Deuteronomy 12
1 “These are the decrees and laws you must carefully observe in the land the LORD, the God of your ancestors, has given you to possess, all the days you live on the earth.
2 Completely destroy every place where the nations you are driving out served their gods: on the high mountains, on the hills, and under every green tree.
3 Tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, burn their Asherah poles in the fire, cut down their carved images of their gods, and wipe out their names from that place.
4 Do not worship the LORD your God this way.
5 Instead, seek the place the LORD your God will choose from among all your tribes to establish his name and dwelling. Go there.
6 Bring there your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes, the contributions from your hands, your vows and freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks.
7 There, before the LORD your God, you will eat and rejoice in everything you have done, you and your households, because the LORD your God has blessed you.
8 You must not do as we are doing here today, each person doing whatever seems right in their own eyes.
9 For you have not yet come to the resting place and inheritance the LORD your God is giving you.
10 But you will cross the Jordan and live in the land the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance. He will give you rest from all your surrounding enemies, and you will live in safety.”
11 “Then there will be a place the LORD your God will choose for his name to dwell. There you will bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes, the contributions from your hands, and all the choicest offerings you vow to the LORD.
12 You will rejoice before the LORD your God—you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, and the Levite in your towns, for he has no share or inheritance with you.
13 Be careful not to offer your burnt offerings wherever you happen to see.
14 Offer your burnt offerings only at the place the LORD chooses in one of your tribes, and there do everything I command you.
15 Still, whenever you desire, you may slaughter and eat meat in any of your towns, according to the blessing the LORD your God has given you. The ceremonially unclean and the clean may eat it, as they would eat gazelle or deer.
16 But you must not eat the blood; pour it out on the ground like water.
17 You may not eat in your towns the tithe of your grain, new wine, or olive oil; the firstborn of your herds and flocks; any of the vows you make; your freewill offerings; or the contributions from your hands.
18 Instead, you must eat them before the LORD your God at the place the LORD your God chooses—you, your son and daughter, your male and female servants, and the Levite in your towns. Rejoice before the LORD your God in everything you do.
19 Be careful not to neglect the Levite as long as you live in your land.
20 When the LORD your God enlarges your territory, as he promised you, and you say, ‘I want to eat meat,’ because you desire to eat meat, then you may eat meat whenever you wish.
21 The place the LORD your God chooses for his name to dwell may be far from you. Then you may slaughter some of your herds and flocks, which the LORD has given you, as I have commanded you, and eat in your towns whenever you wish.”
22 “Just as you eat gazelle or deer, so you may eat this meat. The ceremonially unclean and the clean may eat it together.
23 But be sure not to eat the blood, because the blood is the life. You must not eat the life with the meat.
24 Do not eat it; pour it out on the ground like water.
25 Do not eat it, so that all may go well with you and your children after you, when you do what is right in the eyes of the LORD.
26 But take your sacred offerings and your vows to the place the LORD chooses.
27 Offer your burnt offerings—the meat and the blood—on the altar of the LORD your God. The blood of your sacrifices must be poured out on the altar of the LORD your God, and you may eat the meat.
28 Carefully obey all these words I command you, so that all may go well with you and your children after you forever, when you do what is good and right in the eyes of the LORD your God.
29 When the LORD your God destroys before you the nations you are going to dispossess, and you drive them out and settle in their land,
30 be careful not to be trapped into following them after they have been destroyed before you. Do not seek their gods, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their gods? I will do the same.’
31 Do not worship the LORD your God this way, because they did for their gods everything the LORD detests and hates. They even burned their sons and daughters in the fire for their gods.”
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