Exodus 23

Thomson^{(i) 1} Thou shalt not countenance an idle report, nor conspire with the unrighteous to be a false witness. ² Thou shalt not be with the majority in wickedness, nor join with the multitude to shut out justice. ³ In passing judgment thou shalt not be influenced by compassion for the needy. ⁴ If thou meet the ox of thy enemy or his ass going astray thou shalt turn it back and restore it to him. ⁵ And if thou seest thine enemy's ass fallen under his burden thou shalt not pass it by, but shalt raise it up with its load. ⁶ Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of a poor man in the trial of his cause. ⁷ Thou shalt keep aloof from every thing unjust. An innocent and a righteous man thou shalt not slay; nor shalt thou justify a wicked man for the sake of bribes. ⁸ Bribes thou shalt not receive, for they blind the eyes of them who see, and pervert judgment. ⁹ You shall not afflict a stranger, for you know the heart of a stranger; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. ¹⁰ Six years thou shalt sow thy ground and gather in the products thereof; ¹¹ but on the seventh thou shalt give it rest and let it lie fallow, that the poor of thy people may eat, and what they leave, let the wild beasts of the field eat. The same thou shalt do with thy vineyards and thy olives. ¹² Six days thou shalt do thy work; but on the seventh there shall be a rest; that thy ox and thy ass may rest: and that the son of thy handmaid and the stranger may repose. ¹³ You shall keep all that I have said to you; and make no mention of the name of strange gods, nor let it be heard out of your mouth. ¹⁴ Three times a year you shall keep a festival to me; ¹⁵ the festival of unleavened bread you shall carefully observe. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I have commanded you, at the time fixed in the month of new things. For in that month thou didst come out of Egypt. Thou shalt not appear before me empty. ¹⁶ Thou shalt also keep the festival of the ingathering of the first fruits of thy labours employed in sowing thy field; and the festival of completion at the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours from the field. ¹⁷ Three times a year all thy males must appear before the Lord thy God; ¹⁸ for when I have driven out the nations from before thee I will enlarge thy borders. Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leaven; nor shall the fat of my festival remain till the morning. ¹⁹ The dedications of the first products of thy land thou shalt bring to the house of the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not boil a kid in the milk of its dam. ²⁰ Now behold I send my angel before thy face, that he may guard thee in the way, and bring thee to the land, which I have prepared for thee. ²¹ Take heed to thyself and hearken to him and disobey him not; for he should not withdraw from you; for my name is upon him. ²² If you will hearken diligently to this voice of mine, and do whatever I command thee, and keep my covenant, you shall be to me a peculiar people above all the nations; for the whole earth is mine, but you shall be to me a royal priesthood and a holy nation. These words you shall deliver to the children of Israel; If you will hearken diligently to my voice, and do all that I command thee, I will be an enemy to thy enemies, and an adversary to thy adversaries; ²³ For my angel shall go before thee as thy leader, and conduct thee to the Amorite and the Chettite and the Pherezite and the Chananite and the Gergasite and the Evite and the Jebusite, and I will exterminate them. ²⁴ Thou shalt not worship their gods nor serve them. Thou shalt not do according to their works; but destroy utterly and break in pieces their pillars ²⁵ and worship the Lord thy God. And I will bless thy bread and thy wine and thy water, and turn away sickness from you. ²⁶ There shall not be a man childless, nor a woman barren in thy land. The number of your days I will completely fulfil. ²⁷ And I will send terror before thee and confound all the nations to which thou shalt go; and cause all thy adversaries to flee before thee. ²⁸ And I will send hornets before thee, and thou shalt drive out the Amorites and the Evites and the Chananites and the Chettites from before thee. ²⁹ I will not drive them out in one year, lest the land become a waste and the wild beasts of the earth multiply against thee. ³⁰ By little and little I will drive them away from thee until thou art increased and canst possess the land. ³¹ And I will establish thy boundaries from the Red sea to the sea of Philisteim, and from the wilderness to the great river Euphrates, and deliver into your hands those who are settled in the land, or drive them out from before thee. ³² Thou shalt not make a treaty with them and their gods, ³³ nor shall they dwell in thy land, lest they cause thee to sin against me. For if thou serve their gods, they will be to thee a stumbling block.