Study Desk

"You shall also remember that you were a slave in Egypt, and you shall be careful and comply with these statutes.

"You shall celebrate the Feast of Booths for seven days when you have gathered in from your threshing floor and your wine vat;

and you shall rejoice in your feast, you, your son and your daughter, and your male and female slaves, and the Levite, the stranger, the orphan, and the widow who are in your towns.

"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.

"You shall not distort justice, you shall not show partiality; and you shall not accept a bribe, because a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and distorts the words of the righteous.

"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.

and if it is reported to you and you have heard about it, then you shall investigate thoroughly. And if it is true and the report is trustworthy that this detestable thing has been done in Israel,

then you are to bring out to your gates that man or woman who has done this evil deed, that is, the man or the woman, and you shall stone them to death.

"On the testimony of two witnesses or three witnesses, the condemned shall be put to death; he shall not be put to death on the testimony of only one witness.

"The hands of the witnesses shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hands of all the people. So you shall eliminate the evil from your midst.

"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.

"So you shall come to the Levitical priests or the judge who is in office in those days, and you shall inquire of them and they will declare to you the verdict.

"Then you shall act in accordance with the terms of the verdict which they declare to you from that place which the LORD chooses; and you shall be careful to act in accordance with everything that they instruct you to do.

"In accordance with the terms of the law about which they instruct you, and in accordance with the verdict which they tell you, you shall act; you shall not turn aside from the word which they declare to you, to the right or the left.