Deuteronomy 24–27

Chapter 24

If a man take a wife, and have her, and she find not favour in his eyes, for some uncleanness: he shall write a bill of divorce, and shall give it in her hand, and send her out of his house.

²And when she is departed, and marrieth another husband,

³And he also hateth her, and hath given her a bill of divorce, and hath sent her out of his house or is dead:

⁴The former husband cannot take her again to wife: because she is defiled, and is become abominable before the Lord: lest thou cause thy land to sin, which the Lord thy God shall give thee to possess.

⁵When a man hath lately taken a wife, he shall not go out to war, neither shall any public business be enjoined him, but he shall be free at home without fault, that for one year he may rejoice with his wife.

⁶Thou shalt not take the nether, nor the upper millstone to pledge: for he hath pledged his life to thee.

⁷If any man be found soliciting his brother of the children of Israel, and selling him shall take a price, he shall be put to death, and thou shalt take away the evil from the midst of thee.

⁸Observe diligently that thou incur not the stroke of the leprosy, but thou shalt do whatsoever the priests of the Levitical race shall teach thee, according to what I have commanded them, and fulfil thou it carefully.

⁹Remember what the Lord your God did to Mary, in the way when you came out of Egypt.

¹⁰When thou shalt demand of thy neighbour any thing that he oweth thee, thou shalt not go into his house to take away a pledge:

¹¹But thou shalt stand without, and he shall bring out to thee what he hath.

¹²But if he be poor, the pledge shall not lodge with thee that night,

¹³But thou shalt restore it to him presently before the going down of the sun: that he may sleep in his own raiment and bless thee, and thou mayst have justice before the Lord thy God.

¹⁴Thou shalt not refuse the hire of the needy, and the poor, whether he be thy brother, or a stranger that dwelleth with thee in the land, and is within thy gates:

¹⁵But thou shalt pay him the price of his labour the same day, before the going down of the sun, because he is poor, and with it maintaineth his life: lest he cry against thee to the Lord, and it be reputed to thee for a sin.

¹⁶The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, nor the children for the fathers, but every one shall die for his own sin,

¹⁷Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger nor of the fatherless, neither shalt thou take away the widow’s raiment for a pledge.

¹⁸Remember that thou wast a slave in Egypt, and the Lord thy God delivered thee from thence. Therefore I command thee to do this thing.

¹⁹When thou hast reaped the corn in thy field, and hast forgot and left a sheaf, thou shalt not return to take it away: but thou shalt suffer the stranger, and the fatherless and the widow to take it away: that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the works of thy hands.

²⁰If thou have gathered the fruit of thy olive trees, thou shalt not return to gather whatsoever remaineth on the trees: but shalt leave it for the stranger, for the fatherless, and the widow.

²¹If thou make the vintage of thy vineyard, thou shalt not gather the clusters that remain, but they shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow.

²²Remember that thou also wast a bondman in Egypt, and therefore I command thee to do this thing.

Chapter 25

If there be a controversy between men, and they call upon the judges: they shall give the prize of justice to him whom they perceive to be just: and him whom they find to be wicked, they shall condemn of wickedness.

²And if they see that the offender be worthy of stripes: they shall lay him down, and shall cause him to be beaten before them. According to the measure of the sin shall the measure also of the stripes be:

³Yet so, that they exceed not the number of forty: lest thy brother depart shamefully torn before thy eyes.

⁴Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out thy corn on the floor.

⁵When brethren dwell together, and one of them dieth without children, the wife of the deceased shall not marry to another: but his brother shall take her, and raise up seed for his brother:

⁶And the first son he shall have of her he shall call by his name, that his name be not abolished out of Israel.

⁷But if he will not take his brother’s wife, who by law belongeth to him, the woman shall go to the gate of the city, and call upon the ancients, and say: My husband’s brother refuseth to raise up his brother’s name in Israel: and will not take me to wife.

⁸And they shall cause him to be sent for forthwith, and shall ask him. If he answer: I will not take her to wife:

⁹The woman shall come to him before the ancients, and shall take off his shoe from his foot, and spit in his face, and say: So shall it be done to the man that will not build up his brother’s house:

¹⁰And his name shall be called in Israel, the house of the unshod.

¹¹If two men have words together, and one begin to fight against the other, and the other’s wife willing to deliver her husband out of the hand of the stronger, shall put forth her hand, and take him by the secrets,

¹²Thou shalt cut off her hand, neither shalt thou be moved with any pity in her regard.

¹³Thou shalt not have divers weights in thy bag, a greater and a less:

¹⁴Neither shall there be in thy house a greater bushel and a less.

¹⁵Thou shalt have a just and a true weight, and thy bushel shall be equal and true: that thou mayest live a long time upon the land which the Lord thy God shall give thee.

¹⁶For the Lord thy God abhorreth him that doth these things, and he hateth all injustice.

¹⁷Remember what Amalec did to thee in the way when thou camest out of Egypt:

¹⁸How he met thee: and slew the hindmost of the army, who sat down, being weary, when thou wast spent with hunger and labour, and he feared not God.

¹⁹Therefore when the Lord thy God shall give thee rest, and shall have subdued all the nations round about in the land which he hath promised thee: thou shalt blot out his name from under heaven. See thou forget it not.

Chapter 26

And when thou art come into the land which the Lord thy God will give thee to possess, and hast conquered it, and dwellest in it:

²Thou shalt take the first of all thy fruits, and put them in a basket, and shalt go to the place which the Lord thy God shall choose, that his name may be invocated there:

³And thou shalt go to the priest that shall be in those days, and say to him: I profess this day before the Lord thy God, that I am come into the land, for which he swore to our fathers, that he would give it us.

⁴And the priest taking the basket at thy hand, shall set it before the altar of the Lord thy God:

⁵And thou shalt speak thus in the sight of the Lord thy God: The Syrian pursued my father, who went down into Egypt, and sojourned there in a very small number, and grew into a nation great and strong and of an infinite multitude.

⁶And the Egyptians afflicted us, and persecuted us, laying on us most grievous burdens:

⁷And we cried to the Lord God of our fathers: who heard us, and looked down upon our affliction, and labour, and distress:

⁸And brought us out of Egypt with a strong hand, and a stretched out arm, with great terror, with signs and wonders:

⁹And brought us into this place, and gave us this land flowing with milk and honey.

¹⁰And therefore now I offer the firstfruits of the land which the Lord hath given me. And thou shalt leave them in the sight of the Lord thy God, adoring the Lord thy God.

¹¹And thou shalt feast in all the good things which the Lord thy God hath given thee, and thy house, thou and the Levite, and the stranger that is with thee.

¹²When thou hast made an end of tithing all thy fruits, in the third year of tithes thou shalt give it to the Levite, and to the stranger, and to the fatherless, and to the widow, that they may eat within thy gates, and be filled:

¹³And thou shalt speak thus in the sight of the Lord thy God: I have taken that which was sanctified out of my house, and I have given it to the Levite, and to the stranger, and to the fatherless, and to the widow, as thou hast commanded me: I have not transgressed thy commandments nor forgotten thy precepts.

¹⁴I have not eaten of them in my mourning, nor separated them for any uncleanness, nor spent any thing of them in funerals. I have obeyed the voice of the Lord my God, and have done all things as thou hast commanded me.

¹⁵Look from thy sanctuary, and thy high habitation of heaven, and bless thy people Israel, and the land which thou hast given us, as thou didst swear to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.

¹⁶This day the Lord thy God hath commanded thee to do these commandments and judgments: and to keep and fulfil them with all thy heart, and with all thy soul.

¹⁷Thou hast chosen the Lord this day to be thy God, and to walk in his ways and keep his ceremonies, and precepts, and judgments, and obey his command.

¹⁸And the Lord hath chosen thee this day, to be his peculiar people, as he hath spoken to thee, and to keep all his commandments:

¹⁹And to make thee higher than all nations which he hath created, to his own praise, and name, and glory: that thou mayst be a holy people of the Lord thy God, as he hath spoken.

Chapter 27

And Moses with the ancients of Israel commanded the people, saying: Keep every commandment that I command you this day.

²And when you are passed over the Jordan into the land which the Lord thy God will give thee, thou shalt set up great stones, and shalt plaster them over with plaster,

³That thou mayst write on them all the words of this law, when thou art passed over the Jordan: that thou mayst enter into the land which the Lord thy God will give thee, a land flowing with milk and honey, as he swore to thy fathers.

⁴Therefore when you are passed over the Jordan, set up the stones which I command you this day, in mount Hebal, and thou shalt plaster them with plaster:

⁵And…