Against Instigating Worship of Other Gods

⁷If your brother, your own mother’s son, or your son or daughter, or the wife of your bosom, or your closest friend entices you in secret, saying, “Come let us worship other gods”—whom neither you nor your fathers have experienced—⁸from among the gods of the peoples around you, either near to you or distant, anywhere from one end of the earth to the other: ⁹do not assent or give heed to him. Show him no pity or compassion, and do not shield him; ¹⁰but take his life. Let your hand be the first against him to put him to death, and the hand of the rest of the people thereafter. ¹¹Stone him to death, for he sought to make you stray from the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. ¹²Thus all Israel will hear and be afraid, and such evil things will not be done again in your midst.

¹³If you hear it said, of one of the towns that the Lord your God is giving you to dwell in, ¹⁴that some scoundrels from among you have gone and subverted the inhabitants of their town, saying, “Come let us worship other gods”—whom you have not experienced—¹⁵you shall investigate and inquire and interrogate thoroughly. If it is true, the fact is established—that abhorrent thing was perpetrated in your midst—¹⁶put the inhabitants of that town to the sword and put its cattle to the sword. Doom it and all that is in it to destruction: ¹⁷gather all its spoil into the open square, and burn the town and all its spoil as a holocaust to the Lord your God. And it shall remain an everlasting ruin, never to be rebuilt. ¹⁸Let nothing that has been doomed stick to your hand, in order that the Lord may turn from His blazing anger and show you compassion, and in His compassion increase you as He promised your fathers on oath—¹⁹for you will be heeding the Lord your God, obeying all His commandments that I enjoin upon you this day, doing what is right in the sight of the Lord your God.