1 You are the children of Yahweh your God. You shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
2 For you are a holy people to Yahweh your God, and Yahweh has chosen you to be a people for his own possession, above all peoples who are on the face of the earth.
3 You shall not eat any abominable thing.
4 These are the animals which you may eat: the ox, the sheep, the goat,
5 the deer, the gazelle, the roebuck, the wild goat, the ibex, the antelope, and the chamois.
6 Every animal that parts the hoof, and has the hoof split in two and chews the cud, among the animals, you may eat.
7 Nevertheless these you shall not eat of them that chew the cud, or of those who have the hoof split: the camel, the hare, and the rabbit. Because they chew the cud but don’t part the hoof, they are unclean to you.
8 The pig, because it has a split hoof but doesn’t chew the cud, is unclean to you. You shall not eat their meat. You shall not touch their carcasses.
9 These you may eat of all that are in the waters: you may eat whatever has fins and scales.
10 You shall not eat whatever doesn’t have fins and scales. It is unclean to you.
11 Of all clean birds you may eat.
12 But these are they of which you shall not eat: the eagle, the vulture, the osprey,
13 the red kite, the falcon, the kite of any kind,
14 every raven of any kind,
15 the ostrich, the owl, the seagull, the hawk of any kind,
16 the little owl, the great owl, the horned owl,
17 the pelican, the vulture, the cormorant,
18 the stork, the heron after its kind, the hoopoe, and the bat.
19 All winged creeping things are unclean to you. They shall not be eaten.
20 Of all clean birds you may eat.
21 You shall not eat of anything that dies of itself. You may give it to the foreigner living among you who is within your gates, that he may eat it; or you may sell it to a foreigner; for you are a holy people to Yahweh your God. You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.
22 You shall surely tithe all the increase of your seed, that which comes out of the field year by year.
23 You shall eat before Yahweh your God, in the place which he chooses to cause his name to dwell, the tithe of your grain, of your new wine, and of your oil, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock; that you may learn to fear Yahweh your God always.
24 If the way is too long for you, so that you are not able to carry it because the place which Yahweh your God shall choose to set his name there is too far from you, when Yahweh your God blesses you,
25 then you shall turn it into money, bind up the money in your hand, and shall go to the place which Yahweh your God shall choose.
26 You shall trade the money for whatever your soul desires: for cattle, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatever your soul asks of you. You shall eat there before Yahweh your God, and you shall rejoice, you and your household.
27 You shall not forsake the Levite who is within your gates, for he has no portion nor inheritance with you.
28 At the end of every three years you shall bring all the tithe of your increase in the same year, and shall store it within your gates.
29 The Levite, because he has no portion nor inheritance with you, as well as the foreigner living among you, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your gates shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that Yahweh your God may bless you in all the work of your hand which you do.
7 passages from writers of 2 traditions, in their own words, each with their dates and tradition. The site doesn’t say who is right: read them beside the verses. About these
Reading as
Questions they answer differently
On verse
Oldest first.
Josephus37–c. 100JewishAntiquities of the Jews · on Deuteronomy 14:22–26Let there be taken out of your fruits a tenth, besides that which you have allotted to give to the priests and Levites. This you may indeed sell in the country, but it is to be used in those feasts and sacrifices that are to be celebrated in the holy city; for it is fit that you should enjoy those fruits of the earth which God gives you to possess, so as may be to the honor of the donor.
Let there be taken out of your fruits a tenth, besides that which you have allotted to give to the priests and Levites. This you may indeed sell in the country, but it is to be used in those feasts and sacrifices that are to be celebrated in the holy city; for it is fit that you should enjoy those fruits of the earth which God gives you to possess, so as may be to the honor of the donor.
Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, Antiquities 4.8.8; translated by William Whiston (1737); the text of Project Gutenberg. The edition
A Jewish priest from Jerusalem who fought Rome in the war of 66–70 and afterwards wrote the history of his people for Greek readers.
John Calvin1509–1564ReformedCommentaries · on Deuteronomy 14:21As to the command, in the first passage, to give it to a stranger, or to sell it to an alien, that he might eat it, it does not appear reasonable, since that would be to supply the materials for sin, as though one should offer a sword to a madman, or transfer illicit goods to others. But the solution of this difficulty is easy: for the Gentiles were permitted to eat indifferently of all sorts of food, since no distinctions were placed between them; but the prohibition of certain meats was a mark of separation between them and the elect people of God.
As to the command, in the first passage, to give it to a stranger, or to sell it to an alien, that he might eat it, it does not appear reasonable, since that would be to supply the materials for sin, as though one should offer a sword to a madman, or transfer illicit goods to others. But the solution of this difficulty is easy: for the Gentiles were permitted to eat indifferently of all sorts of food, since no distinctions were placed between them; but the prohibition of certain meats was a mark of separation between them and the elect people of God.
John Calvin, Commentaries, on 14:21; Calvin Translation Society (Edinburgh, 1843–1855); the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
The French reformer of Geneva, from whose teaching the Reformed and Presbyterian churches come.
John Calvin1509–1564ReformedCommentaries · on Deuteronomy 14:28–29Those are mistaken, in my opinion, who think that another kind of tithe is here referred to. It is rather a correction or interpretation of the Law, lest the priests and Levites alone should consume all the tithes, without applying a part to the relief of the poor, of strangers, and widows. … After two harvests, therefore, the tithes of the third year were not the entire property of the Levites, but were shared also by the poor, the orphans, and widows, and strangers. … Now, this was a most equitable arrangement, that the priests and Levites having been well provided for during two years, should admit their poor brethren and strangers to a share.
Those are mistaken, in my opinion, who think that another kind of tithe is here referred to. It is rather a correction or interpretation of the Law, lest the priests and Levites alone should consume all the tithes, without applying a part to the relief of the poor, of strangers, and widows. … After two harvests, therefore, the tithes of the third year were not the entire property of the Levites, but were shared also by the poor, the orphans, and widows, and strangers. … Now, this was a most equitable arrangement, that the priests and Levites having been well provided for during two years, should admit their poor brethren and strangers to a share.
John Calvin, Commentaries, on 14:28; Calvin Translation Society (Edinburgh, 1843–1855); the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
The French reformer of Geneva, from whose teaching the Reformed and Presbyterian churches come.
Matthew Henry1662–1714English PresbyterianCommentary on the Whole Bible · on Deuteronomy 14:1It is an excellent passage which Mr. Ainsworth here quotes from one of the Jewish writers, who understands this as a law against immoderate grief for the death of our relations. If your father (for instance) die, you shall not cut yourselves, that is, you shall not sorrow more than is meet, for you are not fatherless, you have a Father, who is great, living, and permanent, even the holy blessed God, whose children you are, Deu 14:1. … We that have a God to hope in, and a heaven to hope for, must bear up ourselves with that hope under every burden of this kind.
It is an excellent passage which Mr. Ainsworth here quotes from one of the Jewish writers, who understands this as a law against immoderate grief for the death of our relations. If your father (for instance) die, you shall not cut yourselves, that is, you shall not sorrow more than is meet, for you are not fatherless, you have a Father, who is great, living, and permanent, even the holy blessed God, whose children you are, Deu 14:1. … We that have a God to hope in, and a heaven to hope for, must bear up ourselves with that hope under every burden of this kind.
Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible, on 14:1–21; 1706–1714; the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
An English Presbyterian minister whose commentary on the whole Bible Protestants have read for three centuries.
Matthew Henry1662–1714English PresbyterianCommentary on the Whole Bible · on Deuteronomy 14:28–29Every third year this tithe must be disposed of at home in works of charity … that they might make the poor familiar to them and not disdain their company, they are here directed to welcome them to their houses. "Thither let them come, and eat and be satisfied." … God has a particular care for widows and fatherless, and he requires that we should have the same. It is his honour, and will be ours, to help the helpless.
Every third year this tithe must be disposed of at home in works of charity … that they might make the poor familiar to them and not disdain their company, they are here directed to welcome them to their houses. "Thither let them come, and eat and be satisfied." … God has a particular care for widows and fatherless, and he requires that we should have the same. It is his honour, and will be ours, to help the helpless.
Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible, on 14:22–29; 1706–1714; the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
An English Presbyterian minister whose commentary on the whole Bible Protestants have read for three centuries.
John Gill1697–1771BaptistAn Exposition of the Old and New Testament · on Deuteronomy 14:28This, according to Aben Ezra, was a third tithe, and did not excuse the second tithe; … but the Jewish writers generally understand this as the same with the second tithe, which on the two first years from the sabbatical year was carried to Jerusalem, or money in lieu of it, with which provisions were bought and eaten there, but on the third year were eaten in their own cities with the poor, and in the stead of the other; so says Maimonides … on the third and sixth years from the sabbatical year, after they have separated the first tithe they separate from what remains another tithe, and give it to the poor, and it is called the poor's tithe
This, according to Aben Ezra, was a third tithe, and did not excuse the second tithe; … but the Jewish writers generally understand this as the same with the second tithe, which on the two first years from the sabbatical year was carried to Jerusalem, or money in lieu of it, with which provisions were bought and eaten there, but on the third year were eaten in their own cities with the poor, and in the stead of the other; so says Maimonides … on the third and sixth years from the sabbatical year, after they have separated the first tithe they separate from what remains another tithe, and give it to the poor, and it is called the poor's tithe
John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testament, on 14:28; 1746–1763; the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
An English Baptist pastor in London and a scholar of Hebrew and the rabbis, who wrote a verse-by-verse commentary on the whole Bible.
Keil and Delitzsch1807–1888 and 1813–1890LutheranBiblical Commentary on the Old Testament · on Deuteronomy 14:23The sacrificial meals were to be held before the Lord, in the place where He caused His name to dwell (see at Deu 12:5), that Israel might learn to fear Jehovah its God always; … For the fear of the Lord is not merely a feeling of dependence upon Him, but also includes the notion of divine blessedness, which is the predominant idea here, as the sacrificial meals were to furnish the occasion and object of the rejoicing before the Lord. The true meaning therefore is, that Israel might rejoice with holy reverence in the fellowship of its God.
The sacrificial meals were to be held before the Lord, in the place where He caused His name to dwell (see at Deu 12:5), that Israel might learn to fear Jehovah its God always; … For the fear of the Lord is not merely a feeling of dependence upon Him, but also includes the notion of divine blessedness, which is the predominant idea here, as the sacrificial meals were to furnish the occasion and object of the rejoicing before the Lord. The true meaning therefore is, that Israel might rejoice with holy reverence in the fellowship of its God.
Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, on 14:22–23; translated by James Martin and others (Edinburgh, 1866–1891); the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch, two German Lutheran scholars of Hebrew whose commentary on the Old Testament is still read for its learning.
Deuteronomy 14
Deuteronomy 14:1–29, World English Bible
Deuteronomy 14 in the Bible · Told in the Story: Chapter 16, The Place He Chooses
What others have written
7 passages from writers of 2 traditions, in their own words, each with their dates and tradition. The site doesn’t say who is right: read them beside the verses. About these
Oldest first.
Josephus37–c. 100JewishAntiquities of the Jews · on Deuteronomy 14:22–26Let there be taken out of your fruits a tenth, besides that which you have allotted to give to the priests and Levites. This you may indeed sell in the country, but it is to be used in those feasts and sacrifices that are to be celebrated in the holy city; for it is fit that you should enjoy those fruits of the earth which God gives you to possess, so as may be to the honor of the donor.
Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, Antiquities 4.8.8; translated by William Whiston (1737); the text of Project Gutenberg. The edition
A Jewish priest from Jerusalem who fought Rome in the war of 66–70 and afterwards wrote the history of his people for Greek readers.
John Calvin1509–1564ReformedCommentaries · on Deuteronomy 14:21As to the command, in the first passage, to give it to a stranger, or to sell it to an alien, that he might eat it, it does not appear reasonable, since that would be to supply the materials for sin, as though one should offer a sword to a madman, or transfer illicit goods to others. But the solution of this difficulty is easy: for the Gentiles were permitted to eat indifferently of all sorts of food, since no distinctions were placed between them; but the prohibition of certain meats was a mark of separation between them and the elect people of God.
John Calvin, Commentaries, on 14:21; Calvin Translation Society (Edinburgh, 1843–1855); the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
The French reformer of Geneva, from whose teaching the Reformed and Presbyterian churches come.
John Calvin1509–1564ReformedCommentaries · on Deuteronomy 14:28–29Those are mistaken, in my opinion, who think that another kind of tithe is here referred to. It is rather a correction or interpretation of the Law, lest the priests and Levites alone should consume all the tithes, without applying a part to the relief of the poor, of strangers, and widows. … After two harvests, therefore, the tithes of the third year were not the entire property of the Levites, but were shared also by the poor, the orphans, and widows, and strangers. … Now, this was a most equitable arrangement, that the priests and Levites having been well provided for during two years, should admit their poor brethren and strangers to a share.
John Calvin, Commentaries, on 14:28; Calvin Translation Society (Edinburgh, 1843–1855); the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
The French reformer of Geneva, from whose teaching the Reformed and Presbyterian churches come.
Matthew Henry1662–1714English PresbyterianCommentary on the Whole Bible · on Deuteronomy 14:1It is an excellent passage which Mr. Ainsworth here quotes from one of the Jewish writers, who understands this as a law against immoderate grief for the death of our relations. If your father (for instance) die, you shall not cut yourselves, that is, you shall not sorrow more than is meet, for you are not fatherless, you have a Father, who is great, living, and permanent, even the holy blessed God, whose children you are, Deu 14:1. … We that have a God to hope in, and a heaven to hope for, must bear up ourselves with that hope under every burden of this kind.
Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible, on 14:1–21; 1706–1714; the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
An English Presbyterian minister whose commentary on the whole Bible Protestants have read for three centuries.
Matthew Henry1662–1714English PresbyterianCommentary on the Whole Bible · on Deuteronomy 14:28–29Every third year this tithe must be disposed of at home in works of charity … that they might make the poor familiar to them and not disdain their company, they are here directed to welcome them to their houses. "Thither let them come, and eat and be satisfied." … God has a particular care for widows and fatherless, and he requires that we should have the same. It is his honour, and will be ours, to help the helpless.
Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible, on 14:22–29; 1706–1714; the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
An English Presbyterian minister whose commentary on the whole Bible Protestants have read for three centuries.
John Gill1697–1771BaptistAn Exposition of the Old and New Testament · on Deuteronomy 14:28This, according to Aben Ezra, was a third tithe, and did not excuse the second tithe; … but the Jewish writers generally understand this as the same with the second tithe, which on the two first years from the sabbatical year was carried to Jerusalem, or money in lieu of it, with which provisions were bought and eaten there, but on the third year were eaten in their own cities with the poor, and in the stead of the other; so says Maimonides … on the third and sixth years from the sabbatical year, after they have separated the first tithe they separate from what remains another tithe, and give it to the poor, and it is called the poor's tithe
John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testament, on 14:28; 1746–1763; the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
An English Baptist pastor in London and a scholar of Hebrew and the rabbis, who wrote a verse-by-verse commentary on the whole Bible.
Keil and Delitzsch1807–1888 and 1813–1890LutheranBiblical Commentary on the Old Testament · on Deuteronomy 14:23The sacrificial meals were to be held before the Lord, in the place where He caused His name to dwell (see at Deu 12:5), that Israel might learn to fear Jehovah its God always; … For the fear of the Lord is not merely a feeling of dependence upon Him, but also includes the notion of divine blessedness, which is the predominant idea here, as the sacrificial meals were to furnish the occasion and object of the rejoicing before the Lord. The true meaning therefore is, that Israel might rejoice with holy reverence in the fellowship of its God.
Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, on 14:22–23; translated by James Martin and others (Edinburgh, 1866–1891); the text of the Free Use Bible API. The edition
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch, two German Lutheran scholars of Hebrew whose commentary on the Old Testament is still read for its learning.