Deuteronomy 14King James Version
Dietary laws repeated, in shorter form than Leviticus 11. The tithe of the land, given every year. Every third year, the tithe is shared with the Levite, the stranger, the orphan, and the widow. A reminder that prosperity in the land carries an obligation to those who do not have.
Moses restates clean and unclean food laws: which animals, birds, and sea creatures may be eaten and which may not. He then establishes the tithe: a tenth of all produce is to be brought to the central sanctuary and eaten there as a feast before God. If the journey is too far to carry it, the tithe may be converted to silver and spent on whatever the worshipper desires at the sanctuary. Every three years, the tithe stays local for the Levite, the foreigner, the orphan, and the widow.
Eating and giving are both acts of worship: what enters the body and what is released from the hand both signal whose people you are.
2: "For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth." Holiness is not primarily about rules but about identity: you belong to someone, and that belonging shapes how you live.
The plains of Moab, 1406 BC. Moses is describing a yearly pilgrimage festival where an Israelite family carries their best produce to the sanctuary and eats it there in God's presence, sharing it with the priests and the poor. It is designed to feel like abundance, not sacrifice.
Moses, teaching. The Levite, the foreigner, the orphan, and the widow, named explicitly as the recipients of the third-year tithe.
The tithe in Deuteronomy is notably different from later temple-period understandings. It is primarily a joyful feast before God, not a tax or priestly income stream. The three-year local tithe is one of the oldest welfare mechanisms in the ancient world, built directly into the religious calendar.
For when giving feels like loss rather than participation. The chapter describes the tithe as a feast you get to eat, a celebration you get to host, and a way of making sure no one in your community goes hungry.
1Ye are the children of the LORD your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
2For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth.
3Thou shalt not eat any abominable thing.
4These are the beasts which ye shall eat: the ox, the sheep, and the goat,
5The hart, and the roebuck, and the fallow deer, and the wild goat, and the pygarg, and the wild ox, and the chamois.
6And every beast that parteth the hoof, and cleaveth the cleft into two claws, and cheweth the cud among the beasts, that ye shall eat.
7Nevertheless these ye shall not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the cloven hoof; as the camel, and the hare, and the coney: for they chew the cud, but divide not the hoof; therefore they are unclean unto you.
8And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcase.
9These ye shall eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat:
10And whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat; it is unclean unto you.
11Of all clean birds ye shall eat.
12But these are they of which ye shall not eat: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the ospray,
13And the glede, and the kite, and the vulture after his kind,
14And every raven after his kind,
15And the owl, and the night hawk, and the cuckow, and the hawk after his kind,
16The little owl, and the great owl, and the swan,
17And the pelican, and the gier eagle, and the cormorant,
18And the stork, and the heron after her kind, and the lapwing, and the bat.
19And every creeping thing that flieth is unclean unto you: they shall not be eaten.
20But of all clean fowls ye may eat.
21Ye shall not eat of any thing that dieth of itself: thou shalt give it unto the stranger that is in thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou mayest sell it unto an alien: for thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.
22Thou shalt truly tithe all the increase of thy seed, that the field bringeth forth year by year.
23And thou shalt eat before the LORD thy God, in the place which he shall choose to place his name there, the tithe of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the firstlings of thy herds and of thy flocks; that thou mayest learn to fear the LORD thy God always.
24And if the way be too long for thee, so that thou art not able to carry it; or if the place be too far from thee, which the LORD thy God shall choose to set his name there, when the LORD thy God hath blessed thee:
25Then shalt thou turn it into money, and bind up the money in thine hand, and shalt go unto the place which the LORD thy God shall choose:
26And thou shalt bestow that money for whatsoever thy soul lusteth after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatsoever thy soul desireth: and thou shalt eat there before the LORD thy God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou, and thine household,
27And the Levite that is within thy gates; thou shalt not forsake him; for he hath no part nor inheritance with thee.
28At the end of three years thou shalt bring forth all the tithe of thine increase the same year, and shalt lay it up within thy gates:
29And the Levite, (because he hath no part nor inheritance with thee,) and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, which are within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that the LORD thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hand which thou doest.