Day 63 of 364

^14:1You are the children of the LORD your God. You shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead. ^14:2For you are a holy people to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for his own possession, above all peoples who are on the face of the earth. ^14:3You shall not eat any abominable thing. ^14:4These are the animals which you may eat: the ox, the sheep, the goat, ^14:5the deer, the gazelle, the roebuck, the wild goat, the ibex, the antelope, and the chamois. ^14:6Every animal that parts the hoof, and has the hoof split in two and chews the cud, among the animals, you may eat. ^14:7Nevertheless these you shall not eat of them that chew the cud, or of those who have the hoof split: the camel, the hare, and the rabbit. Because they chew the cud but don’t part the hoof, they are unclean to you. ^14:8The pig, because it has a split hoof but doesn’t chew the cud, is unclean to you. You shall not eat their meat. You shall not touch their carcasses. ^14:9These you may eat of all that are in the waters: you may eat whatever has fins and scales. ^14:10You shall not eat whatever doesn’t have fins and scales. It is unclean to you. ^14:11Of all clean birds you may eat. ^14:12But these are they of which you shall not eat: the eagle, the vulture, the osprey, ^14:13the red kite, the falcon, the kite of any kind, ^14:14every raven of any kind, ^14:15the ostrich, the owl, the seagull, the hawk of any kind, ^14:16the little owl, the great owl, the horned owl, ^14:17the pelican, the vulture, the cormorant, ^14:18the stork, the heron after its kind, the hoopoe, and the bat. ^14:19All winged creeping things are unclean to you. They shall not be eaten. ^14:20Of all clean birds you may eat. ^14:21You shall not eat of anything that dies of itself. You may give it to the foreigner living among you who is within your gates, that he may eat it; or you may sell it to a foreigner; for you are a holy people to the LORD your God. You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk. ^14:22You shall surely tithe all the increase of your seed, that which comes out of the field year by year. ^14:23You shall eat before the LORD your God, in the place which he chooses to cause his name to dwell, the tithe of your grain, of your new wine, and of your oil, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock; that you may learn to fear the LORD your God always. ^14:24If the way is too long for you, so that you are not able to carry it because the place which the LORD your God shall choose to set his name there is too far from you, when the LORD your God blesses you, ^14:25then you shall turn it into money, bind up the money in your hand, and shall go to the place which the LORD your God shall choose. ^14:26You shall trade the money for whatever your soul desires: for cattle, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatever your soul asks of you. You shall eat there before the LORD your God, and you shall rejoice, you and your household. ^14:27You shall not forsake the Levite who is within your gates, for he has no portion nor inheritance with you. ^14:28At the end of every three years you shall bring all the tithe of your increase in the same year, and shall store it within your gates. ^14:29The Levite, because he has no portion nor inheritance with you, as well as the foreigner living among you, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your gates shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hand which you do. ^15:1At the end of every seven years, you shall cancel debts. ^15:2This is the way it shall be done: every creditor shall release that which he has lent to his neighbor. He shall not require payment from his neighbor and his brother, because the LORD’s release has been proclaimed. ^15:3Of a foreigner you may require it; but whatever of yours is with your brother, your hand shall release. ^15:4However there will be no poor with you (for the LORD will surely bless you in the land which the LORD your God gives you for an inheritance to possess) ^15:5if only you diligently listen to the LORD your God’s voice, to observe to do all this commandment which I command you today. ^15:6For the LORD your God will bless you, as he promised you. You will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow. You will rule over many nations, but they will not rule over you. ^15:7If a poor man, one of your brothers, is with you within any of your gates in your land which the LORD your God gives you, you shall not harden your heart, nor shut your hand from your poor brother; ^15:8but you shall surely open your hand to him, and shall surely lend him sufficient for his need, which he lacks. ^15:9Beware that there not be a wicked thought in your heart, saying, “The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand,” and your eye be evil against your poor brother and you give him nothing; and he cry to the LORD against you, and it be sin to you. ^15:10You shall surely give, and your heart shall not be grieved when you give to him, because it is for this thing the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you put your hand to. ^15:11For the poor will never cease out of the land. Therefore I command you to surely open your hand to your brother, to your needy, and to your poor, in your land. ^15:12If your brother, a Hebrew man, or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you and serves you six years, then in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you. ^15:13When you let him go free from you, you shall not let him go empty. ^15:14You shall furnish him liberally out of your flock, out of your threshing floor, and out of your wine press. As the LORD your God has blessed you, you shall give to him. ^15:15You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God redeemed you. Therefore I command you this thing today. ^15:16It shall be, if he tells you, “I will not go out from you,” because he loves you and your house, because he is well with you, ^15:17then you shall take an awl, and thrust it through his ear to the door, and he shall be your servant forever. Also to your female servant you shall do likewise. ^15:18It shall not seem hard to you when you let him go free from you, for he has been double the value of a hired hand as he served you six years. The LORD your God will bless you in all that you do. ^15:19You shall dedicate all the firstborn males that are born of your herd and of your flock to the LORD your God. You shall do no work with the firstborn of your herd, nor shear the firstborn of your flock. ^15:20You shall eat it before the LORD your God year by year in the place which the LORD shall choose, you and your household. ^15:21If it has any defect—is lame or blind, or has any defect whatever, you shall not sacrifice it to the LORD your God. ^15:22You shall eat it within your gates. The unclean and the clean shall eat it alike, as the gazelle and as the deer. ^15:23Only you shall not eat its blood. You shall pour it out on the ground like water. ^16:1Observe the month of Abib, and keep the Passover to the LORD your God; for in the month of Abib the LORD your God brought you out of Egypt by night. ^16:2You shall sacrifice the Passover to the LORD your God, of the flock and the herd, in the place which the LORD shall choose to cause his name to dwell there. ^16:3You shall eat no leavened bread with it. You shall eat unleavened bread with it seven days, even the bread of affliction (for you came out of the land of Egypt in haste) that you may remember the day when you came out of the land of Egypt all the days of your life. ^16:4No yeast shall be seen with you in all your borders seven days; neither shall any of the meat, which you sacrifice the first day at evening, remain all night until the morning. ^16:5You may not sacrifice the Passover within any of your gates which the LORD your God gives you; ^16:6but at the place which the LORD your God shall choose to cause his name to dwell in, there you shall sacrifice the Passover at evening, at the going down of the sun, at the season that you came out of Egypt. ^16:7You shall roast and eat it in the place which the LORD your God chooses. In the morning you shall return to your tents. ^16:8Six days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the seventh day shall be a solemn assembly to the LORD your God. You shall do no work. ^16:9You shall count for yourselves seven weeks. From the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain you shall begin to count seven weeks. ^16:10You shall keep the feast of weeks to the LORD your God with a tribute of a free will offering of your hand, which you shall give according to how the LORD your God blesses you. ^16:11You shall rejoice before the LORD your God: you, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your female servant, the Levite who is within your gates, the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow who are among you, in the place which the LORD your God shall choose to cause his name to dwell there. ^16:12You shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt. You shall observe and do these statutes. ^16:13You shall keep the feast of booths seven days, after you have gathered in from your threshing floor and from your wine press. ^16:14You shall rejoice in your feast, you, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your female servant, the Levite, the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your gates. ^16:15You shall keep a feast to the LORD your God seven days in the place which the LORD chooses, because the LORD your God will bless you in all your increase and in all the work of your hands, and you shall be altogether joyful. ^16:16Three times in a year all of your males shall appear before the LORD your God in the place which he chooses: in the feast of unleavened bread, in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of booths. They shall not appear before the LORD empty. ^16:17Every man shall give as he is able, according to the LORD your God’s blessing which he has given you. ^16:18You shall make judges and officers in all your gates, which the LORD your God gives you, according to your tribes; and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment. ^16:19You shall not pervert justice. You shall not show partiality. You shall not take a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and perverts the words of the righteous. ^16:20You shall follow that which is altogether just, that you may live and inherit the land which the LORD your God gives you. ^16:21You shall not plant for yourselves an Asherah of any kind of tree beside the LORD your God’s altar, which you shall make for yourselves. ^16:22Neither shall you set yourself up a sacred stone which the LORD your God hates. ^17:1You shall not sacrifice to the LORD your God an ox or a sheep in which is a defect or anything evil; for that is an abomination to the LORD your God. ^17:2If there is found among you, within any of your gates which the LORD your God gives you, a man or woman who does that which is evil in the LORD your God’s sight in transgressing his covenant, ^17:3and has gone and served other gods and worshiped them, or the sun, or the moon, or any of the stars of the sky, which I have not commanded, ^17:4and you are told, and you have heard of it, then you shall inquire diligently. Behold, if it is true, and the thing certain, that such abomination is done in Israel, ^17:5then you shall bring out that man or that woman who has done this evil thing to your gates, even that same man or woman; and you shall stone them to death with stones. ^17:6At the mouth of two witnesses, or three witnesses, he who is to die shall be put to death. At the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death. ^17:7The hands of the witnesses shall be first on him to put him to death, and afterward the hands of all the people. So you shall remove the evil from among you. ^17:8If there arises a matter too hard for you in judgment, between blood and blood, between plea and plea, and between stroke and stroke, being matters of controversy within your gates, then you shall arise, and go up to the place which the LORD your God chooses. ^17:9You shall come to the priests who are Levites and to the judge who shall be in those days. You shall inquire, and they shall give you the verdict. ^17:10You shall do according to the decisions of the verdict which they shall give you from that place which the LORD chooses. You shall observe to do according to all that they shall teach you. ^17:11According to the decisions of the law which they shall teach you, and according to the judgment which they shall tell you, you shall do. You shall not turn away from the sentence which they announce to you, to the right hand, nor to the left. ^17:12The man who does presumptuously in not listening to the priest who stands to minister there before the LORD your God, or to the judge, even that man shall die. You shall put away the evil from Israel. ^17:13All the people shall hear and fear, and do no more presumptuously. ^17:14When you have come to the land which the LORD your God gives you, and possess it and dwell in it, and say, “I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,” ^17:15you shall surely set him whom the LORD your God chooses as king over yourselves. You shall set as king over you one from among your brothers. You may not put a foreigner over you, who is not your brother. ^17:16Only he shall not multiply horses to himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt, to the end that he may multiply horses; because the LORD has said to you, “You shall not go back that way again.” ^17:17He shall not multiply wives to himself, that his heart not turn away. He shall not greatly multiply to himself silver and gold. ^17:18It shall be, when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write himself a copy of this law in a book, out of that which is before the Levitical priests. ^17:19It shall be with him, and he shall read from it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them; ^17:20that his heart not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he not turn away from the commandment to the right hand, or to the left, to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he and his children, in the middle of Israel.