The Wilderness Years

Thou shalt celebrate the solemnity also of tabernacles seven days, when thou hast gathered in thy fruit of the barnfloor and of the winepress.

And thou shalt make merry in thy festival time, thou, thy son, and thy daughter, thy manservant, and thy maidservant, the Levite also and the stranger, and the fatherless and the widow that are within thy gates.

Seven days shalt thou celebrate feasts to the Lord thy God in the place which the Lord shall choose: and the Lord thy God will bless thee in all thy fruits, and in every work of thy hands, and thou shalt be in joy.

Three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the Lord thy God in the place which he shall choose: in the feast of unleavened bread, in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles. No one shall appear with his hands empty before the Lord:

But every one shall offer according to what he hath, according to the blessing of the Lord his God, which he shall give him.

Thou shalt appoint judges and magistrates in all thy gates, which the Lord thy God shall give thee, in all thy tribes: that they may judge the people with just judgment,

And not go aside to either part. Thou shalt not accept person nor gifts: for gifts blind the eyes of the wise, and change the words of the just.

Thou shalt follow justly after that which is just: that thou mayst live and possess the land, which the Lord thy God shall give thee.

Thou shalt plant no grove, nor any tree near the altar of the Lord thy God:

Neither shalt thou make nor set up to thyself a statue: which things the Lord thy God hateth.

Thou shalt not sacrifice to the Lord thy God a sheep, or an ox, wherein there is blemish, or any fault: for that is an abomination to the Lord thy God.

When there shall be found among you within any of thy gates, which the Lord thy God shall give thee, man or woman that do evil in the sight of the Lord thy God, and transgress his covenant,

So as to go and serve strange gods, and adore them, the sun and the moon, and all the host of heaven, which I have not commanded:

And this is told thee, and hearing it thou hast inquired diligently, and found it to be true, and that the abomination is committed in Israel:

Thou shalt bring forth the man or the woman, who have committed that most wicked thing, to the gates of thy city, and they shall be stoned.

By the mouth of two or three witnesses shall he die that is to be slain. Let no man be put to death, when only one beareth witness against him.

The hands of the witnesses shall be first upon him to kill him, and afterwards the hands of the rest of the people: that thou mayst take away the evil out of the midst of thee.

If thou perceive that there be among you a hard and doubtful matter in judgment between blood and blood, cause and cause, leprosy and leprosy: and thou see that the words of the judges within thy gates do vary: arise, and go up to the place, which the Lord thy God shall choose.

And thou shalt come to the priests of the Levitical race, and to the judge, that shall be at that time: and thou shalt ask of them, and they shall shew thee the truth of the judgment.

And thou shalt do whatsoever they shall say, that preside in the place, which the Lord shall choose, and what they shall teach thee,

According to his law; and thou shalt follow their sentence: neither shalt thou decline to the right hand nor to the left hand.

But he that will be proud, and refuse to obey the commandment of the priest, who ministereth at that time to the Lord thy God, and the decree of the judge, that man shall die, and thou shalt take away the evil from Israel:

And all the people hearing it shall fear, that no one afterwards swell with pride.

When thou art come into the land, which the Lord thy God will give thee, and possessest it, and shalt say: I will set a king over me, as all nations have that are round about:

Thou shalt set him whom the Lord thy God shall choose out of the number of thy brethren. Thou mayst not make a man of another nation king, that is not thy brother.