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Deuteronomy

About this book
Chapter 14

1 You are children of the Lord your God.⁠ Do not cut yourselves or shave your forehead bald for the sake of the dead.⁠ 2 For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. He has chosen you to be his people, prized above all others on the face of the earth.⁠ 3 You must not eat any forbidden thing. 4 These are the animals you may eat: the ox, the sheep, the goat, 5 the ibex, the gazelle, the deer, the wild goat, the antelope, the wild oryx, and the mountain sheep. 6 You may eat any animal that has hooves divided into two parts and that chews the cud. 7 However, you may not eat the following animals among those that chew the cud or those that have divided hooves: the camel, the hare, and the rock badger. (Although they chew the cud, they do not have divided hooves and are therefore ritually impure to you.) 8 Also, the pig is ritually impure to you; though it has divided hooves, it does not chew the cud. You may not eat their meat or even touch their remains. 9 These you may eat from among water creatures: anything with fins and scales you may eat, 10 but whatever does not have fins and scales you may not eat; it is ritually impure to you. 11 All ritually clean birds you may eat. 12 These are the ones you may not eat: the eagle, the vulture, the black vulture, 13 the kite, the black kite, the dayyah after its species, 14 every raven after its species, 15 the ostrich, the owl, the seagull, the falcon after its species, 16 the little owl, the long-eared owl, the white owl, 17 the jackdaw, the carrion vulture, the cormorant, 18 the stork, the heron after its species, the hoopoe, and the bat. 19 And any swarming winged thing is impure to you—they may not be eaten. 20 You may eat any winged creature that is clean. 21 You may not eat any corpse, though you may give it to the resident foreigner who is living in your villages and he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner. You are a people holy to the Lord your God. Do not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.⁠ 22 You must be certain to tithe all the produce of your seed that comes from the field year after year. 23 In the presence of the Lord your God, in the place he chooses to locate his name, you must eat from the tithe of your grain, your new wine, your olive oil, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks, so that you may learn to revere the Lord your God always. 24 When he blesses you, if the place where he chooses to locate his name is distant, 25 you may convert the tithe into money, secure the money, and travel to the place the Lord your God chooses for himself. 26 Then you may spend the money however you wish for cattle, sheep, wine, beer, or whatever you desire. You and your household may eat there in the presence of the Lord your God and enjoy it. 27 As for the Levites in your villages, you must not ignore them, for they have no allotment or inheritance along with you. 28 At the end of every three years you must bring all the tithe of your produce, in that very year, and you must store it up in your villages. 29 Then the Levites (because they have no allotment or inheritance with you), the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows of your villages may come and eat their fill so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work you do.⁠

Texts in conversation

Compare KTU 2.39:12 and Deuteronomy 14:2

Ancient Near East, Ugaritic · Hebrew Bible

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Summary

The royal language of treasured possession in the Ugaritic letter KTU 2.39 makes Israel's holiness a matter of belonging to God, giving the rules in Deuteronomy 14 a basis in loyalty to their divine ruler.

Passages

KTU 2.39:12

Ancient Near East, Ugaritic · Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
Message of the Sun. To Ammurapi say: With the Sun everything is very well. To the f[eet] of the [l]ord, the Sun, [his] lo[rd], his [ser]vant […] for he is [a servant], his treasured possession, and [his master] […] and […] my lord shall not lack. And [you], you surely [k]now: now […] to the Sun, your lord, [a ser]vant, his treasured possession, are you. Now […] the Sun, your lord, you surely know it. To me, the Sun, your lord, for a year, two years, why have you not come? And as for the tablet about food that you sent to the Sun, your lord: that food in your land there is none, the Sun […] If I go […] I have given […] two […] and […] […] […] […] with […] food […] […] And the letter […] [to] me […] wherever there is any, seek it out and give it to me.
1350–1185 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in KTU

Deuteronomy 14:2

Hebrew Bible
1 You are children of the Lord your God. Do not cut yourselves or shave your forehead bald for the sake of the dead. 2 For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. He has chosen you to be his people, prized above all others on the face of the earth. 3 You must not eat any forbidden thing. 4 These are the animals you may eat: the ox, the sheep, the goat, 5 the ibex, the gazelle, the deer, the wild goat, the antelope, the wild oryx, and the mountain sheep. 6 You may eat any animal that has hooves divided into two parts and that chews the cud. 7 However, you may not eat the following animals among those that chew the cud or those that have divided hooves: the camel, the hare, and the rock badger. (Although they chew the cud, they do not have divided hooves and are therefore ritually impure to you.)
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Deuteronomy

References

“... Yhwh has chosen Israel to be for Him a עם סגלה. The word סגלה occurs only eight times in the Old Testament, six of which refer to the people of Israel (Exod. 19:5; Deut. 7:6; 14:2; 26:18; Ps. 135:4; Mal. 3:17). The other two texts make clear that the word denotes possessions. [...] In a metaphorical sense, סגלה, “personal, precious property”, is applied to the people of Israel. In Deut. 7:6, the element of personal property is evident from the words להיות לו (cf. Ps. 135:4, where לסגלתו and לו are paralleled). [...] The metaphorical meaning of סגלה also occurs in Ugarit and Mesopotamia. In Ugarit, the word sglt is used in a letter from the Hittite king to the king of Ugarit (ktu 2.39). The Hittite king, Suppiluliuma ii (1205–1175 b.c.), blames his vassal Ammurapi (1205–1175 b.c.) that he has not come to him for two years now, as was prescribed in earlier treaties, and that he has failed to fulfill certain obligations. [...] The lines that contain the word sglt, however, are fairly clear. 7 k . ʿ[bdm . ]sglth . hw 7 for he [the king of Ugarit] is a servant [of the Hittite king], his personal property 12 ʿb[d]m. sglth . at 12 a servant, his personal property you are ...”
Arie Versluis, The Command to Exterminate the Canaanites: Deuteronomy 7 (Leiden: Brill, 2017), 81–82.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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KTU 2.39:12 and Deuteronomy 14:2

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