. ¹¹From then on, at the place that God , your God, chooses to mark with his name as the place where you can meet him, bring everything that I command you: your Absolution-Offerings and sacrifices, tithes and Tribute-Offerings, and the best of your Vow-Offerings that you vow to God . Celebrate there in the Presence of God , your God, you and your sons and daughters, your servants and maids, including the Levite living in your neighborhood because he has no place of his own in your inheritance. ¹³Be extra careful: Don't offer your Absolution-Offerings just any place that strikes your fancy. Offer your Absolution-Offerings only in the place that God chooses in one of your tribal regions. There and only there are you to bring all that I command you. ¹⁵ It's permissible to slaughter your nonsacrificial animals like gazelle and deer in your towns and eat all you want from them with the blessing of God , your God. Both the ritually clean and unclean may eat. ¹⁶But you may not eat the blood. Pour the blood out on the ground like water. Nor may you eat there the tithe of your grain, new wine, or olive oil; nor the firstborn of your herds and flocks; nor any of the Vow-Offerings that you vow; nor your Freewill-Offerings and Tribute-Offerings. All these you must eat in the Presence of God , your God, in the place God , your God, chooses—you, your son and daughter, your servant and maid, and the Levite who lives in your neighborhood. You are to celebrate in the Presence of God , your God, all the things you've been able to accomplish. ¹⁹ And make sure that for as long as you live on your land you never, never neglect the Levite. ²⁰When God , your God, expands your territory as he promised he would do, and you say, "I'm hungry for meat," because you happen to be craving meat at the time, go ahead and eat as much meat as you want. If you're too far away from the place that God , your God, has marked with his name, it's all right to slaughter animals from your herds and flocks that God has given you, as I've commanded you. In your own towns you may eat as much of them as you want. Just as the nonsacrificial animals like the gazelle and deer are eaten, you may eat them; the ritually unclean and clean may eat them at the same table. ²³Only this: Absolutely no blood. Don't eat the blood. Blood is life; don't eat the life with the meat. Don't eat it; pour it out on the ground like water. Don't eat it; then you'll have a good life, you and your children after you. By all means, do the right thing in God 's eyes. ²⁶And this: Lift high your Holy-Offerings and your Vow-Offerings and bring them to the place God designates. Sacrifice your Absolution-Offerings, the meat and blood, on the Altar of God , your God; pour out the blood of the Absolution-Offering on the Altar of God , your God; then you can go ahead and eat the meat.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

every man: Numbers 15:39, Judges 17:6, Judges 21:25, Proverbs 21:2, Amos 5:25, Acts 7:42

Reciprocal: Exodus 12:25 - when Leviticus 14:34 - When Joshua 3:9 - Hear the words Joshua 5:5 - they had not

Cross-References

Genesis 12:14
When Abram arrived in Egypt, the Egyptians took one look and saw that his wife was stunningly beautiful. Pharaoh's princes raved over her to Pharaoh. She was taken to live with Pharaoh.

Genesis 12:16
Because of her, Abram got along very well: he accumulated sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, men and women servants, and camels. But God hit Pharaoh hard because of Abram's wife Sarai; everybody in the palace got seriously sick.

Genesis 21:33
Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba and worshiped God there, praying to the Eternal God. Abraham lived in Philistine country for a long time.

Joshua 7:2
Joshua sent men from Jericho to Ai (The Ruin), which is near Beth Aven just east of Bethel. He instructed them, "Go up and spy out the land." The men went up and spied out Ai.

Joshua 8:3
Joshua and all his soldiers got ready to march on Ai. Joshua chose thirty thousand men, tough, seasoned fighters, and sent them off at night with these orders: "Look sharp now. Lie in ambush behind the city. Get as close as you can. Stay alert. I and the troops with me will approach the city head-on. When they come out to meet us just as before, we'll turn and run. They'll come after us, leaving the city. As we are off and running, they'll say, ‘They're running away just like the first time.' That's your signal to spring from your ambush and take the city. God , your God, will hand it to you on a platter. Once you have the city, burn it down. God says it, you do it. Go to it. I've given you your orders."

Nehemiah 11:31
The Benjaminites from Geba lived in: Micmash Aijah Bethel and its suburbs Anathoth Nob and Ananiah Hazor Ramah and Gittaim Hadid, Zeboim, and Neballat Lod and Ono and the Valley of the Craftsmen. Also some of the Levitical groups of Judah were assigned to Benjamin.

Isaiah 10:28
You Who Legislate Evil Doom to you who legislate evil, who make laws that make victims— Laws that make misery for the poor, that rob my destitute people of dignity, Exploiting defenseless widows, taking advantage of homeless children. What will you have to say on Judgment Day, when Doomsday arrives out of the blue? Who will you get to help you? What good will your money do you? A sorry sight you'll be then, huddled with the prisoners, or just some corpses stacked in the street. Even after all this, God is still angry, his fist still raised, ready to hit them again. "Doom to Assyria, weapon of my anger. My wrath is a cudgel in his hands! I send him against a godless nation, against the people I'm angry with. I command him to strip them clean, rob them blind, and then push their faces in the mud and leave them. But Assyria has another agenda; he has something else in mind. He's out to destroy utterly, to stamp out as many nations as he can. Assyria says, ‘Aren't my commanders all kings? Can't they do whatever they like? Didn't I destroy Calno as well as Carchemish? Hamath as well as Arpad? Level Samaria as I did Damascus? I've eliminated kingdoms full of gods far more impressive than anything in Jerusalem and Samaria. So what's to keep me from destroying Jerusalem in the same way I destroyed Samaria and all her god-idols?'" When the Master has finished dealing with Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he'll say, "Now it's Assyria's turn. I'll punish the bragging arrogance of the king of Assyria, his high and mighty posturing, the way he goes around saying, "‘I've done all this by myself. I know more than anyone. I've wiped out the boundaries of whole countries. I've walked in and taken anything I wanted. I charged in like a bull and toppled their kings from their thrones. I reached out my hand and took all that they treasured as easily as a boy taking a bird's eggs from a nest. Like a farmer gathering eggs from the henhouse, I gathered the world in my basket, And no one so much as fluttered a wing or squawked or even chirped.'" Does an ax take over from the one who swings it? Does a saw act more important than the sawyer? As if a shovel did its shoveling by using a ditch digger! As if a hammer used the carpenter to pound nails! Therefore the Master, God -of-the-Angel-Armies, will send a debilitating disease on his robust Assyrian fighters. Under the canopy of God's bright glory a fierce fire will break out. Israel's Light will burst into a conflagration. The Holy will explode into a firestorm, And in one day burn to cinders every last Assyrian thornbush. God will destroy the splendid trees and lush gardens. The Assyrian body and soul will waste away to nothing like a disease-ridden invalid. A child could count what's left of the trees on the fingers of his two hands. And on that Day also, what's left of Israel, the ragtag survivors of Jacob, will no longer be fascinated by abusive, battering Assyria. They'll lean on God , The Holy—yes, truly. The ragtag remnant—what's left of Jacob—will come back to the Strong God. Your people Israel were once like the sand on the seashore, but only a scattered few will return. Destruction is ordered, brimming over with righteousness. For the Master, God -of-the-Angel-Armies, will finish here what he started all over the globe. Therefore the Master, God -of-the-Angel-Armies, says: "My dear, dear people who live in Zion, don't be terrorized by the Assyrians when they beat you with clubs and threaten you with rods like the Egyptians once did. In just a short time my anger against you will be spent and I'll turn my destroying anger on them. I, God -of-the-Angel-Armies, will go after them with a cat-o'-nine-tails and finish them off decisively—as Gideon downed Midian at the rock Oreb, as Moses turned the tables on Egypt. On that day, Assyria will be pulled off your back, and the yoke of slavery lifted from your neck." Assyria's on the move: up from Rimmon, on to Aiath, through Migron, with a bivouac at Micmash. They've crossed the pass, set camp at Geba for the night. Ramah trembles with fright. Gibeah of Saul has run off. Cry for help, daughter of Gallim! Listen to her, Laishah! Do something, Anathoth! Madmenah takes to the hills. The people of Gebim flee in panic. The enemy's soon at Nob—nearly there! In sight of the city he shakes his fist At the mount of dear daughter Zion, the hill of Jerusalem. But now watch this: The Master, God -of-the-Angel-Armies, swings his ax and lops the branches, Chops down the giant trees, lays flat the towering forest-on-the-march. His ax will make toothpicks of that forest, that Lebanon-like army reduced to kindling.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Ye shall not do after all the things that we do here,.... In the wilderness, where they had no abiding, but were continually removing from place to place, and could not always observe punctually and precisely the exact order and time of their sacrifices and other things, nor offer them at any certain place, and many were doubtless neglected by them; see Amos 5:25

every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes; that did he, brought the above things when and where he pleased; not that there was no regard had to the laws and rules given, as if there was no priest in Israel; but they were not so exactly in all circumstances conformed to as they would be obliged to when they came into the land of Canaan, and had a certain place to bring their offerings to; so some in Aben Ezra observe, that one would give the firstling, another not, because it depended on the land, or was what they were obliged to only when they came into the land of Canaan; see Exodus 13:11 but he thinks the sense is, that they did not all fear God, and so did not do their duty.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Moses points out that heretofore they had not observed the prescribed order in their worship, because during their migratory life in the wilderness it had been impossible to do so. During their wanderings there were doubtless times when the tabernacle was not set up for days together, and when the daily sacrifice Numbers 28:3, together with many other ordinances, were necessarily omitted (compare Joshua 5:5). This consideration must be carefully borne in mind throughout Deuteronomy. It illustrates the necessity for a repetition of very much of the Sinaitic legislation, and suggests the reason why some parts are so urgently reiterated and impressed, while others are left unnoticed. Moses now warns the people that as they were about to quit their unsettled mode of life, God’s purpose of choosing for Himself a place to set His Name there would be executed, and the whole of the sacred ritual would consequently become obligatory. The “rest and safety” of Canaan is significantly laid down Deuteronomy 12:10-11 as the indispensable condition and basis for an entire fulfillment of the Law: the perfection of righteousness coinciding thus with the cessation of wanderings, dangers, and toils.