Study Desk

You shall be blameless before the LORD your God.

For these nations which you will dispossess listened to soothsayers and diviners; but as for you, the LORD your God has not appointed such for you.

"The LORD your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear,

according to all you desired of the LORD your God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, "Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God, nor let me see this great fire anymore, lest I die.'

Numbers 35:9-28; Joshua 20:1-9">[xr] "When the LORD your God has cut off the nations whose land the LORD your God is giving you, and you dispossess them and dwell in their cities and in their houses,

you shall separate three cities for yourself in the midst of your land which the LORD your God is giving you to possess.

You shall prepare roads for yourself, and divide into three parts the territory of your land which the LORD your God is giving you to inherit, that any manslayer may flee there.

"Now if the LORD your God enlarges your territory, as He swore to your fathers, and gives you the land which He promised to give to your fathers,

and if you keep all these commandments and do them, which I command you today, to love the LORD your God and to walk always in His ways, then you shall add three more cities for yourself besides these three,

lest innocent blood be shed in the midst of your land which the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, and thus guilt of bloodshed be upon you.

"You shall not remove your neighbor's landmark, which the men of old have set, in your inheritance which you will inherit in the land that the LORD your God is giving you to possess.

"When you go out to battle against your enemies, and see horses and chariots and people more numerous than you, do not be afraid of them; for the LORD your God is with you, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.

for the LORD your God is He who goes with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you.'

And when the LORD your God delivers it into your hands, you shall strike every male in it with the edge of the sword.

But the women, the little ones, the livestock, and all that is in the city, all its spoil, you shall plunder for yourself; and you shall eat the enemies' plunder which the LORD your God gives you.

"But of the cities of these peoples which the LORD your God gives you as an inheritance, you shall let nothing that breathes remain alive,

but you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite and the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite, just as the LORD your God has commanded you,

lest they teach you to do according to all their abominations which they have done for their gods, and you sin against the LORD your God.

"If anyone is found slain, lying in the field in the land which the LORD your God is giving you to possess, and it is not known who killed him,

Then the priests, the sons of Levi, shall come near, for the LORD your God has chosen them to minister to Him and to bless in the name of the LORD; by their word every controversy and every assault shall be settled.