1. Here are the laws and rules you must faithfully obey in the land that the Lord God of your ancestors is giving you as your own. You must obey them as long as you live in the land.
2. Completely destroy all the worship sites on the high mountains, on the hills, and under every large tree. The people you’re forcing out worship their gods in these places.
3. Tear down their altars, crush their sacred stones, burn their poles dedicated to the goddess Asherah, cut down their idols, and wipe out the names of their gods from those places.
4. Never worship the Lord your God in the way they worship their gods.
5. The Lord your God will choose a place out of all your tribes to live and put his name. Go there and worship him.
6. Bring him your burnt offerings, your sacrifices, one-tenth of your income, your contributions, the offerings you vow to bring, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your cattle, sheep, and goats.
7. There, in the presence of the Lord your God, you and your families will eat and enjoy everything you’ve worked for, because the Lord your God has blessed you.
8. Never worship in the way that it’s being done here today, where everyone does whatever he considers right.
9. Up until now you haven’t come to your place of rest, the property the Lord your God is giving you.
10. But you will cross the Jordan River and settle in the land the Lord your God is giving you as your own property. He will give you peace from all your enemies around you so that you will live securely.
11. Then the Lord your God will choose a place where his name will live. You must bring everything I command you to that place. Bring your burnt offerings, your sacrifices, one-tenth of your income, your contributions, and all the best offerings you vow to bring to the Lord.
12. Enjoy yourselves in the presence of the Lord your God along with your sons, daughters, male and female slaves, and the Levites. (The Levites live in your cities because they have no land of their own as you have.)
13. Be careful that you don’t sacrifice your burnt offerings wherever you want.
14. Instead, sacrifice them ⌊only⌋ at the place that the Lord will choose in one of your tribes. There you must do everything I command you.
15. In whatever city you live, you may slaughter and eat as much meat as you want from what the Lord your God has blessed you with. Clean and unclean people may eat it as if they were eating a gazelle or a deer.