Persons Excluded from the Assembly

23 “^(A)No one who is ^[a]emasculated or has his male organ cut off may enter the assembly of the Lord. ² No one of illegitimate birth may enter the assembly of the Lord; none of his descendants, even to the tenth generation, may enter the assembly of the Lord. ^3 (B)No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord; none of their descendants, even to the tenth generation, may ever enter the assembly of the Lord, ^4 (C)because they did not meet you with ^[b]food and water on the way when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you ^(D)Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of ^[c]Mesopotamia, to curse you. ⁵ Nevertheless, the Lord your God was unwilling to listen to Balaam, but the Lord your God ^(E)turned the curse into a blessing for you because the Lord your God ^(F)loves you. ^6 (G)You shall never seek their peace or their prosperity all your days.

⁷ “You shall not loathe an ^[d]Edomite, for ^(H)he is your brother; you shall not loathe an Egyptian, ^(I)because you were a stranger in his land. ⁸ The sons of the third generation who are born to them may enter the assembly of the Lord.

⁹ “When you go out as ^[e]an army against your enemies, you shall be on guard against every evil thing.

¹⁰ “^(J)If there is among you any man who is unclean because of a nocturnal emission, then he must go outside the camp; he may not ^[f]reenter the camp. ¹¹ But when evening approaches, he shall bathe himself with water, and at sundown he may ^[g]reenter the camp.

¹² “You shall also have a place allocated outside the camp, so that you may go out there to relieve yourself, ¹³ and you shall have a ^[h]spade among your tools, and it shall be when you sit down outside, you shall dig with it and shall turn and cover up your excrement. ¹⁴ Since ^(K)the Lord your God walks in the midst of your camp to save you and to ^[i]defeat your enemies before you, your camp must be ^(L)holy; so He must not see ^[j]anything indecent among you ^[k]or He will turn away from you.

¹⁵ “^(M)You shall not hand over to his master a slave who has ^[l]escaped from his master to you. ¹⁶ He shall live with you in your midst, in the place that he chooses in one of your ^[m]towns where it pleases him; ^(N)you shall not mistreat him.

¹⁷ “^(O)None of the daughters of Israel shall be a cult prostitute, ^(P)nor shall any of the sons of Israel be a cult prostitute. ¹⁸ You shall not bring the earnings of a prostitute or the money for a ^[n](Q)dog into the house of the Lord your God as payment for any vowed offering, because both of these are an abomination to the Lord your God.

¹⁹ “^(R)You are not to charge interest to your countrymen: interest on money, food, or anything that may be loaned on interest. ^20 (S)You may charge interest to a foreigner, but to your countrymen you shall not charge interest, so that ^(T)the Lord your God may bless you in all ^[o]that you undertake in the land which you are about to enter to ^[p]possess.

²¹ “^(U)When you make a vow to the Lord your God, you shall not delay to pay it, for the Lord your God will certainly require it of you, and it will be a sin ^[q]for you. ²² However, if you refrain from making vows, it will not be a sin ^[r]for you. ²³ You shall be careful and perform what goes out of your lips, since in fact you have vowed a ^[s]voluntary offering to the Lord your God, whatever you have ^[t]promised.

²⁴ “When you enter your neighbor’s vineyard, you may eat grapes ^[u]until you are satisfied; but you are not to put any in your ^[v]basket.

²⁵ “^(V)When you enter your neighbor’s standing grain, you may pluck the heads of grain with your hand, but you are not to ^[w]use a sickle on your neighbor’s standing grain.

Law of Divorce

24 “When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens, if she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some ^(W)indecency in her, that ^(X)he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and ^[x]sends her away from his house, ² and she leaves his house and goes and becomes another man’s wife, ³ and the latter husband ^[y]turns against her, writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand, and ^[z]sends her away from his house, or if the latter husband who took her to be his wife dies, ⁴ then her ^(Y)former husband who ^[aa]sent her away is not allowed to take her again to be his wife, after ^[ab]she has been defiled; for that is an abomination before the Lord, and you shall not bring sin on the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.

⁵ “^(Z)When a man takes a new wife, he is not to go out with the army, nor be assigned any duty; he shall be free at home for one year and shall ^(AA)make his wife whom he has taken happy.

Various Laws

⁶ “No one shall seize a handmill or an upper millstone as a pledge for a loan, since he would be seizing the debtor’s ^[ac]means of life as a pledge.

⁷ “^(AB)If someone is ^[ad]caught kidnapping any of his countrymen of the sons of Israel, and he treats him as merchandise and sells him, then that thief shall die; so you shall eliminate the evil from among you.

⁸ “^(AC)Be careful about an infestation of leprosy, that you are very attentive and act in accordance with everything that the Levitical priests teach you; just as I have commanded them, you shall be careful to act. ⁹ Remember what the Lord your God did ^(AD)to Miriam on the way as you came out of Egypt.

¹⁰ “^(AE)When you make your neighbor a loan of any kind, you shall not enter his house to take his pledge. ¹¹ You shall stand outside, and the person to whom you are making the loan shall bring the pledge outside to you. ¹² And if he is a poor man, you shall not sleep with his pledge. ^13 (AF)When the sun goes down you shall certainly return the pledge to him, so that he may sleep in his cloak and bless you; and ^(AG)it will be righteousness for you before the Lord your God.

¹⁴ “^(AH)You shall not exploit a hired worker who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your countrymen or one of your strangers who are in your land in your ^[ae]towns. ^15 (AI)You shall give him his wages on his day ^[af]before the sun sets—for he is poor and sets his ^[ag]heart on it—so that ^(AJ)he does not cry out against you to the Lord, and it becomes a sin in you.

¹⁶ “^(AK)Fathers shall not be put to death for their sons, nor shall sons be put to death for their fathers; everyone shall be put to death for his own sin alone.

¹⁷ “^(AL)You shall not pervert the justice ^[ah]due a stranger or ^[ai]an orphan, nor ^(AM)seize a widow’s garment as a ^[aj]pledge. ¹⁸ But you are to remember that you were a slave in Egypt, and that the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore I am commanding you to do this thing.

¹⁹ “^(AN)When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you are not to go back to get it; it shall belong ^(AO)to the stranger, the ^[ak]orphan, and to the widow, in order that the Lord your God ^(AP)may bless you in all the work of your hands. ^20 (AQ)When you beat the olives off your olive tree, you are not to search through the branches ^[al]again; that shall be left ^(AR)for the stranger, the ^[am]orphan, and for the widow.

²¹ “When you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you are not to ^[an]go over it again; that shall be left for the stranger, the ^[ao]orphan, and the widow. ²² And you shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt; therefore I am commanding you to do this thing.

Various Laws

25 “^(AS)If there is a dispute between people and they go to ^[ap]court, and ^[aq]the judges decide their case, ^(AT)and they declare the righteous innocent and pronounce the wicked guilty, ² then it shall be if the wicked person ^[ar](AU)deserves to be beaten, the judge shall then make him lie down and have him beaten in his presence with the number of lashes according to his ^[as]wrongful act. ^3 (AV)He may have him beaten forty times, but not more, so that he does not have him beaten with many more lashes than these, and that your brother does not ^(AW)become contemptible in your eyes.

⁴ “^(AX)You shall not muzzle the ox while it is threshing.

⁵ “When brothers live together, and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the deceased shall not be married outside the family to a strange man. ^(AY)Her husband’s brother shall have relations with her and take her to himself as his wife, and perform the duty of a husband’s brother to her. ⁶ It shall then be that the firstborn to whom she gives birth shall ^[at]assume the name of his father’s deceased brother, so that ^(AZ)his name will not be wiped out from Israel. ^7 (BA)But if the man does not desire to take his brother’s widow, then his brother’s widow shall go up to the gate to the elders, and say, ‘My husband’s brother refuses to establish a name for his brother in Israel; he is not willing to perform the duty of a husband’s brother to me.’ ⁸ Then the elders of his city shall summon him and speak to him. And if he persists and says, ‘I do not desire to take her,’ ^9 (BB)then his brother’s widow shall come up to him in the sight of the elders, and pull his sandal off his foot and ^(BC)spit in his face; and she shall ^[au]declare, ‘This is what is done to the man who does not build up his brother’s house!’ ¹⁰ And in Israel ^[av]his family shall be called by the name, ‘The house of him whose sandal was removed.’

¹¹ “If two men, a man and his countryman, have a fight ^[aw]with each other, and the wife of one comes up to save her husband from the hand of the one who is hitting him, and she reaches out with her hand and grasps ^[ax]that man’s genitals, ¹² then you shall cut off her ^[ay]hand; ^[az](BD)you shall not show pity.

¹³ “^(BE)You shall not have in your bag ^[ba]differing weights, a large and a small. ¹⁴ You shall not have in your house ^[bb]differing measures, a large and a small. ¹⁵ You shall have a correct and honest ^[bc]weight; you shall have a correct and honest ^[bd]measure, ^(BF)so that your days may be prolonged ^[be]in the land which the Lord your God is giving you. ¹⁶ For ^(BG)everyone who does these things, everyone who acts unjustly is an abomination to the Lord your God.

¹⁷ “^(BH)Remember what Amalek did to you on the way when you came out of Egypt, ¹⁸ how he confronted you on the way and attacked among you all the stragglers at your rear when you were tired and weary; and he ^(BI)did not ^[bf]fear God. ¹⁹ So it shall come about, when the Lord your God has given you ^(BJ)rest from all your surrounding enemies in the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance to ^[bg]possess, that you shall wipe out the mention of the name Amalek from under heaven; you must not forget.

Offering First Fruits

26 “Then it shall be, when you enter the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, and you take possession of it and live in it, ² that you shall take some of ^(BK)the first of all the produce of the ground which you bring in from your land that the Lord your God gives you, and you shall put it in a basket and ^(BL)go to the place where the Lord your God chooses to establish His name. ³ And you shall go to the priest who is in office at that time and say to him, ‘I declare today to the Lord ^[bh]my God that I have entered the land which the Lord swore to our fathers to give us.’ ⁴ Then the priest shall take the basket from your hand and set it before the altar of the Lord your God. ⁵ And you shall respond and say before the Lord your God, ‘^(BM)My father was a ^[bi]wandering Aramean, and he went down to Egypt and ^[bj]resided there, ^(BN)few in number; but there he became a ^(BO)great, mighty, and populous nation. ⁶ And the ^(BP)Egyptians treated us badly and oppressed us, and imposed hard labor on us. ⁷ Then ^(BQ)we cried out to the Lord, the God of our fathers, and the Lord heard our voice and saw our wretched condition, our trouble, and our oppression; ^8 (BR)and the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand, an outstretched arm, and with great terror, and with signs and wonders; ⁹ and He has brought us to this place, and has given us this land, ^(BS)a land flowing with milk and honey. ¹⁰ And now behold, I have brought the first of the produce of the ground ^(BT)which You, Lord have given me.’ Then you shall set it before the Lord your God, and worship before the Lord your God; ¹¹ and you, ^(BU)the Levite, and the stranger who is among you shall ^(BV)rejoice in all the good which the Lord your God has given you and your household.

¹² “^(BW)When you have finished paying all the tithe of your produce in the third year, the year of the tithe, then you shall give it to the Levite, to the stranger, to the ^[bk]orphan, and to the widow, so that they may eat in your ^[bl]towns and be satisfied. ¹³ And you shall say before the Lord your God, ‘I have removed the sacred portion from my house, and have also given it to the Levite, the stranger, the ^[bm]orphan, and the widow, in accordance with all Your commandments which You have commanded me; ^(BX)I have not violated or forgotten any of Your commandments. ¹⁴ I have not eaten of it while mourning, nor have I removed any of it while I was unclean, nor offered any of it to the dead. I have listened to the voice of the Lord my God; I have acted in accordance with everything that You have commanded me. ^15 (BY)Look down from Your holy dwelling place, from heaven, and bless Your people Israel, and the ground which You have given us, ^(BZ)a land flowing with milk and honey just as You swore to our fathers.’

¹⁶ “This day the Lord your God commands you to perform these statutes and ordinances. Therefore you shall be careful to perform them ^(CA)with all your heart and with all your soul. ^17 (CB)Today you have declared the Lord to be your God, and ^[bn]that you will walk in His ways and keep His statutes, His commandments, and His ordinances, and listen to His voice. ¹⁸ And the Lord has today declared you to be ^(CC)His people, His personal possession, just as He promised you, and ^[bo]that you are to keep all His commandments; ¹⁹ and ^[bp]that He will ^(CD)put you high above all the nations which He has made, for glory, fame, and honor; and that you shall be ^(CE)a consecrated people to the Lord your God, just as He has spoken.”

Instruction about Prayer

11 It happened that while ^[a]Jesus was praying in a certain place, when He had finished, one of His disciples said to Him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John also taught his disciples.” ² And He said to them, “^(A)When you pray, say:

⁵ And He said to them, “^[f]Suppose one of you has a friend, and goes to him at midnight and says to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves, ⁶ because a friend of mine has come to me from a journey and I have nothing to serve him’; ⁷ and from inside he answers and says, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been shut and my children ^[g]and I are in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.’ ⁸ I tell you, even if he will not get up and give him anything just because he is his friend, yet ^(D)because of his ^[h]shamelessness he will get up and give him as much as he needs.

⁹ “So I say to you, ^[i](E)ask, and it will be given to you; ^[j]seek, and you will find; ^[k]knock, and it will be opened to you. ¹⁰ For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks, it will be opened. ¹¹ Now ^[l]which one of you fathers will his son ask for a ^[m]fish, and instead of a fish, he will give him a snake? ¹² Or he will even ask for an egg, and his father will give him a scorpion? ¹³ So ^(F)if you, despite being ^[n]evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will ^[o]your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?”

Pharisees’ Blasphemy

^14 (G)And He was casting out a mute demon; when the demon had gone out, the man who was previously unable to speak talked, and the crowds were amazed. ¹⁵ But some of them said, “He casts out the demons ^(H)by ^(I)Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons.” ¹⁶ Others, ^[p]to test Him, ^(J)were demanding of Him a ^[q]sign from heaven. ^17 (K)But He knew their thoughts and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and a house divided against ^[r]itself falls. ¹⁸ And if ^(L)Satan also has been divided against himself, how will his kingdom ^[s]stand? For you claim that I cast out the demons by ^(M)Beelzebul. ¹⁹ Yet if by ^(N)Beelzebul I cast out the demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore, they will be your judges. ²⁰ But if I cast out the demons by ^[t]the ^(O)finger of God, then ^(P)the kingdom of God has come upon you. ²¹ When ^[u]a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are ^[v]secure. ²² But when someone stronger than he attacks him and overpowers him, that man takes away his armor on which he had relied and distributes his plunder. ^23 (Q)The one who is not with Me is against Me; and the one who does not gather with Me scatters.

²⁴ “^(R)When the unclean spirit comes out of ^[w]a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, and not finding any, it then says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ ²⁵ And when it comes, it finds it swept and put in order. ²⁶ Then it goes and brings along seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they come in and live there; and the last condition of that person becomes worse than the first.”

²⁷ While ^[x]Jesus was saying these things, one of the women in the crowd raised her voice and said to Him, “^(S)Blessed is the womb that carried You, and the breasts at which You nursed!” ²⁸ But He said, “On the contrary, blessed are ^(T)those who hear the word of God and follow it.”

The Sign of Jonah

²⁹ Now as the crowds were increasing, He began to say, “^(U)This generation is a wicked generation; it ^(V)demands a ^[y]sign, and so no ^[z]sign will be given to it except the ^[aa]sign of Jonah. ³⁰ For just as ^(W)Jonah became a ^[ab]sign to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation. ³¹ The ^(X)Queen of the South will rise up with the men of this generation at the judgment and condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon; and behold, something greater than Solomon is here. ³² The men of Nineveh will stand up with this generation at the judgment and condemn it, because ^(Y)they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.

³³ “^(Z)No one lights a lamp and puts it away in a cellar nor under a basket, but on the lampstand, so that those who enter may see the light. ^34 (AA)Your eye is the lamp of your body; when your eye is ^[ac]clear, your whole body also is full of light; but when it is ^[ad]bad, your body also is full of darkness. ³⁵ So watch out that the light in you is not darkness. ³⁶ Therefore if your whole body is full of light, without any dark part, it will be wholly illuminated, as when the lamp illuminates you with its light.”

Woes upon the Pharisees

³⁷ Now when He had spoken, a Pharisee *asked Him to have lunch with him; and He went in and reclined at the table. ³⁸ When the Pharisee saw this, he was surprised that Jesus had not first ^[ae](AB)ceremonially washed before the ^[af]meal. ³⁹ But ^(AC)the Lord said to him, “Now ^(AD)you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and of the dish; but your inside is full of greed and wickedness. ^40 (AE)You foolish ones, did He who made the outside not make the inside also? ⁴¹ But ^(AF)give that which is within as a charitable gift, and ^[ag]then all things are ^(AG)clean for you.

⁴² “^(AH)But woe to you Pharisees! For you ^(AI)pay tithes of mint, rue, and every kind of garden herb, and yet you ^[ah]ignore justice and the love of God; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. ⁴³ Woe to you Pharisees! For you ^(AJ)love the seat of honor in the synagogues and personal greetings in the marketplaces. ^44 (AK)Woe to you! For you are like ^[ai]unseen tombs, and the people who walk over them are unaware of it.”

⁴⁵ One of the ^[aj](AL)lawyers *said to Him in reply, “Teacher, when You say these things, You insult us too.” ⁴⁶ But He said, “Woe to you ^(AM)lawyers as well! For ^(AN)you load people with burdens that are hard to bear, ^[ak]while you yourselves will not even ^[al]touch the burdens with one of your fingers. ^47 (AO)Woe to you! For you build the ^[am]tombs of the prophets, and it was your fathers who killed them. ⁴⁸ So you are witnesses and you approve of the deeds of your fathers; because it was they who killed them, and you build their ^[an]tombs. ⁴⁹ For this reason also, ^(AP)the wisdom of God said, ‘^(AQ)I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill, and some they will ^[ao]persecute, ⁵⁰ so that the blood of all the prophets, shed ^(AR)since the foundation of the world, may be charged ^[ap]against this generation, ⁵¹ from ^(AS)the blood of Abel to ^(AT)the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the house of God; yes, I tell you, it shall be charged ^[aq]against this generation.’ ⁵² Woe to you ^[ar](AU)lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge; ^(AV)you yourselves did not enter, and you hindered those who were entering.”

⁵³ When He left that place, the scribes and the Pharisees began to be very hostile and to interrogate Him about many subjects, ^54 (AW)plotting against Him ^(AX)to catch ^[as]Him in something He might say.