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Expiation of a Crime

¹ "If a slain person is found lying in the open country in the land which the LORD your God gives you to ^(F1)possess, and it is not known who has struck him,² then your elders and your judges shall go out and measure the distance to the cities which are around the slain one.³ "It shall be that the city which is nearest to the slain man, that is, the elders of that city, shall take a heifer of the herd, which has not been worked and which has not pulled in a yoke;⁴ and the elders of that city shall bring the heifer down to a valley with running water, which has not been plowed or sown, and shall break the heifer's neck there in the valley.⁵ "Then ^(C1)the priests, the sons of Levi, shall come near, for the LORD your God has chosen them to serve Him and to bless in the name of the LORD; and every dispute and every ^(F1)assault ^(F2)shall be settled by them.⁶ "All the elders of that city ^(F1)which is nearest to the slain man shall ^(C1)wash their hands over the heifer whose neck was broken in the valley;⁷ and they shall answer and say, 'Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it.⁸ '^(F1)Forgive Your people Israel whom You have redeemed, O LORD, and do not place the guilt of ^(C1)innocent blood in the midst of Your people Israel.' And the bloodguiltiness shall be ^(F2)forgiven them.⁹ "^(C1)So you shall remove the guilt of innocent blood from your midst, when you do what is right in the eyes of the LORD.

Domestic Relations

¹⁰ "When you go out to battle against your enemies, and ^(C1)the LORD your God delivers them into your hands and you take them away captive,¹¹ and see among the captives a beautiful woman, and have a desire for her and would take her as a wife for yourself,¹² then you shall bring her home to your house, and she shall ^(C1)shave her head and ^(F1)trim her nails.¹³ "She shall also ^(F1)remove the clothes of her captivity and shall remain in your house, and ^(C1)mourn her father and mother a full month; and after that you may go in to her and be her husband and she shall be your wife.¹⁴ "It shall be, if you are not pleased with her, then you shall let her go ^(F1)wherever she wishes; but you shall certainly not sell her for money, you shall not ^(F2)mistreat her, because you have ^(C1)humbled her.

¹⁵ "If a man has two wives, the one loved and ^(C1)the other ^(F1)unloved, and both the loved and the ^(F1)unloved have borne him sons, if the firstborn son belongs to the ^(F1)unloved,¹⁶ then it shall be in the day he ^(F1)wills what he has to his sons, he cannot make the son of the loved the firstborn before the son of the ^(F2)unloved, who is the firstborn.¹⁷ "But he shall acknowledge the firstborn, the son of the ^(F1)unloved, by giving him a double portion of all that ^(F2)he has, for he is the ^(C1)beginning of his strength; ^(C2)to him belongs the right of the firstborn.

¹⁸ "If any man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will ^(C1)not obey his father or his mother, and when they chastise him, he will not even listen to them,¹⁹ then his father and mother shall seize him, and bring him out to the elders of his city ^(F1)at the gateway of his hometown.²⁰ "They shall say to the elders of his city, 'This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey us, he is a glutton and a drunkard.'²¹ "^(C1)Then all the men of his city shall stone him to death; so ^(C2)you shall remove the evil from your midst, and ^(C3)all Israel will hear of it and fear.

²² "If a man has committed a sin ^(C1)worthy of death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree,^23 (C1)his corpse shall not hang all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him on the same day (for ^(C2)he who is hanged is ^(F1)accursed of God), so that you ^(C3)do not defile your land which the LORD your God gives you as an inheritance.