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Religious and Social Regulations

¹ The Lord spoke to Moses: ² "Speak to the whole congregation of the Israelites and tell them, ‘You must be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy. ³ Each of you must respect his mother and his father, and you must keep my Sabbaths. I am the Lord your God. ⁴ Do not turn to idols, and you must not make for yourselves gods of cast metal. I am the Lord your God.

Eating the Peace Offering

⁵ "‘When you sacrifice a peace offering sacrifice to the Lord, you must sacrifice it so that it is accepted for you. ⁶ It must be eaten on the day of your sacrifice and on the following day, but what is left over until the third day must be burned up. ⁷ If, however, it is eaten on the third day, it is spoiled, it will not be accepted, ⁸ and the one who eats it will bear his punishment for iniquity because he has profaned what is holy to the Lord. That person will be cut off from his people.

Leaving the Gleanings

⁹ "‘When you gather in the harvest of your land, you must not completely harvest the corner of your field, and you must not gather up the gleanings of your harvest. ¹⁰ You must not pick your vineyard bare, and you must not gather up the fallen grapes of your vineyard. You must leave them for the poor and the foreigner. I am the Lord your God.

Dealing Honestly

¹¹ "‘You must not steal, you must not tell lies, and you must not deal falsely with your fellow citizen. ¹² You must not swear falsely in my name, so that you do not profane the name of your God. I am the Lord. ¹³ You must not oppress your neighbor or commit robbery against him. You must not withhold the wages of the hired laborer overnight until morning. ¹⁴ You must not curse a deaf person or put a stumbling block in front of a blind person. You must fear your God; I am the Lord.

Justice, Love, and Propriety

¹⁵ "‘You must not deal unjustly in judgment: you must neither show partiality to the poor nor honor the rich. You must judge your fellow citizen fairly. ¹⁶ You must not go about as a slanderer among your people. You must not stand idly by when your neighbor's life is at stake. I am the Lord. ¹⁷ You must not hate your brother in your heart. You must surely reprove your fellow citizen so that you do not incur sin on account of him. ¹⁸ You must not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the children of your people, but you must love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord. ¹⁹ You must keep my statutes. You must not allow two different kinds of your animals to breed, you must not sow your field with two different kinds of seed, and you must not wear a garment made of two different kinds of fabric.

Lying with a Slave Woman

²⁰ "‘When a man has sexual intercourse with a woman, although she is a slave woman designated for another man and she has not yet been ransomed, or freedom has not been granted to her, there will be an obligation to pay compensation. They must not be put to death, because she was not free. ²¹ He must bring his guilt offering to the Lord at the entrance of the Meeting Tent, a guilt offering ram, ²² and the priest is to make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering before the Lord for his sin that he has committed, and he will be forgiven of his sin that he has committed.

The Produce of Fruit Trees

²³ "‘When you enter the land and plant any fruit tree, you must consider its fruit to be forbidden. Three years it will be forbidden to you; it must not be eaten. ²⁴ In the fourth year all its fruit will be holy, praise offerings to the Lord. ²⁵ Then in the fifth year you may eat its fruit to add its produce to your harvest. I am the Lord your God.

Blood, Hair, and Body

²⁶ "‘You must not eat anything with the blood still in it. You must not practice either divination or soothsaying. ²⁷ You must not round off the corners of the hair on your head or ruin the corners of your beard. ²⁸ You must not slash your body for a dead person or incise a tattoo on yourself. I am the Lord. ²⁹ Do not profane your daughter by making her a prostitute, so that the land does not practice prostitution and become full of lewdness.

Purity, Honor, Respect, and Honesty

³⁰ "‘You must keep my Sabbaths and fear my sanctuary. I am the Lord. ³¹ Do not turn to the spirits of the dead and do not seek familiar spirits to become unclean by them. I am the Lord your God. ³² You must stand up in the presence of the aged, honor the presence of an elder, and fear your God. I am the Lord. ³³ When a foreigner resides with you in your land, you must not oppress him. ³⁴ The foreigner who resides with you must be to you like a native citizen among you; so you must love him as yourself, because you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. ³⁵ You must not do injustice in the regulation of measures, whether of length, weight, or volume. ³⁶ You must have honest balances, honest weights, an honest ephah, and an honest hin. I am the Lord your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt. ³⁷ You must be sure to obey all my statutes and regulations. I am the Lord.'"