In this manner you will purge out the guilt of innocent blood from among you, for you must do what is right before the Lord.

When you go out to do battle with your enemies and the Lord your God allows you to prevail and you take prisoners,

his father and mother must seize him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his city.

They must declare to the elders of his city, "Our son is stubborn and rebellious and pays no attention to what we say -- he is a glutton and drunkard."

Then all the men of his city must stone him to death. In this way you will purge out wickedness from among you, and all Israel will hear about it and be afraid.

When you see your neighbor's ox or sheep going astray, do not ignore it; you must return it without fail to your neighbor.

If the owner does not live near you or you do not know who the owner is, then you must corral the animal at your house and let it stay with you until the owner looks for it; then you must return it to him.

When you see your neighbor's donkey or ox fallen along the road, do not ignore it; instead, you must be sure to help him get the animal on its feet again.

You must be sure to let the mother go, but you may take the young for yourself. Do this so that it may go well with you and you may have a long life.

If you build a new house, you must construct a guard rail around your roof to avoid being culpable in the event someone should fall from it.

Then the father and mother of the young woman must produce the evidence of virginity for the elders of the city at the gate.

Moreover, he has raised accusations of impropriety by saying, 'I discovered your daughter was not a virgin,' but this is the evidence of my daughter's virginity!" The cloth must then be spread out before the city's elders.

you must bring the two of them to the gate of that city and stone them to death, the young woman because she did not cry out though in the city and the man because he violated his neighbor's fianc?e; in this way you will purge evil from among you.

for the man met her in the field and the engaged woman cried out, but there was no one to rescue her.

When you go out as an army against your enemies, guard yourselves against anything impure.

If there is someone among you who is impure because of some nocturnal emission, he must leave the camp; he may not reenter it immediately.

When evening arrives he must wash himself with water and then at sunset he may reenter the camp.

When you make a vow to the Lord your God you must not delay in fulfilling it, for otherwise he will surely hold you accountable as a sinner.

If you refrain from making a vow, it will not be sinful.

Whatever you vow, you must be careful to do what you have promised, such as what you have vowed to the Lord your God as a freewill offering.

When you enter the vineyard of your neighbor you may eat as many grapes as you please, but you must not take away any in a container.

If a man marries a woman and she does not please him because he has found something offensive in her, then he may draw up a divorce document, give it to her, and evict her from his house.

When a man is newly married, he need not go into the army nor be obligated in any way; he must be free to stay at home for a full year and bring joy to the wife he has married.

Remember what the Lord your God did to Miriam along the way after you left Egypt.

When you make any kind of loan to your neighbor, you may not go into his house to claim what he is offering as security.

You must stand outside and the person to whom you are making the loan will bring out to you what he is offering as security.

If the person is poor you may not use what he gives you as security for a covering.

You must by all means return to him at sunset the item he gave you as security so that he may sleep in his outer garment and bless you for it; it will be considered a just deed by the Lord your God.

You must pay his wage that very day before the sun sets, for he is poor and his life depends on it. Otherwise he will cry out to the Lord against you, and you will be guilty of sin.

Fathers must not be put to death for what their children do, nor children for what their fathers do; each must be put to death for his own sin.

You must not pervert justice due a resident foreigner or an orphan, or take a widow's garment as security for a loan.

Whenever you reap your harvest in your field and leave some unraked grain there, you must not return to get it; it should go to the resident foreigner, orphan, and widow so that the Lord your God may bless all the work you do.

When you beat your olive tree you must not repeat the procedure; the remaining olives belong to the resident foreigner, orphan, and widow.

When you gather the grapes of your vineyard you must not do so a second time; they should go to the resident foreigner, orphan, and widow.

You must not muzzle your ox when it is treading grain.

Then the first son she bears will continue the name of the dead brother, thus preventing his name from being blotted out of Israel.

But if the man does not want to marry his brother's widow, then she must go to the elders at the town gate and say, "My husband's brother refuses to preserve his brother's name in Israel; he is unwilling to perform the duty of a brother-in-law to me!"

then his sister-in-law must approach him in view of the elders, remove his sandal from his foot, and spit in his face. She will then respond, "Thus may it be done to any man who does not maintain his brother's family line!"

If two men get into a hand-to-hand fight, and the wife of one of them gets involved to help her husband against his attacker, and she reaches out her hand and grabs his genitals,

You must have an accurate and correct stone weight and an accurate and correct measuring container, so that your life may be extended in the land the Lord your God is about to give you.

Remember what the Amalekites did to you on your way from Egypt,

So when the Lord your God gives you relief from all the enemies who surround you in the land he is giving you as an inheritance, you must wipe out the memory of the Amalekites from under heaven -- do not forget!

When you enter the land that the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, and you occupy it and live in it,

you must take the first of all the ground's produce you harvest from the land the Lord your God is giving you, place it in a basket, and go to the place where he chooses to locate his name.

You must go to the priest in office at that time and say to him, "I declare today to the Lord your God that I have come into the land that the Lord promised to our ancestors to give us."

The priest will then take the basket from you and set it before the altar of the Lord your God.

So we cried out to the Lord, the God of our ancestors, and he heard us and saw our humiliation, toil, and oppression.

Therefore the Lord brought us out of Egypt with tremendous strength and power, as well as with great awe-inspiring signs and wonders.

So now, look! I have brought the first of the ground's produce that you, Lord, have given me." Then you must set it down before the Lord your God and worship before him.

When you finish tithing all your income in the third year (the year of tithing), you must give it to the Levites, the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows so that they may eat to their satisfaction in your villages.

Then you shall say before the Lord your God, "I have removed the sacred offering from my house and given it to the Levites, the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows just as you have commanded me. I have not violated or forgotten your commandments.

I have not eaten anything when I was in mourning, or removed any of it while ceremonially unclean, or offered any of it to the dead; I have obeyed you and have done everything you have commanded me.

You must build the altar of the Lord your God with whole stones and offer burnt offerings on it to the Lord your God.

Also you must offer fellowship offerings and eat them there, rejoicing before the Lord your God.

"The Levites will call out to every Israelite with a loud voice:

Cursed is the one who makes a carved or metal image -- something abhorrent to the Lord, the work of the craftsman -- and sets it up in a secret place.' Then all the people will say, 'Amen!'

Cursed is the one who perverts justice for the resident foreigner, the orphan, and the widow.' Then all the people will say, 'Amen!'

You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out.

The Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you will always end up at the top and not at the bottom, if you obey his commandments which I am urging you today to be careful to do.

You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.

The Lord will make the rain of your land powder and dust; it will come down on you from the sky until you are destroyed.

You will feel your way along at noon like the blind person does in darkness and you will not succeed in anything you do; you will be constantly oppressed and continually robbed, with no one to save you.

You will be engaged to a woman and another man will rape her. You will build a house but not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but not even begin to use it.

Your ox will be slaughtered before your very eyes but you will not eat of it. Your donkey will be stolen from you as you watch and will not be returned to you. Your flock of sheep will be given to your enemies and there will be no one to save you.

Your sons and daughters will be given to another people while you look on in vain all day, and you will be powerless to do anything about it.

As for the produce of your land and all your labor, a people you do not know will consume it, and you will be nothing but oppressed and crushed for the rest of your lives.

The Lord will force you and your king whom you will appoint over you to go away to a people whom you and your ancestors have not known, and you will serve other gods of wood and stone there.

"You will take much seed to the field but gather little harvest, because locusts will consume it.

You will plant vineyards and cultivate them, but you will not drink wine or gather in grapes, because worms will eat them.

You will then eat your own offspring, the flesh of the sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you, because of the severity of the siege by which your enemies will constrict you.

and will secretly eat her afterbirth and her newborn children (since she has nothing else), because of the severity of the siege by which your enemy will constrict you in your villages.

There will be very few of you left, though at one time you were as numerous as the stars in the sky, because you will have disobeyed the Lord your God.

This is what will happen: Just as the Lord delighted to do good for you and make you numerous, he will take delight in destroying and decimating you. You will be uprooted from the land you are about to possess.

The Lord will scatter you among all nations, from one end of the earth to the other. There you will worship other gods that neither you nor your ancestors have known, gods of wood and stone.

In the morning you will say, 'If only it were evening!' And in the evening you will say, 'I wish it were morning!' because of the things you will fear and the things you will see.

These are the words of the covenant that the Lord commanded Moses to make with the people of Israel in the land of Moab, in addition to the covenant he had made with them at Horeb.

I have led you through the desert for forty years. Your clothing has not worn out nor have your sandals deteriorated.

When you came to this place King Sihon of Heshbon and King Og of Bashan came out to make war and we defeated them.

Then we took their land and gave it as an inheritance to Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh.

your infants, your wives, and the foreigners living in your encampment, those who chop wood and those who carry water --

It is not with you alone that I am making this covenant by oath,

You have seen their detestable things and idols of wood, stone, silver, and gold.)

The Lord will single him out for judgment from all the tribes of Israel according to all the curses of the covenant written in this scroll of the law.

The generation to come -- your descendants who will rise up after you, as well as the foreigner who will come from distant places -- will see the afflictions of that land and the illnesses that the Lord has brought on it.

The whole land will be covered with brimstone, salt, and burning debris; it will not be planted nor will it sprout or produce grass. It will resemble the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the Lord destroyed in his intense anger.

Then all the nations will ask, "Why has the Lord done all this to this land? What is this fierce, heated display of anger all about?"

Then people will say, "Because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, the God of their ancestors, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt.

That is why the Lord's anger erupted against this land, bringing on it all the curses written in this scroll.

Then he will bring you to the land your ancestors possessed and you also will possess it; he will do better for you and multiply you more than he did your ancestors.

"This commandment I am giving you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it too remote.

It is not in heaven, as though one must say, "Who will go up to heaven to get it for us and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?"

And it is not across the sea, as though one must say, "Who will cross over to the other side of the sea and get it for us and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?"

For the thing is very near you -- it is in your mouth and in your mind so that you can do it.

What I am commanding you today is to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to obey his commandments, his statutes, and his ordinances. Then you will live and become numerous and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are about to possess.

The Lord will do to them just what he did to Sihon and Og, the Amorite kings, and to their land, which he destroyed.

Then Moses called out to Joshua in the presence of all Israel, "Be strong and courageous, for you will accompany these people to the land that the Lord promised to give their ancestors, and you will enable them to inherit it.

Then Moses wrote down this law and gave it to the Levitical priests, who carry the ark of the Lord's covenant, and to all Israel's elders.

He commanded them: "At the end of seven years, at the appointed time of the cancellation of debts, at the Feast of Temporary Shelters,

At that time my anger will erupt against them and I will abandon them and hide my face from them until they are devoured. Many disasters and distresses will overcome them so that they will say at that time, 'Have not these disasters overcome us because our God is not among us?'

But I will certainly hide myself at that time because of all the wickedness they will have done by turning to other gods.