I have not eaten of it in my mourning, neither have I removed any of it while I was unclean, nor given of it for the dead. I have listened to Yahweh my God’s voice. I have done according to all that you have commanded me.
Not to eat the second tithe while in a state of mourning
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
לֹא־אָכַלְתִּי בְאֹנִי מִמֶּנּוּ
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
שהזהיר מאכול מעשר שני באנינות. והוא אמרו לא אכלתי באוני. ולשון המשנה בבכורים שהמעשר והבכורים טעונין הבאת מקום וטעונין וידוי ואסורין לאונן. וכן כל אונן אסור בקדשים מזה הכתוב, וכתוב בתורה ותקראנה אותי כאלה וגו'. וכבר התבארו משפטי מצוה זו רצה לומר אנינות בשמיני מפסחים ושני מזבחים. וכל מי שאכל קדשים או מעשר באנינות לוקה. (שם, שם):
That He prohibited us from eating second tithe when grieving - even in Jerusalem - until it has been redeemed. And that is His saying, "I did not eat of it when grieving" (Deuteronomy 26:14). And the language of the Mishnah in Bikkurim (Bikkurim 2:2) is, "That the [second] tithe and firstfruits require being brought to [the appointed] place; they require confession; and they are forbidden to one grieving." And likewise anyone grieving is forbidden with regards to all consecrated foods due to this verse, as well as due to it being written in the Torah, "and such things have befallen me" (Leviticus 10:19). And the regulations of this commandment - meaning to say, grieving - have already been explained in the eighth [chapter] of Pesachim and the second [chapter] of Zevachim. And one who eats second tithe or tithes while grieving is lashed. (See Parashat Ki Tavo; Mishneh Torah, Second Tithes and Fourth Year's Fruit 3.)
Hebrew: Sefer HaMitzvot, Warsaw 1883 (public domain). English: Sefaria Edition, trans. Rabbi Francis Nataf, 2021 (CC0). Via Sefaria; translator’s footnotes omitted.
Literary form: a command embedded in narrative
Applicability
How the catalog describes where and when this commandment applies. These are independent descriptions, not a verdict on which laws still count.
- Requires a standing Temple
- Binding in the land of Israel
Classical halakhic consequences
The consequences the classical halakhah attaches to this commandment, grouped by who imposes them. Where a category has none recorded, that absence is itself meaningful.
Imposed by a court
- Lashes (malkot)
At the hands of Heaven
No divinely-imposed consequence is recorded.
Ritual remedy
No ritual remedy is recorded.
How the streams of Judaism treat this commandment
The streams of Judaism read the same commandment differently — an ongoing plurality, not a ranking. Each position below is reported as the catalog records it; none is presented as the correct one.
- Orthodox Binding
- Conservative Not binding
- Reform Not binding
- Reconstructionist Not binding
- Karaite Disputed
24 of 613 commandments have been examined in depth so far — this one is queued.
How later traditions received this commandment
How later traditions read or reworked this commandment, each attributed to its own voice. The catalog’s own classification of each reception is shown as it records it, never adopted as GEBible’s.
Josephus
- Ant. 4.240-243 paraphrased it
Beside the older legal codes of its world
The commandment set beside the ancient Near-Eastern legal collections scholars compare it to — a descriptive comparison, not a claim of dependence.
- ugaritic texts The Ugaritic text KTU 1.114 depicts a divine drinking feast often associated in scholarship with the marzeaḥ, illuminating the West Semitic mourning/drinking-feast milieu that the tithe-confession clause of Deuteronomy 26:14 may implicitly oppose by forbidding sacred tithe consumption in mourning Relationship to the parallel: polemical contrast KTU 1.114 (El's drinking-feast text, frequently linked to the marzeaḥ institution) Pardee, Ritual and Cult at Ugarit (SBL, 2002)
Where this commandment meets modern human-rights frameworks
One modern normative lens, attributed to it — not GEBible’s assessment. Each row names the framework it measures against and the catalog’s own classification of the relation.
This framework catalogues tensions; it records agreement in only one of its entries. The near-total tension rate is the shape of the instrument, not a finding.
-
general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
The commandment prescribes corporal punishment for eating one's own food while grieving — a non-violent act arising from a state of acute bereavement. Modern proportionality doctrine excludes lashing for any consumption offense, particularly one involving a person in mourning.
-
Article 7
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
ICCPR Article 7 prohibits cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment; inflicting thirty-nine lashes on a mourner for eating during acute grief is classified as inhuman or degrading treatment under international human-rights standards.
-
general principle
This framework classifies the relation as abrogated in practice.
The commandment is doubly inoperative: it requires a standing Temple (the second-tithe regime is Temple-dependent) and an ordained Sanhedrin capable of imposing malkot; both prerequisites lapsed with the Temple's destruction and rabbinic tradition acknowledges the commandment is de jure only.