Deuteronomy 12

¹“These are the statutes and judgments which you shall be careful to observe in the land which the Lord

²You shall utterly destroy all the places where the nations which you shall dispossess served their gods, on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree.

³And you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and burn their wooden images with fire; you shall cut down the carved images of their gods and destroy their names from that place.

⁴You shall not worship the Lord

⁵“But you shall seek the place where the Lord

⁶There you shall take your burnt offerings, your sacrifices, your tithes, the heave offerings of your hand, your vowed offerings, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks.

⁷And there you shall eat before the Lord

⁸“You shall not at all do as we are doing here today—every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes—

⁹for as yet you have not come to the rest and the inheritance which the Lord

¹⁰But when you cross over the Jordan and dwell in the land which the Lord

¹¹then there will be the place where the Lord

¹²And you shall rejoice before the Lord

¹³Take heed to yourself that you do not offer your burnt offerings in every place that you see;

¹⁴but in the place which the Lord

¹⁵“However, you may slaughter and eat meat within all your gates, whatever your heart desires, according to the blessing of the Lord

¹⁶Only you shall not eat the blood; you shall pour it on the earth like water.

¹⁷You may not eat within your gates the tithe of your grain or your new wine or your oil, of the firstborn of your herd or your flock, of any of your offerings which you vow, of your freewill offerings, or of the heave offering of your hand.

¹⁸But you must eat them before the Lord

¹⁹Take heed to yourself that you do not forsake the Levite as long as you live in your land.

²⁰“When the Lord

²¹If the place where the Lord

²²Just as the gazelle and the deer are eaten, so you may eat them; the unclean and the clean alike may eat them.

²³Only be sure that you do not eat the blood, for the blood is the life; you may not eat the life with the meat.

²⁴You shall not eat it; you shall pour it on the earth like water.

²⁵You shall not eat it, that it may go well with you and your children after you, when you do what is right in the sight of the Lord

²⁶Only the holy things which you have, and your vowed offerings, you shall take and go to the place which the Lord

²⁷And you shall offer your burnt offerings, the meat and the blood, on the altar of the Lord

²⁸Observe and obey all these words which I command you, that it may go well with you and your children after you forever, when you do what is good and right in the sight of the Lord

²⁹“When the Lord

³⁰take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them, after they are destroyed from before you, and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their gods? I also will do likewise.’

³¹You shall not worship the Lord

³²“Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it; you shall not add to it nor take away from it.