Deuteronomy 16: Verse-by-Verse Commentary (with Videos)

¹Observe the month of Abib and celebrate the Passover to the LORD your God, because in the month of Abib the LORD your God brought you out of Egypt by night.

²You are to offer to the LORD your God the Passover sacrifice from the herd or flock in the place the LORD will choose as a dwelling for His Name.

³You must not eat leavened bread with it; for seven days you are to eat with it unleavened bread, the bread of affliction, because you left the land of Egypt in haste—so that you may remember for the rest of your life the day you left the land of Egypt.

⁴No leaven is to be found in all your land for seven days, and none of the meat you sacrifice in the evening of the first day shall remain until morning.

⁵You are not to sacrifice the Passover animal in any of the towns that the LORD your God is giving you.

⁶You must only offer the Passover sacrifice at the place the LORD your God will choose as a dwelling for His Name. Do this in the evening as the sun sets, at the same time you departed from Egypt.

⁷And you shall roast it and eat it in the place the LORD your God will choose, and in the morning you shall return to your tents.

⁸For six days you must eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day you shall hold a solemn assembly to the LORD your God, and you must not do any work.

⁹You are to count off seven weeks from the time you first put the sickle to the standing grain.

¹⁰And you shall celebrate the Feast of Weeks to the LORD your God with a freewill offering that you give in proportion to how the LORD your God has blessed you,

¹¹and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God in the place He will choose as a dwelling for His Name—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite within your gates, as well as the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widows among you.

¹²Remember that you were slaves in Egypt, and carefully follow these statutes.

¹³You are to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles for seven days after you have gathered the produce of your threshing floor and your winepress.

¹⁴And you shall rejoice in your feast—you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levite, as well as the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widows among you.

¹⁵For seven days you shall celebrate a feast to the LORD your God in the place He will choose, because the LORD your God will bless you in all your produce and in all the work of your hands, so that your joy will be complete.

¹⁶Three times a year all your men are to appear before the LORD your God in the place He will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Tabernacles. No one should appear before the LORD empty-handed.

¹⁷Everyone must appear with a gift as he is able, according to the blessing the LORD your God has given you.

¹⁸You are to appoint judges and officials for your tribes in every town that the LORD your God is giving you. They are to judge the people with righteous judgment.

¹⁹Do not deny justice or show partiality. Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous.

²⁰Pursue justice, and justice alone, so that you may live, and you may possess the land that the LORD your God is giving you.

²¹Do not set up any wooden Asherah pole next to the altar you will build for the LORD your God,

²²and do not set up for yourselves a sacred pillar, which the LORD your God hates.