13Take care not to sacrifice your burnt offerings in any place you like, 14but only in the place that the LORD will choose in one of your tribal territories. There you shall sacrifice your burnt offerings and there you shall observe all that I enjoin upon you. 15But whenever you desire, you may slaughter and eat meat in any of your settlements, according to the blessing that the LORD your God has granted you. The unclean and the clean alike may partake of it, as of the gazelle and the deer.b 16But you must not partake of the blood; you shall pour it out on the ground like water.
17You may not partake in your settlements of the tithes of your new grain or wine or oil, or of the firstlings of your herds and flocks, or of any of the votive offerings that you vow, or of your freewill offerings, or of your contributions.a 18These you must consume before the LORD your God in the place that the LORD your God will choose—you and your sons and your daughters, your male and female slaves, and the Levite in your settlements—happy before the LORD your God in all your undertakings. 19Be sure not to neglect the Levite as long as you live in your land.
20When the LORD enlarges your territory, as He has promised you, and you say, “I shall eat some meat,” for you have the urge to eat meat, you may eat meat whenever you wish. 21If the place where the LORD has chosen to establish His name is too far from you, you may slaughter any of the cattle or sheep that the LORD gives you, as I have instructed you; and you may eat to your heart’s content in your settlements. 22Eat it, however, as the gazelle and the deer are eaten: the unclean may eat it together with the clean. 23But make sure that you do not partake of the blood; for the blood is the life, and you must not consume the life with the flesh. 24You must not partake of it; you must pour it out on the ground like water: 25you must not partake of it, in order that it may go well with you and with your descendants to come, for you will be doing what is right in the sight of the LORD.
26But such sacred and votive donations as you may have c-shall be taken by you-c to the site that the LORD will choose. 27You shall offer your burnt offerings, both the flesh and the blood, on the altar of the LORD your God; and of your other sacrifices, the blood shall be poured out on the altar of the LORD your God, and you shall eat the flesh.
28Be careful to heed all these commandments that I enjoin upon you; thus it will go well with you and with your descendants after you forever, for you will be doing what is good and right in the sight of the LORD your God.
29When the LORD your God has cut down before you the nations that you are about to enter and dispossess, and you have dispossessed them and settled in their land, 30beware of being lured into their ways after they have been wiped out before you! Do not inquire about their gods, saying, “How did those nations worship their gods? I too will follow those practices.” 31You shall not act thus toward the LORD your God, for they perform for their gods every abhorrent act that the LORD detests; they even offer up their sons and daughters in fire to their gods.
13 1Be careful to observe only that which I enjoin upon you: neither add to it nor take away from it.
2If there appears among you a prophet or a dream-diviner and he gives you a sign or a portent, 3saying, “Let us follow and worship another god”— whom you have not experienceda—even if the sign or portent that he named to you comes true, 4do not heed the words of that prophet or that dream-diviner. For the LORD your God is testing you to see whether you really love the LORD your God with all your heart and soul. 5Follow none but the LORD your God, and revere none but Him; observe His commandments alone, and heed only His orders; worship none but Him, and hold fast to Him. 6As for that prophet or dream-diviner, he shall be put to death; for he urged disloyalty to the LORD your God—who freed you from the land of Egypt and who redeemed you from the house of bondage—to make you stray from the path that the LORD your God commanded you to follow. Thus you will sweep out evil from your midst.
7If your brother, b-your own mother’s son,-b or your son or daughter, or the wife of your bosom, or your c-closest friend-c entices you in secret, saying, “Come let us worship other gods”— whom neither you nor your fathers have experienceda—8from among the gods of the peoples around you, either near to you or distant, anywhere from one end of the earth to the other: 9do not assent or give heed to him. Show him no pity or compassion, and do not shield him; 10but take his life. Let your hand be the first against him to put him to death, and the hand of the rest of the people thereafter. 11Stone him to death, for he sought to make you stray from the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 12Thus all Israel will hear and be afraid, and such evil things will not be done again in your midst.
13If you hear it said, of one of the towns that the LORD your God is giving you to dwell in, 14that some scoundrels from among you have gone and subverted the inhabitants of their town, saying, “Come let us worship other gods”— whom you have not experienced—15you shall investigate and inquire and interrogate thoroughly. If it is true, the fact is established—that abhorrent thing was perpetrated in your midst—16put the inhabitants of that town to the sword and put its cattle to the sword. Doom it and all that is in it to destruction: 17gather all its spoil into the open square, and burn the town and all its spoil as a holocaust to the LORD your God. And it shall remain an everlasting ruin, never to be rebuilt. 18Let nothing that has been doomed stick to your hand, in order that the LORD may turn from His blazing anger and show you compassion, and in His compassion increase you as He promised your fathers on oath—19for you will be heeding the LORD your God, obeying all His commandments that I enjoin upon you this day, doing what is right in the sight of the LORD your God.
14 You are children of the LORD your God. You shall not gash yourselves or shave the front of your heads because of the dead. 2For you are a people consecrated to the LORD your God: the LORD your God chose you from among all other peoples on earth to be His treasured people.
3You shall not eat anything abhorrent. 4These are the animals that you may eat: the ox, the sheep, and the goat; 5athe deer, the gazelle, the roebuck, the wild goat, the ibex, the antelope, the mountain sheep, 6and any other animal that has true hoofs which are cleft in two and brings up the cud—such you may eat. 7But the following, which do bring up the cud or have true hoofs which are cleft through, you may not eat: the camel, the hare, and the daman—for although they bring up the cud, they have no true hoofs—they are unclean for you; 8also the swine—for although it has true hoofs, it does not bring up the cud—is unclean for you. You shall not eat of their flesh or touch their carcasses.
9These you may eat of all that live in water: you may eat anything that has fins and scales. 10But you may not eat anything that has no fins and scales: it is unclean for you.
11You may eat any clean bird. 12The following you may not eat: athe eagle, the vulture, and the black vulture; 13the kite, the falcon, and the buzzard of any variety; 14every variety of raven; 15the ostrich, the nighthawk, the sea gull, and the hawk of any variety; 16the little owl, the great owl, and the white owl; 17the pelican, the bustard, and the cormorant; 18the stork, any variety of heron, the hoopoe, and the bat.
19All winged swarming things are unclean for you: they may not be eaten. 20You may eat only clean winged creatures.
21You shall not eat anything that has died a natural death; give it to the stranger in your community to eat, or you may sell it to a foreigner. For you are a people consecrated to the LORD your God.
You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s
