1Then the LORD said to Moses, 2“Speak to the whole congregation of Israel and tell them: Be holy because I, the LORD your God, am holy. 3Each of you must respect his mother and father, and you must keep My Sabbaths. I am the LORD your God. 4Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves molten gods. I am the LORD your God. 5When you sacrifice a peace offering to the LORD, you shall offer it for your acceptance. 6It shall be eaten on the day you sacrifice it, or on the next day; but what remains on the third day must be burned up. 7If any of it is eaten on the third day, it is tainted and will not be accepted. 8Whoever eats it will bear his iniquity, for he has profaned what is holy to the LORD. That person must be cut off from his people. 9When you reap the harvest of your land, you are not to reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. 10You must not strip your vineyard bare or gather its fallen grapes. Leave them for the poor and the foreigner. I am the LORD your God. 11You must not steal. You must not lie or deceive one another. 12You must not swear falsely by My name and so profane the name of your God. I am the LORD. 13You must not defraud your neighbor or rob him. You must not withhold until morning the wages due a hired hand. 14You must not curse the deaf or place a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear your God. I am the LORD. 15You must not pervert justice; you must not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the rich; you are to judge your neighbor fairly. 16You must not go about spreading slander among your people. You must not endanger the life of your neighbor. I am the LORD. 17You must not harbor hatred against your brother in your heart. Directly rebuke your neighbor, so that you will not incur guilt on account of him. 18Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against any of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD. 19You are to keep My statutes. You shall not crossbreed two different kinds of livestock; you shall not sow your fields with two kinds of seed; and you shall not wear clothing made of two kinds of material. 20If a man lies carnally with a slave girl promised to another man but who has not been redeemed or given her freedom, there must be due punishment. But they are not to be put to death, because she had not been freed. 21The man, however, must bring a ram to the entrance to the Tent of Meeting as his guilt offering to the LORD. 22The priest shall make atonement on his behalf before the LORD with the ram of the guilt offering for the sin he has committed, and he will be forgiven the sin he has committed. 23When you enter the land and plant any kind of tree for food, you shall regard the fruit as forbidden. For three years it will be forbidden to you and must not be eaten. 24In the fourth year all its fruit must be consecrated as a praise offering to the LORD. 25But in the fifth year you may eat its fruit; thus your harvest will be increased. I am the LORD your God. 26You must not eat anything with blood still in it. You must not practice divination or sorcery. 27You must not cut off the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard. 28You must not make any cuts in your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the LORD. 29You must not defile your daughter by making her a prostitute, or the land will be prostituted and filled with depravity. 30You must keep My Sabbaths and have reverence for My sanctuary. I am the LORD. 31You must not turn to mediums or spiritists; do not seek them out, or you will be defiled by them. I am the LORD your God. 32You are to rise in the presence of the elderly, honor the aged, and fear your God. I am the LORD. 33When a foreigner resides with you in your land, you must not oppress him. 34You must treat the foreigner living among you as native-born and love him as yourself, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God. 35You must not use dishonest measures of length, weight, or volume. 36You shall maintain honest scales and weights, an honest ephah, and an honest hin. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt. 37You must keep all My statutes and all My ordinances and follow them. I am the LORD.”
Matthew Henry's Commentary
laws. - There are some ceremonial precepts in this chapter, but most of these precepts are binding on us, for they are explanations of the ten commandments. It is required that Israel be a holy people, because the God of Israel is a holy God, ver. #2|. To teach real separation from the world and the flesh, and entire devotedness to God. This is now the law of Christ; may the Lord bring every thought within us into obedience to it! Children are to be obedient to their parents, ver. #3|. The fear here required includes inward reverence and esteem, outward respect and obedience, care to please them and to make them easy. God only is to be worshipped, ver. #4|. Turn not from the true God to false ones, from the God who will make you holy and happy, to those that will deceive you, and make you for ever miserable. Turn not your eyes to them, much less your heart. They should leave the gleanings of their harvest and vintage for the poor, ver. #9|. Works of piety must be always attended with works of charity, according to our ability. We must not be covetous, griping, and greedy of every thing we can lay claim to, nor insist upon our right in all things. We are to be honest and true in all our dealings, ver. #11|. Whatever we have in the world, we must see that we get it honestly, for we cannot be truly rich, or long rich, with that which is not so. Reverence to the sacred name of God must be shown, ver. #12|. We must not detain what belongs to another, particularly the wages of the hireling, ver. #13|. We must be tender of the credit and safety of those that cannot help themselves, ver. #14|. Do no hurt to any, because they are unwilling or unable to avenge themselves. We ought to take heed of doing any thing which may occasion our weak brother to fall. The fear of God should keep us from doing wrong things, though they will not expose us to men's anger. Judges, and all in authority, are commanded to give judgment without partiality, ver. #15|. To be a tale-bearer, and to sow discord among neighbours, is as bad an office as a man can put himself into. We are to rebuke our neighbour in love, ver. #17|. Rather rebuke him than hate him, for an injury done to thyself. We incur guilt by not reproving; it is hating our brother. We should say, I will do him the kindness to tell him of his faults. We are to put off all malice, and to put on brotherly love, ver. #18|. We often wrong ourselves, but we soon forgive ourselves those wrongs, and they do not at all lessen our love to ourselves; in like manner we should love our neighbour. We must in many cases deny ourselves for the good of our neighbour. Ver. #31|: For Christians to have their fortunes told, to use spells and charms, or the like, is a sad affront to God. They must be grossly ignorant who ask, "What harm is there in these things?" Here is a charge to young people to show respect to the aged, ver. #32|. Religion teaches good manners, and obliges us to honour those to whom honour is due. A charge was given to the Israelites to be very tender of strangers, ver. #33|. Strangers, and the widows and fatherless, are God's particular care. It is at our peril, if we do them any wrong. Strangers shall be welcome to God's grace; we should do what we can to recommend religion to them. Justice in weights and measures is commanded, ver. #35|. We must make conscience of obeying God's precepts. We are not to pick and choose our duty, but must aim at standing complete in all the will of God. And the nearer our lives and tempers are to the precepts of God's law, the happier shall we be, and the happier shall we make all around us, and the better shall we adorn the gospel.