You shall not trim and round off the side-growth of [the hair on] your heads, nor mar the edges of your beard.

You shall not make any cuts on your body [in mourning] for the dead, nor make any tattoo marks on yourselves; I am the Lord.

‘Do not profane your daughter by making her a prostitute, so that the land will not fall to prostitution and become full of wickedness.

‘Do not turn to mediums [who pretend to consult the dead] or to spiritists [who have spirits of divination]; do not seek them out to be defiled by them. I am the Lord your God.

‘When a stranger resides with you in your land, you shall not oppress or mistreat him.

If the people of the land should ever tolerate that man when he gives any of his children [as a burnt offering] to Molech, and fail to put him to death [as My law requires],

‘As for the person who turns to mediums [who consult the dead] or to spiritists, to play the prostitute after them, I shall set My face against that person and will cut him off from his people [excluding him from the atonement made for them].

You shall not uncover the nakedness of (have intimate relations with) your mother’s sister or your father’s sister, for such a one has uncovered his blood relative; they will bear their guilt.

If there is a man who lies [intimately] with his uncle’s wife, he has uncovered his uncle’s nakedness; they will bear their sin. They will die childless.

If a man takes his brother’s wife, it is a hated and unclean thing; he has uncovered his brother’s nakedness. They will be childless.

‘Therefore keep all My statutes and all My ordinances and do them, so that the land where I am bringing you to live may not vomit you out [as it did those before you].

You shall not follow the statutes (laws, practices, customs) of the nation which I am driving out before you; for they did all these things, and therefore I have loathed them.

You are therefore to make a distinction between the [ceremonially] clean animal and the unclean, and between the unclean bird and the clean; and you shall not make yourselves detestable by animal or by bird or by anything that crawls on the ground, which I have set apart from you as unclean.

He shall not become unclean as a relative by marriage among his people, and so profane himself.

The priests shall not shave their heads, nor shave off the edges of their beards, nor make any cuts in their body.

They shall be holy to their God and not profane the name of their God; for they present the offerings by fire to the Lord, the food of their God; so they shall be holy.

They shall not take [as a wife] a woman who is a prostitute, nor a woman who is divorced from her husband; for the priest is holy to his God.

‘But he who is the high priest among his brothers, on whose head the anointing oil has been poured and who has been consecrated to wear the [sacred] garments, shall not uncover his head nor tear his clothes [in mourning],

He may not marry a widow or a divorced woman or one who is profaned by prostitution, but he is to marry a virgin from his own people,

so that he will not profane or dishonor his children among his people; for I am the Lord who sanctifies the high priest.’”

“Say to Aaron, ‘Throughout their generations none of your descendants who has any [physical] defect shall approach [the altar] to present the food of his God.

No man among the descendants of Aaron the priest who has a [physical] defect and is disfigured or deformed is to approach [the altar] to present the offerings of the Lord by fire. He has a defect; he shall not approach [the altar] to present the food of his God.

but he shall not go within the veil or approach the altar [of incense], because he has a defect, so that he will not profane My sanctuaries; for I am the Lord who sanctifies them.’”

“Tell Aaron and his sons to be careful with the holy things (offerings, gifts) which the children of Israel dedicate to Me, so that they do not profane My holy name; I am the Lord.

the person who touches any such thing shall be unclean until evening and shall not eat the holy things unless he has bathed his body in water.

He shall not eat that which dies [of natural causes] or is torn by a predator, becoming unclean by it; I am the Lord.

‘No layman [that is, someone outside of Aaron’s family] is to eat the holy gift [which has been offered to God]; a foreigner residing with the priest or a hired man shall not eat the holy thing.

If a priest’s daughter is married to a layman [one not part of the priestly tribe], she shall not eat the offering of the holy things.

The priests shall not profane the holy things the Israelites offer to the Lord,

You shall not offer anything which has a blemish, because it will not be accepted for you.

Animals that are blind or fractured or mutilated, or have a sore or a running wound or an itch or scabs, you shall not offer to the Lord nor make an offering of them by fire on the altar to the Lord.

For a freewill offering you may offer either a bull or a lamb which has an overgrown or stunted member (deformity), but for [the payment of] a vow it will not be accepted.

You shall not offer to the Lord any animal which has its testicles bruised or crushed or torn or cut off, or sacrifice it in your land.

Nor shall you offer as the food of your God any such [animals obtained] from a foreigner, because their corruption and blemish makes them unfit; there is a defect in them, they shall not be accepted for you.’”

And whether [the mother] is a cow or a sheep, you shall not kill both it and its young in one day.

‘When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the edges of your field, nor gather the gleaning of your harvest; you are to leave them for the poor and for the stranger. I am the Lord your God.’”

If there is any person who will not humble himself on this same day, he shall be cut off from his people [excluding him from the atonement made for them].

Whatever reseeds itself (uncultivated) in your harvest you shall not reap, nor shall you gather the grapes from your uncultivated vine, it shall be a year of sabbatical rest for the land.

That fiftieth year shall be a Jubilee for you; you shall not sow [seed], nor reap what reseeds itself, nor gather the grapes of the uncultivated vines.

If you sell anything to your friend or buy from your friend, you shall not wrong one another.

You shall not wrong one another, but you shall fear your God [with profound reverence]; for I am the Lord your God.

And if you say, “What are we going to eat in the seventh year if we do not sow [seed] or gather in our crops?”

‘The land shall not be sold permanently, for the land is Mine; you are [only] foreigners and temporary residents with Me.

But if it is not redeemed for him within a full year, then the house that is in the walled city passes permanently and irrevocably to the purchaser throughout his generations. It does not revert back in the Year of Jubilee.

Therefore, what is [purchased] from the Levites may be redeemed [by a Levite], and the house that was sold in the city they possess reverts in the Year of Jubilee, for the houses in the Levite cities are their [ancestral] property among the Israelites.

But the pasture lands of their cities may not be sold, for that is their permanent possession.

You shall not give him your money at interest, nor your food at a profit.

‘And if your fellow countryman becomes so poor [in his dealings] with you that he sells himself to you [as payment for a debt], you shall not let him do the work of a slave [who is ineligible for redemption],

For the Israelites are My servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold in a slave sale.

You shall not rule over him with harshness (severity, oppression), but you are to fear your God [with profound reverence].

You may even bequeath them as an inheritance to your children after you, to receive as a possession; you can use them as permanent slaves. But in respect to your fellow countrymen, the children of Israel, you shall not rule over one another with harshness (severity, oppression).

Like a man hired year by year he shall deal with him; he shall not rule over him with harshness in your sight.

Even if he is not redeemed during these years and under these provisions, then he shall go free in the Year of Jubilee, he and his children with him.

I will make My dwelling among you, and My soul will not reject nor separate itself from you.

‘But if you do not obey Me and do not [obediently] do all these commandments,

if, instead, you reject My statutes, and if your soul rejects My ordinances, so that you will not [obediently] do all My commandments, and in this way break My covenant,

If in spite of all this you still will not listen to Me and be obedient, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins.

Your strength will be spent uselessly, for your land will not yield its produce and the trees of the land will not yield their fruit.

‘If then, you act with hostility toward Me and are unwilling to obey Me, I will increase the plague on you seven times in accordance with your sins.

‘And if by these things you are not turned to Me, but act with hostility against Me,

When I break your staff of bread [that is, cut off your supply of food], ten women will bake your bread in one oven, and they will ration your bread; and you will eat and not be satisfied.

‘Yet if in spite of this you will not [attentively] listen to Me but act with hostility against me,

I will lay waste your cities as well and will make your sanctuaries desolate, and I will not smell your sweet and soothing aromas [of offerings by fire].

As long as it lies desolate, it will have rest, the rest it did not have on your Sabbaths, while you were living on it.

Yet in spite of this, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, nor will I so despise them as to destroy them, breaking My covenant with them; for I am the Lord their God.

He shall not replace it or exchange it, a good for a bad, or a bad for a good; but if he does exchange an animal for an animal, then both the original offering and its substitute shall be holy.

If it is any unclean animal of the kind which men do not present as an offering to the Lord, then he shall bring the animal before the priest,

If he does not redeem the field, but has sold it to another man, it may no longer be redeemed.

Or if a man consecrates to the Lord a field which he has bought, which is not part of the field of his [ancestral] property,

If it is among the unclean animals, the owner may redeem it in accordance with your valuation, and add one-fifth to it; or if it is not redeemed, then it shall be sold in accordance with your valuation.

The man is not to be concerned whether the animal is good or bad, nor shall he exchange it. But if he does exchange it, then both it and its substitute shall become holy; it shall not be redeemed.’”