One Place for Worship
These are the statutes and the judgments that you shall keep to do in the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess it — all the days that you live on the ground.
You shall surely destroy all the places where the nations that you are dispossessing served their gods — on the high mountains, and on the hills, and under every green tree.
And you shall tear down their altars, and shatter their standing stones, and their Asherah poles you shall burn with fire; and the carved images of their gods you shall cut down; and you shall destroy their name from that place.
You shall not do so to the LORD your God.
But to the place that the LORD your God chooses out of all your tribes to set his name there — to his dwelling you shall seek, and there you shall come.
And you shall bring there your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, and your tithes, and the contribution of your hand, and your vows, and your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock.
And you shall eat there before the LORD your God, and rejoice in every undertaking of your hand — you and your households — in which the LORD your God has blessed you.
You shall not do according to all that we are doing here today — each man whatever is right in his own eyes —
for you have not yet come to the resting place and to the inheritance that the LORD your God is giving you.
But you shall cross the Jordan, and live in the land that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance; and he will give you rest from all your enemies around you, and you shall live in security.
And the place that the LORD your God chooses to make his name dwell there — there you shall bring all that I am commanding you: your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, your tithes, and the contribution of your hand, and all the choicest of your vows that you vow to the LORD.
And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God — you, and your sons and your daughters, and your male slaves and your female slaves, and the Levite who is within your gates, for he has no portion or inheritance with you.
Take care for yourself, so that you do not offer up your burnt offerings in every place you see —
but in the place that the LORD chooses in one of your tribes: there you shall offer up your burnt offerings, and there you shall do all that I am commanding you.
Only, with all the desire of your soul, you may slaughter and eat meat within any of your gates, according to the blessing of the LORD your God that he has given you. The unclean and the clean may eat it, as of the gazelle and of the deer.
Only the blood you shall not eat; on the earth you shall pour it out like water.
You may not eat within your gates the tithe of your grain, or of your new wine, or of your fresh oil, or the firstborn of your herd or of your flock, or any of your vows that you vow, or your freewill offerings, or the contribution of your hand.
But before the LORD your God you shall eat it, in the place that the LORD your God chooses — you, and your son and your daughter, and your male slave and your female slave, and the Levite who is within your gates; and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God in every undertaking of your hand.
Take care for yourself, so that you do not forsake the Levite, all your days on your ground.
When the LORD your God enlarges your border, as he has spoken to you, and you say, “Let me eat meat,” because your soul desires to eat meat — with all the desire of your soul you may eat meat.
If the place that the LORD your God chooses to set his name there is far from you, then you may slaughter of your herd and of your flock that the LORD has given you, as I have commanded you; and you may eat within your gates with all the desire of your soul.
Only, as the gazelle and the deer are eaten, so you may eat it; the unclean and the clean alike may eat it.
Only be strong not to eat the blood — for the blood is the soul, and you shall not eat the soul with the flesh.
You shall not eat it; on the earth you shall pour it out like water.
You shall not eat it, so that it may go well for you and for your sons after you, when you do what is right in the eyes of the LORD.
Only your holy things that you have, and your vows, you shall take up and go to the place that the LORD chooses.
And you shall offer your burnt offerings, the flesh and the blood, on the altar of the LORD your God; and the blood of your sacrifices shall be poured out on the altar of the LORD your God, and the flesh you may eat.
Keep and hear all these words that I am commanding you, so that it may go well for you and for your sons after you forever, when you do what is good and right in the eyes of the LORD your God.
A Warning against Idolatry
When the LORD your God cuts off from before you the nations into whose land you are going, to dispossess them, and you dispossess them and live in their land —
take care for yourself, so that you are not snared into following them after they have been destroyed from before you, and so that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, “How did these nations serve their gods? I too will do the same.”
You shall not do so to the LORD your God — for every abomination to the LORD, which he hates, they have done for their gods; for even their sons and their daughters they burn with fire to their gods.
Every word that I am commanding you — that you shall keep to do. You shall not add to it, and you shall not take away from it.