“Then I commanded your judges at that time, saying, ‘Hear the matters between your brothers [your fellow countrymen], and judge righteously and fairly between a man and his brother, or the stranger (resident alien, foreigner) who is with him.

You shall not show partiality in judgment; you shall hear and pay attention to the [cases of the] least [important] as well as the great. You shall not fear man, for the judgment is God’s. The case that is too hard for you [to judge], you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.’

So I spoke to you, but you would not listen. Instead you rebelled against the command of the Lord, and acted presumptuously and went up into the hill country.

This day I will begin to put the dread and the fear of you on the peoples (pagans) under the whole heaven, who, when they hear the reports about you, will tremble and be in anguish because of you.’

So keep and do them, for that is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’

especially the day you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb (Mount Sinai), when the Lord said to me, ‘Assemble the people to Me and I will let them hear My words, so that they may learn to fear Me [with awe-filled reverence and profound respect] all the days they live on the land, and so that they may teach their children.’

And there you will serve [false and foreign] gods, the work of human hands, [lifeless images of] wood and stone, which neither see nor hear nor eat nor smell [the offerings of food given to them].

Did [any] people ever hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you heard, and [still] live?

Out of the heavens He let you hear His voice to discipline and admonish you; and on earth He let you see His great fire, and you heard His words from the midst of the fire.

Then Moses summoned all Israel and said to them:

“Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments (legal decisions) which I am speaking today in your hearing, so that you may learn them and observe them carefully.

The Lord did not make this covenant with our fathers, but with us, all of us who are alive here today.

Now then why should we die? For this great fire will consume us; if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any longer, then we will die.

You, Moses, go near and listen to everything that the Lord our God says; then speak to us everything that the Lord our God speaks to you, and we will listen and do it.’

But as for you, stand here by Me, and I will tell you all the commandments and the statutes and the judgments which you shall teach them, so that they may obey them in the land which I give them to possess.’

Therefore listen, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you and that you may increase greatly [in numbers], as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.

“Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one [the only God]!

“Hear, O Israel! You are crossing the Jordan today to go in to dispossess nations greater and more powerful than you, great cities fortified to heaven,

Then the Lord said to me, ‘Arise, go down from here quickly, for your people whom you brought from Egypt have acted corruptly. They have quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them; they have made (cast) a molten image for themselves.’

“You shall not do at all what we are doing here [in the camp] today, every man doing whatever is right in his [own] eyes.

Then all Israel will hear and be afraid, and will never again do such a wicked thing among you.

“If you hear [it said] in one of your cities, which the Lord your God gives you to live in,

However, you are not to eat any of these [animals] among those which chew the cud, or among those that divide the hoof in two: the camel, the hare and the shaphan, for though they chew the cud, they do not split the hoof; they are unclean for you.

and if it is told to you and you hear about it, then you shall investigate thoroughly [all the charges]. If it is confirmed beyond doubt that this detestable thing has been done in Israel,

Then all the people will hear and be afraid, and will not act presumptuously again.

This is according to all that you asked of the Lord your God at Horeb (Mount Sinai) on the day of the assembly, saying, ‘Let me not hear the voice of the Lord my God again, nor see this great fire anymore, so that I will not die.’

Those who remain will hear and be afraid, and will never again do such an evil thing among you.

and shall say to them, ‘Hear, O Israel: you are advancing today to battle against your enemies. Do not lack courage. Do not be afraid, or panic, or tremble [in terror] before them,

And who is the man who is engaged (legally promised) to a woman and has not married her? Let him go and return to his house, otherwise he might die in the battle and another man would marry her.’

and you see a beautiful woman among the captives, and desire her and would take her as your wife,

then you shall bring her [home] to your house, and she shall shave her head and trim her nails [in preparation for mourning].

She shall take off the clothes of her captivity and remain in your house, and weep (mourn) for her father and her mother a full month. After that you may go in to her and be her husband and she shall be your wife.

But it shall be that if you have no delight and take no pleasure in her, then you shall let her go wherever she wishes. You certainly shall not sell her for money; you shall not deal with her as a slave or mistreat her, because you have humbled her [by forced marriage].

then on the day when he wills his possessions to his sons, he cannot treat the son of his loved wife as firstborn in place of the son of the unloved wife—the [actual] firstborn.

Then all the men of his city shall stone him to death; so you shall remove the evil from among you, and all Israel will hear of it and be afraid.

“If any man takes a wife and goes in to her and then scorns and hates her,

and charges her [without cause] with shameful behavior and publicly defames her, and says, ‘I took this woman, but when I approached her, I did not find in her evidence of virginity,’

then the young woman’s father and her mother shall get and bring out the evidence of her virginity to the elders of the city at the gate [where court is held].

The father of the young woman shall say to the elders, ‘I gave my daughter to this man as a wife, but he hates her and has turned against her;

and behold, he has made baseless charges against her, saying, “I did not find in your daughter the evidence of her virginity.” But this is the evidence of my daughter’s virginity.’ And they shall spread out the garment before the elders of the city.

and they shall fine him a hundred shekels of silver and give it to the father of the young woman, because he publicly defamed a virgin of Israel. And she shall remain his wife; he is not allowed to divorce her as long as he lives.

then they shall bring her out to the doorway of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death because she has committed a deliberate sin in Israel by playing the prostitute in her father’s house. So you shall remove the evil from among you.

“If a young woman who is a virgin is engaged (legally betrothed) to a man, and another man finds her in the city and is intimate with her,

“However, if the man finds the girl who is engaged (legally betrothed) in the [open] field, and seizes her and is intimate with her [by force], then only the man who lies with her shall be put to death.

When he found her in the [open] field, the engaged girl [may have] cried out for help, but there was no one to [hear and] save her.

“If a man finds a girl who is a virgin, who is not engaged, and seizes her and is intimate with her and they are discovered,

then the man who was intimate with her shall give fifty shekels of silver to the girl’s father, and she shall become his wife because he has violated her; he can never divorce her.

“A man shall not take his father’s [former] wife, so that he will not expose his father’s wife.

You shall not bring the wages of a prostitute or the price of a dog [that is, a male prostitute] into the house of the Lord your God as payment for any vow, for both of these [the gift and the giver] are utterly repulsive to the Lord your God.

“When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she loses his favor because he has found something indecent or unacceptable about her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house,

and if the latter husband turns against her and writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house, or if the latter husband dies who took her as his wife,

then her former husband who [first] sent her away may not take her again as his wife, since she has been defiled; for that is an outrage before the Lord, and you shall not bring sin on the land which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance.

You shall give him his wages on the day that he earns them before the sun sets—for he is poor and is counting on it—so that he does not cry out to the Lord against you, and it becomes a sin for you.

“If brothers are living together and one of them dies without a son, the widow of the deceased shall not be married outside the family to a stranger. Her husband’s brother shall be intimate with her after taking her as his wife and perform the duty of a husband’s brother to her.

Then the elders of his city will summon him and speak to him. And if he stands firm and says, ‘I do not want to marry her,’

“If [two] men, a man and his countryman, are fighting and the wife of one approaches to rescue her husband from the man who is striking him, and she reaches out with her hand and grabs the aggressor’s genitals,

then you shall cut off her hand; you shall not show pity [for her].

Then Moses and the Levitical priests said to all Israel, “Be silent and listen, O Israel! This day you have become a people for the Lord your God.

You will be pledged to marry a wife, but another man will be intimate with her [before you]; you will build a house, but you will not live in it; you will plant a vineyard, but you will not use its fruit.

The stranger who lives among you will rise above you higher and higher, and you will go down lower and lower.

The most refined and well-bred woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground because she is so delicate and pampered, will be cruel and hostile toward the husband she cherishes and toward her son and daughter,

and toward her afterbirth that comes from between her legs and toward the children whom she bears; for she will eat them secretly for lack of anything else, during the siege and the misery by which your enemy will oppress you in your cities.

Yet to this day the Lord has not given you a heart and mind to understand, nor eyes to see, nor ears to hear.

your little ones, your wives, and the stranger (resident alien, foreigner) who is in your camps, from the one who chops and gathers your firewood to the one who draws your water—

but with those [future Israelites] who are not here with us today, as well as with those who stand here with us today in the presence of the Lord our God

It is not [a secret hidden] in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up to heaven for us and bring it to us, so that we may hear it and obey it?’

Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross the sea for us and bring it to us, so that we may hear it and obey it?’

But if your heart turns away and you will not hear and obey, but are drawn away and worship other gods and serve them,

Assemble the people, the men and the women and children and the stranger (resident alien, foreigner) within your cities, so that they may hear and learn and fear the Lord your God [with awe-filled reverence and profound respect], and be careful to obey all the words of this law.

Their children, who have not known [the law], will hear and learn to fear [and worship] the Lord your God, as long as you live in the land which you are crossing the Jordan to possess.”

“Listen, O heavens, and I will speak;
And let the earth hear the words of my mouth.

“As an eagle that protects its nest,
That flutters over its young,
He spread out His wings and took them,
He carried them on His pinions.

Then die on the mountain which you climb, and be gathered to your people [in death], just as Aaron your brother died on Mount Hor and was gathered to his people,

And [Moses said] this of Judah:

“Hear, O Lord, the voice of Judah,
And bring him to his people.
With his hands he contended for them,
And may You be a help against his enemies.”