Study Desk

"For six days you shall eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day there shall be a festive assembly to the LORD your God; you shall do no work on it.

"Then you shall celebrate the Feast of Weeks to the LORD your God with a voluntary offering of your hand in a proportional amount, which you shall give just as the LORD your God blesses you;

and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God, you, your son and your daughter, and your male and female slaves, and the Levite who is in your town, and the stranger, the orphan, and the widow who are in your midst, at the place where the LORD your God chooses to establish His name.

"For seven days you shall celebrate a feast to the LORD your God in the place which the LORD chooses, because the LORD your God will bless you in all your produce and in all the work of your hands, so that you will be altogether joyful.

"Three times a year all your males shall appear before the LORD your God at the place which He chooses: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Booths; and they are not to appear before the LORD empty-handed.

"Everyone shall give as he is able, in accordance with the blessing of the LORD your God which He has given you.

"You shall appoint for yourself judges and officers in all your towns which the LORD your God is giving you, according to your tribes, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment.

"Justice, and only justice, you shall pursue, so that you may live and possess the land which the LORD your God is giving you.

"You shall not plant for yourself an Asherah of any kind of tree beside the altar of the LORD your God, which you shall make for yourself.

"And you shall not set up for yourself a memorial stone, which the LORD your God hates.

"You shall not sacrifice to the LORD your God an ox or a sheep which has a blemish or any defect, for that is a detestable thing to the LORD your God.

"If there is found in your midst, in any of your towns which the LORD your God is giving you, a man or a woman who does what is evil in the sight of the LORD your God, by violating His covenant,

"If a case is too difficult for you to decide, between one kind of homicide or another, between one kind of lawsuit or another, and between one kind of assault or another, that are cases of dispute in your courts, then you shall arise and go up to the place which the LORD your God chooses.

"But the person who acts insolently by not listening to the priest who stands there to serve the LORD your God, nor to the judge, that person shall die; so you shall eliminate the evil from Israel.

"When you enter the land which the LORD your God is giving you, and you take possession of it and live in it, and you say, 'I will appoint a king over me like all the nations who are around me,'

you shall in fact appoint a king over you whom the LORD your God chooses. One from among your countrymen you shall appoint as king over yourselves; you may not put a foreigner over yourselves, anyone who is not your countryman.

"And it shall be with him, and he shall read it all the days of his life, so that he will learn to fear the LORD his God, by carefully following all the words of this Law and these statutes,

"For the LORD your God has chosen him and his sons from all your tribes, to stand to serve in the name of the LORD always.

then he shall serve in the name of the LORD his God, like all his fellow Levites who stand there before the LORD.

"When you enter the land which the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not learn to imitate the detestable things of those nations.