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    Deuteronomy · 32 verses

    Deuteronomy 12

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    A craving for meat is granted a place in the law: offerings must travel to the chosen dwelling, but dinner may happen at home.

    One place for the Namevv. 1–14

    The old worship-sites are to be dismantled with magnificent thoroughness: altars down, pillars smashed, Asherah poles burned, idols cut down, names wiped away. The LORD’s worship is not to imitate this scattered arrangement. A place will be chosen from among the tribes as a dwelling for His Name, and there the offerings are to gather. For now, everyone is doing what seems right in his own eyes; the chapter treats that as a temporary state, pending Jordan, inheritance, rest, and security.

    The household and the altarvv. 15–28

    Here the chapter draws its wonderfully firm boundary. Ordinary meat may be slaughtered within any gates, whenever the appetite arrives—even with the plain declaration, “I want to eat meat.” Offerings, tithes, firstborn animals, and vowed gifts must go to the chosen place, where households, servants, and the Levite may eat and rejoice. Blood, meanwhile, receives the most domestic of destinations: it is poured on the ground like water, precisely because it is the life and must not be eaten with the meat.

    No enquiries into the neighbours’ godsvv. 29–32

    Once the nations have been driven out, curiosity itself becomes the danger. The forbidden question is perfectly intelligible—“How do these nations serve their gods? I will do likewise.”—which is why it is forbidden. The chapter ends by pointing to practices it calls abominations, including burning sons and daughters in the fire, and then closes the gate from both directions: neither additions nor subtractions.

    The text

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    Berean Standard Bible, public domain. Names the Hebrew and Greek put in the verse link to the person, place or people they name; the address beside each verse is a link to that verse, which is what a reader copies and shares.

    1. Deut 12:1These are the statutes and ordinances you must be careful to follow all the days you live in the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess.

    2. Deut 12:2Destroy completely all the places where the nations you are dispossessing have served their gods—atop the high mountains, on the hills, and under every green tree.

    3. Deut 12:3Tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, burn up their Asherah poles, cut down the idols of their gods, and wipe out their names from every place.

    4. Deut 12:4You shall not worship the LORD your God in this way.

    5. Deut 12:5Instead, you must seek the place the LORD your God will choose from among all your tribes to establish as a dwelling for His Name, and there you must go.

    6. Deut 12:6To that place you are to bring your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and heave offerings, your vow offerings and freewill offerings, as well as the firstborn of your herds and flocks.

    7. Deut 12:7There, in the presence of the LORD your God, you and your households shall eat and rejoice in all you do, because the LORD your God has blessed you.

    8. Deut 12:8You are not to do as we are doing here today, where everyone does what seems right in his own eyes.

    9. Deut 12:9For you have not yet come to the resting place and the inheritance that the LORD your God is giving you.

    10. Deut 12:10When you cross the Jordan and live in the land that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, and He gives you rest from all the enemies around you and you dwell securely,

    11. Deut 12:11then the LORD your God will choose a dwelling for His Name. And there you are to bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all the choice offerings you vow to the LORD.

    12. Deut 12:12And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates, since he has no portion or inheritance among you.

    13. Deut 12:13Be careful not to offer your burnt offerings in just any place you see;

    14. Deut 12:14you must offer them only in the place the LORD will choose in one of your tribal territories, and there you shall do all that I command you.

    15. Deut 12:15But whenever you want, you may slaughter and eat meat within any of your gates, according to the blessing the LORD your God has given you. Both the ceremonially clean and unclean may eat it as they would a gazelle or deer,

    16. Deut 12:16but you must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

    17. Deut 12:17Within your gates you must not eat the tithe of your grain or new wine or oil, the firstborn of your herds or flocks, any of the offerings that you have vowed to give, or your freewill offerings or special gifts.

    18. Deut 12:18Instead, you must eat them in the presence of the LORD your God at the place the LORD your God will choose—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates. Rejoice before the LORD your God in all you do,

    19. Deut 12:19and be careful not to neglect the Levites as long as you live in your land.

    20. Deut 12:20When the LORD your God expands your territory as He has promised, and you crave meat and say, “I want to eat meat,” you may eat it whenever you want.

    21. Deut 12:21If the place where the LORD your God chooses to put His Name is too far from you, then you may slaughter any of the herd or flock He has given you, as I have commanded you, and you may eat it within your gates whenever you want.

    22. Deut 12:22Indeed, you may eat it as you would eat a gazelle or deer; both the ceremonially unclean and the clean may eat it.

    23. Deut 12:23Only be sure not to eat the blood, because the blood is the life, and you must not eat the life with the meat.

    24. Deut 12:24You must not eat the blood; pour it on the ground like water.

    25. Deut 12:25Do not eat it, so that it may go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is right in the eyes of the LORD.

    26. Deut 12:26But you are to take your holy things and your vow offerings and go to the place the LORD will choose.

    27. Deut 12:27Present the meat and blood of your burnt offerings on the altar of the LORD your God. The blood of your other sacrifices must be poured out beside the altar of the LORD your God, but you may eat the meat.

    28. Deut 12:28Be careful to obey all these things I command you, so that it may always go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is good and right in the eyes of the LORD your God.

    29. Deut 12:29When the LORD your God cuts off before you the nations you are entering to dispossess, and you drive them out and live in their land,

    30. Deut 12:30be careful not to be ensnared by their ways after they have been destroyed before you. Do not inquire about their gods, asking, “How do these nations serve their gods? I will do likewise.”

    31. Deut 12:31You must not worship the LORD your God in this way, because they practice for their gods every abomination which the LORD hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in the fire as sacrifices to their gods.

    32. Deut 12:32See that you do everything I command you; do not add to it or subtract from it.

    01 — Also here

    Who else the chapter reaches

    Names written in the English are linked in the text above. These are the ones that are not: an entity the Hebrew or Greek names under a spelling the translation does not use, or one reached only by an assertion about a verse of this chapter.

    Named in the Hebrew or Greek somewhere in this chapter, under a form the English renders differently — the registry's Ludim against the translation's Ludites — so there is no word in the sentence to hang the link on.

    02 — Read alongside

    Where this is echoed

    Readers' own connections, from OpenBible's crowd-voted cross-references — agreement about relevance, and not scholarly confidence. 345 passages were voted onto 32 verses of this chapter; the 16 shown lead on votes, and each is listed at the verse it was voted onto most strongly.

    • 32Deuteronomy 4:2You must not add to or subtract from what I command you, so that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God that I am giving you.
    • 32Revelation 22:18–19I testify to everyone who hears the words of prophecy in this book: If anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book.
    • 5Deuteronomy 12:11then the LORD your God will choose a dwelling for His Name. And there you are to bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all the choice offerings you vow to the LORD.
    • 32Joshua 1:7Above all, be strong and very courageous. Be careful to observe all the law that My servant Moses commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right or to the left, so that you may prosper wherever you go.
    • 23Leviticus 17:11For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for your souls upon the altar; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.
    • 52 Chronicles 7:12the LORD appeared to him at night and said to him: “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice.
    • 5Deuteronomy 26:2you are to take some of the firstfruits of all your produce from the soil of the land that the LORD your God is giving you and put them in a basket. Then go to the place the LORD your God will choose as a dwelling for His Name,
    • 32Proverbs 30:6Do not add to His words, lest He rebuke you and prove you a liar.
    • 23Genesis 9:4But you must not eat meat with its lifeblood still in it.
    • 51 Kings 8:29May Your eyes be open toward this temple night and day, toward the place of which You said, ‘My Name shall be there,’ so that You may hear the prayer that Your servant prays toward this place.
    • 8Judges 21:25In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
    • 2Deuteronomy 7:5Instead, this is what you are to do to them: tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, cut down their Asherah poles, and burn their idols in the fire.
    • 8Judges 17:6In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
    • 4Leviticus 20:23You must not follow the statutes of the nations I am driving out before you. Because they did all these things, I abhorred them.
    • 7Deuteronomy 12:18Instead, you must eat them in the presence of the LORD your God at the place the LORD your God will choose—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates. Rejoice before the LORD your God in all you do,
    • 18Deuteronomy 12:7There, in the presence of the LORD your God, you and your households shall eat and rejoice in all you do, because the LORD your God has blessed you.

    Onward

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    Next chapterDeuteronomy 1318 verses.Named hereLeviEverything the graph connects to this name.BookDeuteronomyAll 34 chapters.Every bookThe Bible66 books, 1,189 chapters.