Deuteronomy 23

No man with crushed testicles or a severed penis may worship with God’s people.

No child of an Israelite father and a non-Israelite mother or his descendants, extending to the tenth generation, may worship with God’s people. \*

No Ammonites or Moabites may worship with God’s people, extending to the tenth generation.

One reason for this is that their leaders refused to give you food and water when they were traveling from the nation of Egypt {to the region of Canaan}. Another reason is that they paid Balaam son of Beor from the town of Pethor in the region of Aram Naharaim to curse you Israelites. \*

But God our God did not pay attention to Balaam; instead, he caused Balaam to bless you rather than curse you, because God our God loves you.

As long as Israel is a nation, you must not do anything to cause things to go well for those two people groups to enable them to prosper. \*

But do not despise any Edomites, because they are descendants of your ancestor Isaac, just like you are. Likewise, do not despise people from Egypt, because they treated your ancestors well when they first lived in Egypt.

The grandchildren of people from Edom and Egypt who live among you now may worship with God’s people. \*

When your fighting men are living in a camp in time of war, they must avoid doing things that would make them unacceptable to God.

If any soldier becomes unacceptable to God because semen comes out of his body during the night, the next morning he must go outside the camp and stay there during that day.

But in the evening of that day he must bathe, and at sunset he will be allowed to come back into the camp. \*

Your fighting men must have a toilet area outside the camp where you can go when you need to.

{When you go to fight against your enemies,} carry something to dig with along with your weapons, in order that when you need to defecate, you can dig a hole, and then cover up the hole when you have finished defecating in it.

You must keep the camp acceptable to God our God, because he is with you in your camp to protect you and to enable you to defeat your enemies. Do not do anything disgraceful that would cause God to abandon you. \*

If slaves who escape from their masters come to you and request you to protect them, do not send them back to their masters.

Allow them to stay among you, in whatever town they choose because they like it, and do not mistreat them. \*

Do not allow any Israelite man or woman to become religious prostitutes.

Also, do not allow any woman who earned money from being a prostitute or any man who earned money being a homosexual prostitute to bring any of that money into the temple of God our God, even if they solemnly promised to pay that money to him. Both of these sexual practices are disgusting to God our God. \*

When you lend money or food or anything else to a fellow Israelite, do not charge them interest.

You are allowed to charge interest when you lend money to foreigners, but not when you lend money to Israelites. Do this in order that God our God will bless you in everything that you do in the land that you are about to enter and occupy. \*

When you solemnly promise to give something to God your God or to do something for him, do not delay in doing it. God expects you to do what you promised, and if you do not do it, you will be sinning.

But it is not sinful not to solemnly promise things to God.

But if you voluntarily promise to do something for God our God, you must surely do it. \*

When you walk through someone else’s vineyard, you are allowed to {pick and} eat as many grapes as you want, but you must not put any in a container {and take them away}.

When you walk along a path in someone else’s field of grain, you are allowed to pluck some of the grain by hand {and eat it}, but you must not cut any of his grain with a sickle. \*