1“You must not sacrifice unto the LORD your God an ox or sheep that has a blemish, or any defect; for that is detestable to the LORD your God.”

2“If a man or woman is found among you, within any of the towns which the LORD your God gives you, doing evil in the eyes of the LORD your God, transgressing His covenant, 3Serving or worshipping other gods, the sun, moon, or any stars of heaven, which I have not commanded; 4And you hear of it, and have inquired diligently, and found it true that such abomination is being done in Israel: 5Then you shall bring that man or woman, who is doing that wicked thing, to your gates, and shall stone that person to death. 6On the testimony of two or three witnesses, shall they be found worthy of death; but not on the testimony of only one witness. 7The witnesses must be first to stone them, then all the people may join in, to put that person to death. In this way, you shall purge the evil from among you.”

8“If a dispute arises within your town that is too difficult for you to judge, whether it involves bloodshed, lawsuit, or assault, being matters of controversy: then you shall bring it to the place where the LORD your God shall choose, 9To the priests, the Levites, and to the one in the office of judge at that time, and enquire of them; and they shall pronounce the verdict. 10And you must abide by the verdict, which those in that place, which the LORD shall choose, shall pronounce. 11You shall do according to the verdict of the law which they shall teach you, and the decisions that they give: you shall not deviate to the right nor to the left, from the verdict they shall render. 12Any person who rejects and will not comply with the verdict of the priest or judge that serves there before the LORD your God, shall be put to death. You must purge lawlessness and evil from Israel. 13And all the people shall hear, and be afraid to act presumptuously.”

14“When you have entered, taken possession of, and settled in the land which the LORD your God gives you, and if you then say, ‘Let us set a king over us, like all these nations around us.’ 15Be sure to select one from among your brethren that the LORD your God chooses, as your king. You must not set a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite. 16But that king must not accumulate many horses for himself, nor send people to Egypt to get more horses; because the LORD has told you, ‘You shall not ever return there again.’ 17Nor shall your king acquire many wives for himself, so that his heart is not led astray; nor shall he accumulate large amounts of silver and gold. 18And when he ascends the throne of his kingdom, he shall write his own copy of this law in a scroll, copied from the scroll that is before the Levitical priests; 19And that scroll shall be kept with him, and he shall read it all the days of his life, so that he may learn to revere the LORD his God, to keep and obey all the words of this law and its statutes, 20And not consider himself better than his fellow Israelites, and so that he does not turn to the right or to the left from God’s law. Then he and his descendants may reign a long time over his kingdom of Israel.”