Give back what you find
1 If you find the lost ox or sheep of your brother, do not pretend that you did not see it, but bring it back to its owner.
2 If your brother does not live near you, or you do not know to whom the animal belongs, you shall keep it in your house until its owner comes looking for it. Then you shall re turn it to him.
3 Do the same with his ass, his clothes, or with anything lost by your brother that you happen to find. Do not pretend not to notice them.
4 If you see the ass of your brother or his ox fall down by the way, do not pretend not to notice it, but help your brother lift the animal up.
5 A woman must not wear a man’s cloth ing, nor a man the clothing of a wo man, because whoever does such a thing deserves the reprobation of Yahweh.
6 If you find along your way a bird’s nest in a tree or on the ground, and the mother-bird is sitting upon the birdlings or upon the eggs, you shall not bring with you the mother-bird together with the young,
7 but you shall let the mother go and take only the young. Then you shall prosper and live long.
8 When you build a new house, you shall construct a small wall around the roof, lest someone should fall from it, and your house become stained with blood.
9 Do not sow any other seed in your vine yard because when you do this, you can neither eat from the produce of the grapes nor from the produce of the other plants.
10 Do not plow with an ox and an ass to gether.
11 Do not wear a garment woven from wool and linen together.
12 Make for yourself tassels on the four corners of your cloak with which you cover yourself.
13 It may happen that a man takes a wife and afterwards does not like her,
14 so he reproaches her for her behavior, and defames her by saying: “I married this woman, but when I went to bed with her, I found out that she was not a virgin.”
15 In this case, the father and mother of the young woman shall take the sheet of the wedding night which proves that she was a virgin, and will show this to the judges of the city.
16 The father of the young woman shall then say to the judges: “I have given my daughter as wife to this man, but now that he no longer likes her,
17 he pretends that when he married her she was not a virgin. And yet, see, here is the proof of my daughter’s virginity.”
18 They shall spread the sheet before the judges of the city. If the man is guilty, the judges shall arrest him and have him whipped.
19 They shall also fine him a hundred silver coins which they shall give to the father of the young woman because the man publicly defamed a virgin of Israel. The husband shall have her as his wife and cannot repudiate her as long as he lives.
20 But if what the man says is true, and the proof of her virginity is not found,
21 then you shall bring her to the door of her father’s house and the people shall stone her to death for having committed an evil deed in Israel—becoming a prostitute while still in her father’s house. So shall you banish evil from your midst.
22 If a man is caught lying with a married woman, the two shall die: the adulterer and the adulteress. So shall you banish evil from Israel.
23 If a young woman has been promised in marriage to a man, and another man meets her in the city and lies with her,
24 they shall bring the two and stone them to death: the young woman be cause she did not cry for help when she was in the city, and the man because he dis honored the future wife of his neighbor. So shall you banish evil from your midst.
25 But if in the fields, a man meets a young woman promised in marriage, and violates her by force, then only the man shall die.
26 The young woman shall not suffer punishment. She does not deserve death, for this case is similar to a highwayman who falls upon a man and mur ders him; in the same manner, the young woman was assaulted.
27 She was alone in the fields, she cried but no one came to help her.
28 If a man meets a young virgin who is not promised in marriage to another man, and that man violates her by force, and they are caught by surprise,
29 the man who lay with her shall give to the father of the young woman fifty pieces of silver, and take her as his wife, because he has dishonored her, and he cannot send her away all his life.