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Deuteronomy 23
1He who is emasculated by crushing or cutting shall not enter into the LORD’s assembly.
2A person born of a forbidden union shall not enter into the LORD’s assembly; even to the tenth generation shall no one of his enter into the LORD’s assembly.
3An Ammonite or a Moabite shall not enter into the LORD’s assembly; even to the tenth generation shall no one belonging to them enter into the LORD’s assembly forever,
4because they didn’t meet you with bread and with water on the way when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you.
5Nevertheless the LORD your God wouldn’t listen to Balaam, but the LORD your God turned the curse into a blessing to you, because the LORD your God loved you.
6You shall not seek their peace nor their prosperity all your days forever.
7You shall not abhor an Edomite, for he is your brother. You shall not abhor an Egyptian, because you lived as a foreigner in his land.
8The children of the third generation who are born to them may enter into the LORD’s assembly.
9When you go out and camp against your enemies, then you shall keep yourselves from every evil thing.
10If there is among you any man who is not clean by reason of that which happens to him by night, then shall he go outside of the camp. He shall not come within the camp;
11but it shall be, when evening comes, he shall bathe himself in water. When the sun is down, he shall come within the camp.
12You shall have a place also outside of the camp where you go relieve yourself.
13You shall have a trowel among your weapons. It shall be, when you relieve yourself, you shall dig with it, and shall turn back and cover your excrement;
14for the LORD your God walks in the middle of your camp, to deliver you, and to give up your enemies before you. Therefore your camp shall be holy, that he may not see an unclean thing in you, and turn away from you.
15You shall not deliver to his master a servant who has escaped from his master to you.
16He shall dwell with you, among you, in the place which he shall choose within one of your gates, where it pleases him best. You shall not oppress him.
17There shall be no prostitute of the daughters of Israel, neither shall there be a sodomite of the sons of Israel.
18You shall not bring the hire of a prostitute, or the wages of a male prostitute, into the your God for any vow; for both of these are an abomination to the LORD your God.
19You shall not lend on interest to your brother: interest of money, interest of food, interest of anything that is lent on interest.
20You may charge a foreigner interest; but you shall not charge your brother interest, that the LORD your God may bless you in all that you put your hand to, in the land where you go in to possess it.
21When you vow a vow to the LORD your God, you shall not be slack to pay it, for the LORD your God will surely require it of you; and it would be sin in you.
22But if you refrain from making a vow, it shall be no sin in you.
23You shall observe and do that which has gone out of your lips. Whatever you have vowed to the LORD your God as a free will , which you have promised with your mouth, you must do.
24When you come into your neighbor’s , then you may eat your fill of grapes at your own pleasure; but you shall not put any in your container.
25When you come into your neighbor’s standing grain, then you may pluck the ears with your hand; but you shall not use a sickle on your neighbor’s standing grain.
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Questions this passage answers
Who is God?
God is the one living Creator who made everything and depends on nothing, and Scripture answers this question mainly by telling us his character rather than by defining his substance. When God described himself to Moses he said he is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abundant in loving kindness and truth, and yet will by no means clear the guilty. The New Testament adds that this God is finally known in Jesus Christ, who has made him known.
What does it mean to fear the Lord?
The fear of the LORD is not terror of an unpredictable God. It is the reverence of a creature who has rightly understood who God is, holy, sovereign and near, and who therefore takes him seriously in every decision. Proverbs calls it the beginning of knowledge, because a person who has not reckoned with God has not yet begun to understand anything rightly.