Various Statutes

1“You shall not see your brother’s ox or his sheep straying away and [†]ignore them; you shall certainly bring them back to your brother. 2And if your brother is not near you, or if you do not know him, then you shall bring it home to your house, and it shall be with you until your brother searches for it; then you shall give it back to him. 3Thus you shall do with his donkey, and you shall do likewise with his garment, and you shall do likewise with anything lost by your brother, which he has lost and you have found. You are not allowed to [†]ignore them. 4You shall not see your brother’s donkey or his ox fallen down on the way and [†]ignore them; you shall certainly help him to raise them up.

5“A woman shall not wear man’s clothing, nor shall a man put on a woman’s clothing; for whoever does these things is an abomination to Yahweh your God.

6“If you happen to come upon a bird’s nest along the way, in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs, and the mother sitting on the young or on the eggs, you shall not take the mother with the young; 7you shall certainly let the mother go, but the young you may take for yourself, in order that it may be well with you and that you may prolong your days.

8“When you build a new house, you shall make a parapet for your roof, so that you will not bring bloodguilt on your house if anyone falls from it.

9“You shall not sow your vineyard with two kinds of seed, lest [†]all the produce of the seed which you have sown and the increase of the vineyard become defiled.

10“You shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together.

11“You shall not wear a material mixed of wool and flax together.

12“You shall make yourself tassels on the four corners of your garment with which you cover yourself.

Statutes About Sexual Immorality

13“If any man takes a wife and goes in to her and then [†]turns against her, 14and charges her with shameful deeds and brings forth against her a bad name and says, ‘I took this woman, but when I came near her, I did not find her a virgin,’ 15then the girl’s father and her mother shall take and bring out the evidence of the girl’s virginity to the elders of the city at the gate. 16Then the girl’s father shall say to the elders, ‘I gave my daughter to this man as a wife, but he [†]turned against her; 17and behold, he has charged her with shameful deeds, saying, “I did not find your daughter a virgin.” But [†]this is the evidence of my daughter’s virginity.’ And they shall spread the garment before the elders of the city. 18So the elders of that city shall take the man and chastise him, 19and they shall fine him [†]one hundred shekels of silver and give it to the girl’s father because he brought forth a bad name against a virgin of Israel. And she shall be his wife; he cannot [†]divorce her all his days.

20“But if this [†]charge is true, that the girl was not found a virgin, 21then they shall bring out the girl to the doorway of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her, and she will die because she has committed a disgraceful act in Israel by playing the harlot in her father’s house; thus you shall purge the evil from among you.

22“If a man is found lying with a married woman, then both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman; thus you shall purge the evil from Israel.

23“If there is a girl who is a virgin engaged to a man, and another man finds her in the city and lies with her, 24then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them, and they will die; the girl, because she did not cry out in the city, and the man, because he has violated his neighbor’s wife. Thus you shall purge the evil from among you.

25“But if in the field the man finds the girl who is engaged, and the man forces her and lies with her, then only the man who lies with her shall die. 26But you shall do nothing to the girl; there is no sin in the girl worthy of death, for just as a man rises against his neighbor and murders him, so is this case. 27When he found her in the field, the engaged girl cried out, but there was no one to save her.

28“If a man finds a girl who is a virgin, who is not engaged, and seizes her and lies with her and they are found, 29then the man who lay with her shall give to the girl’s father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall become his wife because he has violated her; he cannot divorce her all his days.

30“[†]A man shall not take his father’s wife so that he will not uncover his father’s skirt.