Deuteronomy 12:5–19

⁵Out of the territory of all your tribes the Lord will choose the one place where the people are to come into his presence and worship him. ⁶There you are to offer your sacrifices that are to be burnt and your other sacrifices, your tithes and your offerings, the gifts that you promise to the Lord, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your cattle and sheep. ⁷There, in the presence of the Lord your God, who has blessed you, you and your families will eat and enjoy the good things that you have worked for.

⁸“When that time comes, you must not do as you have been doing. Until now you have all been worshipping as you please, ⁹because you have not yet entered the land that the Lord your God is giving you, where you can live in peace. ¹⁰When you cross the River Jordan, the Lord will let you occupy the land and live there. He will keep you safe from all your enemies, and you will live in peace. ¹¹The Lord will choose a single place where he is to be worshipped, and there you must bring to him everything that I have commanded: your sacrifices that are to be burnt and your other sacrifices, your tithes and your offerings, and those special gifts that you have promised to the Lord. ¹²Be joyful there in his presence, together with your children, your servants, and the Levites who live in your towns; remember that the Levites will have no land of their own. ¹³You are not to offer your sacrifices wherever you choose; ¹⁴you must offer them only in the one place that the Lord will choose in the territory of one of your tribes. Only there are you to offer your sacrifices that are to be burnt and do all the other things that I have commanded you.

¹⁵“But you are free to kill and eat your animals wherever you live. You may eat as many as the Lord gives you. All of you, whether ritually clean or unclean, may eat them, just as you would eat the meat of deer or antelope. ^16*But you must not use their blood as food; you must pour it out on the ground like water. ¹⁷Nothing that you offer to the Lord is to be eaten in the places where you live: neither the tithes of your corn, your wine, or your olive oil, nor the firstborn of your cattle and sheep, the gifts that you promise to the Lord, your freewill offerings, or any other offerings. ¹⁸You and your children, together with your servants and the Levites who live in your towns, are to eat these offerings only in the presence of the Lord your God, in the one place of worship chosen by the Lord your God. And you are to be happy there over everything that you have done. ¹⁹Be sure, also, not to neglect the Levites, as long as you live in your land.