You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt, where you lived. You shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. You shall not follow their statutes.
Not to adopt the ways of idolaters or practice their customs
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
וּבְחֻקֹּתֵיהֶם לֹא תֵלֵכוּ
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
הזהירנו מללכת בדרכי העכו"ם ומהתנהג במנהגותיהם ואפילו במלבושיהם ובקבוציהם במושבם. והוא אמרו יתעלה לא תלכו בחקות הגוים, ובא הפירוש לא אמרתי אלא החקוקים להם מאבותיהם. ולשון ספרי ובחקותיהם לא תלכו בנימוסות שלהם ובדברים החקוקים להם כגון טרטריאות וקרקסיאות, ואלו הם מינים ממושבם שהיו מתקבצין בהם לעבודת הצלמים, רבי מאיר אומר אלו דרכן של אמורים שמנו חכמים, רבי יהודה אומר שלא תנהיר שלא תגדל ציצית ושלא תספר קומי. ומי שעשה דבר מאלה חייב מלקות, ונכפלה האזהרה מזה הענין במקום אחר, והוא אמרו השמר לך פן תנקש אחריהם שמא תדמה להם ותעשה כמעשיהם והיה לך למוקש שלא תאמר הואיל והוא יוצא בתלוסין אף אני אצא בתלוסין, והוא מין ממיני זיון הפרשים. וכבר ידעת לשון הנביא על כל הלובשים מלבוש נכרי (צפניה א׳:ח׳). וזה כלו להתרחק מהם ולגנות כל חקותיהם ואפילו במלבוש. והתבארו משפטי מצוה זו בששי משבת. (קדושים תהיו, מדע הלכות ע"ז וחקות העכו"ם פי"א):
He prohibited us from following in the ways of the idolaters, and from behaving according to their practices - and even with their clothing and with their gatherings in their assemblies. And that is His, may He be exalted, saying, "You shall not follow the practices of the nation(s)" (Leviticus 20:23). And in the explanation (Sifra, Acharei Mot, Section 8:8), it appears - "I only said those that were established for them from their forefathers." And the language of the [Sifra] (Sifra, Acharei Mot, Chapter 13:8) is, "'And in their statutes you shall not walk' (Leviticus 18:3) - in their customs, those things that are established for them, such as theatres and circuses." And these were types of assemblies in which they would gather for worship of the images. "Rabbi Meir says, 'These are the ways of the Amorites, which the Sages enumerated.' Rabbi Yehudah says, 'that you not round [your face], and not cultivate locks, and not wear the hair komi.'" And one who does one of these things is liable for lashes. And the prohibition of this content was repeated in another place. And that is His saying, "Take heed unto yourselves, lest you are drawn in after them" (Deuteronomy 12:30). Lest you resemble them and do their deeds and it becomes a stumbling block; that you should not say, "Since they are going out with telusin, I will also go out with telusin" - and that is a type of weapon of the Persians. And you already know the language of the prophet (Zephaniah 1:8), "and all such as are clothed in foreign garments." And this is all to distance ourselves from them and to revile all of their practices, and even their clothes. And the regulations of this commandment have been explained in the sixth [chapter] of Shabbat. (See Parashat Kedoshim; Mishneh Torah, Foreign Worship and Customs of the Nations 11.)
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 prohibition
Applicability
How the catalog describes where and when this commandment applies. These are independent descriptions, not a verdict on which laws still count.
- Recorded as practiced today
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 Binding, with modification
- Reform Rejected
- Reconstructionist Not binding
- Karaite As the catalog records it: binding textual only
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.
Qumran (the Dead Sea Scrolls)
- CD-A (Cairo Damascus Document) on separation from the surrounding nations and their practices read it more strictly
Rabbinic aggadah
- Sifra Acharei Mot 13:8-9 expanded it homiletically
- Leviticus Rabbah 23:7 expanded it homiletically
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 3 (approx. 3.22-25) rationalized it addresses the forbidden sexual unions of Lev 18 rather than the chuqqot ha-goyim frame specifically; precise section range approximate
Josephus
- Antiquities 3.274 paraphrased it summarizes the Levitical sexual prohibitions rather than the gentile-customs frame specifically
The New Testament
- 2 Corinthians 6:14-17 reinterpreted it Call to separation from unbelievers echoing the be-distinct-from-the-nations motif; the passage 6:14-7:1 is regarded by many critical scholars as a possible non-Pauline interpolation
- 1 Peter 4:3-4 reinterpreted it rejection of gentile excesses framed as past way of life; paraenetic reuse of the be-distinct motif rather than legal affirmation of the Levitical commandment
The Qur'an and hadith
- Hadith tradition of 'differing from the disbelievers/polytheists' (e.g., the widely cited dictum 'whoever imitates a people is one of them,' Sunan Abu Dawud); specific canonical locus varies in the collections carried a parallel
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 Ugaritic texts illustrate the broader West-Semitic cultic milieu (Baal worship, Asherah veneration, associated ritual) against which the Holiness Code's polemic about Canaanite practice can be read; the link is interpretive context rather than direct documentation of the specific practices Lev 18:3 targets, and Ugarit is geographically and chronologically distinct from the 'Canaan' of the H frame Relationship to the parallel: polemical contrast Baal Cycle (KTU 1.1–1.6) and Ugaritic ritual texts Pardee, Ritual and Cult at Ugarit (SBL, 2002)
- egyptian negative confession The negative confession's structure of ethical self-definition by denial of forbidden practices parallels the Holiness Code's strategy of defining Israelite identity by contrast with the practices of Egypt and Canaan Relationship to the parallel: shared theme Book of the Dead Ch. 125, declarations 1–42 T.G. Allen, The Book of the Dead or Going Forth by Day (SAOC 37, 1974)
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.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
The commandment prohibits adopting cultural, social, and aesthetic practices associated with non-Jewish populations on pain of flogging; freedom of conscience encompasses the right to participate in shared cultural life without state-coerced conformity to an ethnoreligious boundary regime.
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Article 18 (freedom of thought, conscience, and religion)
This framework classifies the relation as a substantive tension.
The broad Maimonidean extension of the chuqqot ha-goyim prohibition to dress, hairstyle, and practices identified with other religious communities imposes behavioral conformity whose ultimate purpose is to prevent assimilation into the cultural life of other religious traditions; ICCPR Article 18 protects the right to manifest belief in practice and observance in ways that this prohibition's enforcement mechanism directly constrains.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as an incompatible method.
The punishment of thirty-nine lashes for imitation of non-Jewish cultural practices is a corporal sanction for non-violent expressive behavior; post-Enlightenment criminal law systems regard corporal punishment for lifestyle conduct as categorically impermissible.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
Flogging for attending a theatre, adopting a hairstyle, or wearing clothing associated with non-Jewish communities violates the modern proportionality principle, which precludes corporal punishment for non-violent expressive or cultural acts.
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Article 5
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
The thirty-nine-lash sanction constitutes corporal punishment categorically prohibited by UDHR Article 5 as cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.
The enumeration counts this as a structural duplicate of commandment #562 — Structural duplicate of #562 sharing collision_key shm:Negative 30. This is a clear, unambiguous true duplicate. Three independent lines of evidence converge: (1) The dataset's own dispute_flag/dispute_summary fields on BOTH entries explicitly diagnose this as a "counting duplication" where both verses share the same Rambam number; (2) The bible_reference.db stores See task #95..