Deuteronomy 6:1–25

¹“Now these are the commandment, the regulations and the judicial decisions that Jehovah ​YOUR​ God has commanded to teach ​YOU, so as to do them in the land to which ​YOU​ are passing over there to take possession of it;²in order that you may fear Jehovah your God so as to keep all his statutes and his commandments that I am commanding you, you and your son and your grandson, all the days of your life, and in order that your days may prove long.³And you must listen, O Israel, and take care to do [them], that it may go well with you and that ​YOU​ may become very many, just as Jehovah the God of your forefathers has promised you, as respects the land flowing with milk and honey.

⁴“Listen, O Israel: Jehovah our God is one Jehovah.⁵And you must love Jehovah your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your vital force.⁶And these words that I am commanding you today must prove to be on your heart;⁷and you must inculcate them in your son and speak of them when you sit in your house and when you walk on the road and when you lie down and when you get up.⁸And you must tie them as a sign upon your hand, and they must serve as a frontlet band between your eyes;⁹and you must write them upon the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

¹⁰“And it must occur that when Jehovah your God will bring you into the land that he swore to your forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to give you, great and good‐looking cities that you did not build,¹¹and houses full of all good things and that you did not fill, and cisterns hewn out that you did not hew out, vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant, and you shall have eaten and become satisfied,¹²watch out for yourself that you may not forget Jehovah, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slaves.¹³Jehovah your God you should fear, and him you should serve, and by his name you should swear.¹⁴YOU​ must not walk after other gods, any gods of the peoples who are all around ​YOU,¹⁵(for Jehovah your God in your midst is a God exacting exclusive devotion,) for fear the anger of Jehovah your God may blaze against you and he must annihilate you from off the surface of the ground.

¹⁶“YOU​ must not put Jehovah ​YOUR​ God to the test, the way ​YOU​ put him to the test at Mas′sah.¹⁷YOU​ should by all means keep the commandments of Jehovah ​YOUR​ God and his testimonies and his regulations that he has commanded you.¹⁸And you must do what is right and good in Jehovah’s eyes, in order that it may go well with you and you may indeed enter and take possession of the good land about which Jehovah has sworn to your forefathers,¹⁹by pushing away all your enemies from before you, just as Jehovah has promised.

²⁰“In case your son should ask you in a future day, saying, ‘What do the testimonies and the regulations and the judicial decisions mean that Jehovah our God has commanded ​YOU?’²¹then you must say to your son, ‘We became slaves to Phar′aoh in Egypt, but Jehovah proceeded to bring us out of Egypt with a strong hand.²²So Jehovah kept putting signs and miracles, great and calamitous, upon Egypt, upon Phar′aoh and upon all his household before our eyes.²³And he brought us out from there in order that he might bring us here to give us the land about which he had sworn to our forefathers.²⁴Hence Jehovah commanded us to carry out all these regulations, to fear Jehovah our God for our good always, that we might keep alive as at this day.²⁵And it will mean righteousness for us, that we take care to do all this commandment before Jehovah our God, just as he has commanded us.’