Deuteronomy 17

Administration of Justice

1“1You shall not sacrifice to the Lord your God an ox or a sheep which has a blemish or any 2defect, for that is a detestable thing to the Lord your God.

2“3If there is found in your midst, in any of your 4towns, which the Lord your God is giving you, a man or a woman who does what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God, by transgressing His covenant, 3and has gone and 5served other gods and worshiped them, 6or the sun or the moon or any of the heavenly host, 7which I have not commanded, 4and if it is told you and you have heard of it, then you shall inquire thoroughly. Behold, if it is true and the thing certain that this detestable thing has been done in Israel, 5then you shall bring out that man or that woman who has done this evil deed to your gates, that is, the man or the woman, and 8you shall stone them to 9death. 610On the 11evidence of two witnesses or three witnesses, he who is to die shall be put to death; he shall not be put to death on the 12evidence of one witness. 713The hand of the witnesses shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. 14So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

8“15If any case is too difficult for you to decide, between 16one kind of homicide or another, between 17one kind of lawsuit or another, and between 18one kind of assault or another, being cases of dispute in your 19courts, then you shall arise and go up to 20the place which the Lord your God chooses. 9So you shall come to 21the Levitical priest or the judge who is in office in those days, and you shall inquire of them and they will declare to you the verdict in the case. 10You shall do according to the 22terms of the verdict which they declare to you from that place which the Lord chooses; and you shall be careful to observe according to all that they teach you. 1123According to the 24terms of the law which they teach you, and according to the verdict which they tell you, you shall do; you shall not turn aside from the word which they declare to you, to the right or the left. 12The man who acts 25presumptuously by not listening to the priest who stands there to serve the Lord your God, nor to the judge, that man shall die; thus you shall purge the evil from Israel. 13Then all the people will hear and be afraid, and will not act 26presumptuously again.

14“When you enter the land which the Lord your God gives you, and you 27possess it and live in it, and you say, ‘28I will set a king over me like all the nations who are around me,’ 15you shall surely set a king over you whom the Lord your God chooses, one 29from among your 30countrymen you shall set as king over yourselves; you may not put a foreigner over yourselves who is not your 31countryman. 1632Moreover, he shall not multiply horses for himself, nor shall he 33cause the people to return to Egypt to multiply horses, since 34the Lord has said to you, ‘You shall never again return that way.’ 1735He shall not multiply wives for himself, 36or else his heart will turn away; nor shall he greatly increase silver and gold for himself.

18“Now it shall come about when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll 3738in the presence of the Levitical priests. 19It shall be with him and he shall read it 39all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, 40by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes, 20that his heart may not be lifted up above his 41countrymen 42and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, to the right or the left, so that he and his sons may continue long in his kingdom in the midst of Israel.