Deuteronomy 17

₁Moses said: ‘You may not sacrifice to the Lord your God an ox or a sheep ram that is crippled or an animal that is sick. The Lord your God hates such offerings.’

₂‘If there is a man or a woman who does wrong in one of the towns that the Lord your God gives you, if it is something that God does not like and the man or woman has done something wrong against the covenant of the Lord, then you must punish that person. If that person did not listen to the laws ₃and has worshipped other gods or bowed down before the sun or the moon or the stars in the sky, then he has done wrong. I have told you not to do that. ₄If someone tells you about it, then you must make sure that it is true. You must find out if something as bad as that has really happened in the land_of_Israel. ₅If it has really happened, then you must bring the man or woman who has done that bad thing to the gate of the town or city and kill him or her with stones. ₆But you may do this only if there are 2 or 3 witnesses who have said it is true, and he has done wrong. You may not kill a person if there is only one witness. ₇The witnesses must throw the first stone to kill the person and then the other people must throw stones. This is how you must take away everything that is sinful among you.’

₈‘Sometimes it will be very difficult for a judge to decide if someone has murdered a person or if it was an accident, or if something is right or wrong, or to say if someone has attacked another person first and hurt him. If it is too difficult for you to decide about these things where you live, then you must go to the place that the Lord your God chooses where you must worship Him. ₉There you must go to the priests who are the descendants of Levi and the judge who serves the Lord, and ask them what to do, and they will tell you what to say. ₁₀They will tell you at the place that the Lord will choose and you must do what they say. You must do everything exactly as they tell you. ₁₁They will tell you what the laws of God say and what you must decide and you must do it. You must do everything that they tell you. You must do it exactly like that. ₁₂A person who does not listen to the judge or the priest who serves the Lord must die because he does not respect him. This is how you must take away everything that is sinful among the Israelites. ₁₃Everyone must know about this and they must become afraid so that none of them will disobey the judge again.’

₁₄‘When you come into the land that the Lord your God gives you, you must take the land for yourselves and you go and live there. Then you will say that you want to have a king like all the other nations around you. ₁₅You may do that and have a king, but he must be a person whom the Lord your God chooses to be king. He must be an Israelite. You may not have a king who is from another nation.

₁₆The king may not ask to have a lot of horses and he may not take the Israelites back to the land of Egypt to get a lot of horses for himself. The Lord said you may never go back that way. ₁₇The king may not take a lot of wives for himself and he may not stop serving the Lord. He may not want to have a lot of silver and gold.

₁₈When he becomes king, he must go to the priests who are the descendants of Levi and who have these laws, then he must write down these laws and keep them for himself. ₁₉The king must always have these laws with him and he must read them every day so that he can learn to respect the Lord his God and keep on doing everything that the laws say. ₂₀The king must not be proud and think he is better than the other Israelites. He must do exactly what these laws say so that he and his sons will rule over Israel for many years.’