Exodus 23

Exodus 23

Laws of Justice and Mercy

1You must not give a false report. Do not join your hand with the wicked to be a malicious witness.[#Ps 101:5; #Ps 35:11]

2You must not follow the masses to do evil, and do not testify in a dispute that agrees with the crowd to pervert justice.[#Lev 19:15]

3You must not show partiality to a poor man in his dispute.

4If you meet your enemy’s ox or his donkey going astray, you shall surely return it to him.[#Dt 22:1–4; Pr 25:21]

5If you see the donkey of someone who hates you lying under its burden, you must not ignore it; you must surely help him with it.[#Dt 22:4]

6You shall not turn justice away from your poor in his dispute.[#Dt 27:19]

7Keep far away from a false charge, and do not kill the innocent and the righteous, for I will not justify the wicked.[#Ro 1:18]

8You shall not take a bribe, for a bribe blinds those who see and subverts the words of the righteous.[#Dt 16:19; Pr 15:27]

9Also you shall not oppress a foreigner, for you know the life of a foreigner, seeing you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.[#Ex 22:21; Dt 27:19]

The Laws of Sabbaths

10You shall sow your land for six years and shall gather in its produce,

11but in the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow, so that the poor of your people may eat, and what they leave the beasts of the field may eat. You shall do likewise with your vineyard and with your olive grove.

12For six days you are to do your work, but on the seventh day you must cease, so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your female servant and the foreigner may refresh themselves.[#Ex 20:8–11]

13In all things that I have said to you, watch yourselves, and do not mention the name of other gods, nor let them be heard from your mouth.[#Jos 23:7]

The Three Annual Feasts

14Three times in the year you must celebrate a feast to Me.[#Dt 16:16]

15You shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread. For seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, in the appointed time of the month Aviv, for in it you came out from Egypt.[#Nu 28:16–25]

No one shall appear before Me empty-handed.

16You shall observe the Feast of Harvest, the firstfruits of your labors, which you have sown in the field.[#Ex 34:22; Lev 23:9–21]

You shall observe the Feast of Ingathering at the end of the year, when you have gathered in the fruit of your labors from the field.

17Three times in the year all your males shall appear before the Lord God .[#Ex 34:23; Dt 16:16]

18You shall not offer the blood of My sacrifice with leavened bread, nor shall the fat of My sacrifice remain until the morning.[#Ex 34:25; Lev 2:11]

19The first of the firstfruits of your land you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.[#Ex 34:26; Dt 26:10]

You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.

The Angel Prepares the Way

20Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you along the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared.[#Ex 14:19; 32:34]

21Be on guard before him and obey his voice. Do not provoke him, for he will not pardon your transgressions, for My name is in him.[#Ps 78:40, 56]

22But if you diligently obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.[#Ge 12:3; Dt 30:7]

23For My angel will go before you and bring you to the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, and I will completely destroy them.[#Ex 23:20]

24You must not bow down to their gods, or serve them, or do according to their practices, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break down their images in pieces.[#Ex 20:5; #Nu 33:52]

25You shall serve the Lord your God, and He shall bless your bread and your water, and I will remove sickness from your midst.[#Dt 6:13; #Ex 15:26]

26No one shall be miscarrying or be barren in your land. I will fulfill the number of your days.[#Dt 7:14; #Job 5:26]

27I will send My fear before you, and I will throw into panic all the people to whom you shall come. I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you.[#Dt 2:25; 7:23]

28I will send hornets before you which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before you.[#Dt 7:20]

29I will not drive them out before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the beasts of the field multiply against you.[#Dt 7:22]

30Little by little I will drive them out before you, until you become fruitful and inherit the land.

31I will set your boundaries from the Red Sea to the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the Euphrates River; for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you will drive them out before you.[#Ge 15:18; #Jos 21:44]

32You must not make a covenant with them or with their gods.[#Ex 34:12; Dt 7:2]

33They shall not live in your land, lest they cause you to sin against Me, for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you.[#Dt 7:16; Ps 106:36]

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