'God' in the Bible

You are children of the Lord your God. Do not cut yourselves or shave your forehead bald for the sake of the dead.

For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. He has chosen you to be his people, prized above all others on the face of the earth.

You may not eat any corpse, though you may give it to the resident foreigner who is living in your villages and he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner. You are a people holy to the Lord your God. Do not boil a young goat in its mother's milk.

In the presence of the Lord your God you must eat from the tithe of your grain, your new wine, your olive oil, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks in the place he chooses to locate his name, so that you may learn to revere the Lord your God always.

you may convert the tithe into money, secure the money, and travel to the place the Lord your God chooses for himself.

Then you may spend the money however you wish for cattle, sheep, wine, beer, or whatever you desire. You and your household may eat there in the presence of the Lord your God and enjoy it.

Then the Levites (because they have no allotment or inheritance with you), the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows of your villages may come and eat their fill so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work you do.

For the Lord your God will bless you just as he has promised; you will lend to many nations but will not borrow from any, and you will rule over many nations but they will not rule over you.

If a fellow Israelite from one of your villages in the land that the Lord your God is giving you should be poor, you must not harden your heart or be insensitive to his impoverished condition.

You must by all means lend to him and not be upset by doing it, for because of this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you attempt.

You must supply them generously from your flock, your threshing floor, and your winepress -- as the Lord your God has blessed you, you must give to them.

Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you; therefore, I am commanding you to do this thing today.

You should not consider it difficult to let him go free, for he will have served you for six years, twice the time of a hired worker; the Lord your God will bless you in everything you do.

You must set apart for the Lord your God every firstborn male born to your herds and flocks. You must not work the firstborn of your bulls or shear the firstborn of your flocks.

You and your household must eat them annually before the Lord your God in the place he chooses.

If they have any kind of blemish -- lameness, blindness, or anything else -- you may not offer them as a sacrifice to the Lord your God.

Observe the month Abib and keep the Passover to the Lord your God, for in that month he brought you out of Egypt by night.

You must sacrifice the Passover animal (from the flock or the herd) to the Lord your God in the place where he chooses to locate his name.

You may not sacrifice the Passover in just any of your villages that the Lord your God is giving you,

You must cook and eat it in the place the Lord your God chooses; you may return the next morning to your tents.

You must eat bread made without yeast for six days. The seventh day you are to hold an assembly for the Lord your God; you must not do any work on that day.

Then you are to celebrate the Festival of Weeks before the Lord your God with the voluntary offering that you will bring, in proportion to how he has blessed you.

You are to celebrate the festival seven days before the Lord your God in the place he chooses, for he will bless you in all your productivity and in whatever you do; so you will indeed rejoice!

Three times a year all your males must appear before the Lord your God in the place he chooses for the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of Weeks, and the Festival of Temporary Shelters; and they must not appear before him empty-handed.

Every one of you must give as you are able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God that he has given you.

You must appoint judges and civil servants for each tribe in all your villages that the Lord your God is giving you, and they must judge the people fairly.

You must pursue justice alone so that you may live and inherit the land the Lord your God is giving you.

You must not plant any kind of tree as a sacred Asherah pole near the altar of the Lord your God which you build for yourself.

You must not erect a sacred pillar, a thing the Lord your God detests.

You must not sacrifice to him a bull or sheep that has a blemish or any other defect, because that is considered offensive to the Lord your God.

Suppose a man or woman is discovered among you -- in one of your villages that the Lord your God is giving you -- who sins before the Lord your God and breaks his covenant

If a matter is too difficult for you to judge -- bloodshed, legal claim, or assault -- matters of controversy in your villages -- you must leave there and go up to the place the Lord your God chooses.

The person who pays no attention to the priest currently serving the Lord your God there, or to the verdict -- that person must die, so that you may purge evil from Israel.

When you come to the land the Lord your God is giving you and take it over and live in it and then say, "I will select a king like all the nations surrounding me,"

you must select without fail a king whom the Lord your God chooses. From among your fellow citizens you must appoint a king -- you may not designate a foreigner who is not one of your fellow Israelites.

It must be with him constantly and he must read it as long as he lives, so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God and observe all the words of this law and these statutes and carry them out.

For the Lord your God has chosen them and their sons from all your tribes to stand and serve in his name permanently.

When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, you must not learn the abhorrent practices of those nations.

Whoever does these things is abhorrent to the Lord and because of these detestable things the Lord your God is about to drive them out from before you.

You must be blameless before the Lord your God.

Those nations that you are about to dispossess listen to omen readers and diviners, but the Lord your God has not given you permission to do such things.

The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you -- from your fellow Israelites; you must listen to him.

This accords with what happened at Horeb in the day of the assembly. You asked the Lord your God: "Please do not make us hear the voice of the Lord our God any more or see this great fire any more lest we die."

When the Lord your God destroys the nations whose land he is about to give you and you dispossess them and settle in their cities and houses,

you must set apart for yourselves three cities in the middle of your land that the Lord your God is giving you as a possession.

You shall build a roadway and divide into thirds the whole extent of your land that the Lord your God is providing as your inheritance; anyone who kills another person should flee to the closest of these cities.

If the Lord your God enlarges your borders as he promised your ancestors and gives you all the land he pledged to them,

and then you are careful to observe all these commandments I am giving you today (namely, to love the Lord your God and to always walk in his ways), then you must add three more cities to these three.

You must not shed innocent blood in your land that the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, for that would make you guilty.

You must not encroach on your neighbor's property, which will have been defined in the inheritance you will obtain in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

When you go to war against your enemies and see chariotry and troops who outnumber you, do not be afraid of them, for the Lord your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt, is with you.

for the Lord your God goes with you to fight on your behalf against your enemies to give you victory."

The Lord your God will deliver it over to you and you must kill every single male by the sword.

However, the women, little children, cattle, and anything else in the city -- all its plunder -- you may take for yourselves as spoil. You may take from your enemies the plunder that the Lord your God has given you.

As for the cities of these peoples that the Lord your God is going to give you as an inheritance, you must not allow a single living thing to survive.

Instead you must utterly annihilate them -- the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites -- just as the Lord your God has commanded you,

so that they cannot teach you all the abhorrent ways they worship their gods, causing you to sin against the Lord your God.

If a homicide victim should be found lying in a field in the land the Lord your God is giving you, and no one knows who killed him,

Then the Levitical priests will approach (for the Lord your God has chosen them to serve him and to pronounce blessings in his name, and to decide every judicial verdict)

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

his body must not remain all night on the tree; instead you must make certain you bury him that same day, for the one who is left exposed on a tree is cursed by God. You must not defile your land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.

A woman must not wear men's clothing, nor should a man dress up in women's clothing, for anyone who does this is offensive to the Lord your God.

But the Lord your God refused to listen to Balaam and changed the curse to a blessing, for the Lord your God loves you.

For the Lord your God walks about in the middle of your camp to deliver you and defeat your enemies for you. Therefore your camp should be holy, so that he does not see anything indecent among you and turn away from you.

You must never bring the pay of a female prostitute or the wage of a male prostitute into the temple of the Lord your God in fulfillment of any vow, for both of these are abhorrent to the Lord your God.

You may lend with interest to a foreigner, but not to your fellow Israelite; if you keep this command the Lord your God will bless you in all you undertake in the land you are about to enter to possess.

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.

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.

her first husband who divorced her is not permitted to remarry her after she has become ritually impure, for that is offensive to the Lord. You must not bring guilt on the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.

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

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.

Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore I am commanding you to do all this.

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.

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.

For anyone who acts dishonestly in these ways is abhorrent to the Lord your God.

how they met you along the way and cut off all your stragglers in the rear of the march when you were exhausted and tired; they were unafraid of God.

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.

Then you must affirm before the Lord your God, "A wandering Aramean was my ancestor, and he went down to Egypt and lived there as a foreigner with a household few in number, but there he became a great, powerful, and numerous people.

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

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.

You will celebrate all the good things that the Lord your God has given you and your family, along with the Levites and the resident foreigners among you.

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.

Today the Lord your God is commanding you to keep these statutes and ordinances, something you must do with all your heart and soul.

Today you have declared the Lord to be your God, and that you will walk in his ways, keep his statutes, commandments, and ordinances, and obey him.

Then he will elevate you above all the nations he has made and you will receive praise, fame, and honor. You will be a people holy to the Lord your God, as he has said.

When you cross the Jordan River to the land the Lord your God is giving you, you must erect great stones and cover them with plaster.

Then you must inscribe on them all the words of this law when you cross over, so that you may enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, a land flowing with milk and honey just as the Lord, the God of your ancestors, said to you.

Then you must build an altar there to the Lord your God, an altar of stones -- do not use an iron tool on them.

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.

Then Moses and the Levitical priests spoke to all Israel: "Be quiet and pay attention, Israel. Today you have become the people of the Lord your God.

"If you indeed obey the Lord your God and are careful to observe all his commandments I am giving you today, the Lord your God will elevate you above all the nations of the earth.

All these blessings will come to you in abundance if you obey the Lord your God:

"But if you ignore the Lord your God and are not careful to keep all his commandments and statutes I am giving you today, then all these curses will come upon you in full force:

All these curses will fall on you, pursuing and overtaking you until you are destroyed, because you would not obey the Lord your God by keeping his commandments and statutes that he has given you.

"Because you have not served the Lord your God joyfully and wholeheartedly with the abundance of everything you have,