Bible Strands
Leviticus 20:23
You must not follow the statutes of the nations I am driving out before you. Because they did all these things, I abhorred them.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Yahweh speaks to the Israelites through Moses, concluding a block of holiness laws just before the promised inheritance of Canaan. The command addresses the entire community at the threshold of entering the land.
The words — The Hebrew תְּלֵכוּ (te.le.khu) translates literally as "you will walk," paired with בְּחֻקֹּת (be.chu.kot), "in the statutes." Together they frame covenant obedience as a sustained trajectory rather than a single act.
The thread — The prohibition against adopting foreign statutes appears in Leviticus 18:3 and Leviticus 18:24, where the same warning precedes the threat of the land vomiting out its occupants. The promise of inheritance in Leviticus 20:24 and the grace note in Deuteronomy 9:5 complete the sequence.
Why it lands — The text demands exclusive adherence to Yahweh's statutes before the reader accepts the land. It requires the reader to reject the moral patterns of displaced cultures as a condition of remaining in the territory.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation, which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them.
Cross-references
- Leviticus 18:24 Do not defile yourselves by any of these practices, for by all these things the nations I am driving out before you have defiled themselves.
- Deuteronomy 9:5 It is not because of your righteousness or uprightness of heart that you are going in to possess their land, but it is because of their wickedness that the LORD your God is driving out these nations before you, to keep the promise He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
- Leviticus 18:3 You must not follow the practices of the land of Egypt, where you used to live, and you must not follow the practices of the land of Canaan, into which I am bringing you. You must not walk in their customs.
- Leviticus 18:30 You must keep My charge not to practice any of the abominable customs that were practiced before you, so that you do not defile yourselves by them. I am the LORD your God.”
- Leviticus 18:27 For the men who were in the land before you committed all these abominations, and the land has become defiled.
- Deuteronomy 12:30 be careful not to be ensnared by their ways after they have been destroyed before you. Do not inquire about their gods, asking, “How do these nations serve their gods? I will do likewise.”
- Jeremiah 10:1 Hear the word that the LORD speaks to you, O house of Israel.
- Psalms 78:59 On hearing it, God was furious and rejected Israel completely.
- Zechariah 11:8 And in one month I dismissed three shepherds. My soul grew impatient with the flock, and their souls also detested me.