You may not eat within your gates the tithe of your grain, or of your new wine, or of your oil, or the firstborn of your herd or of your flock, nor any of your vows which you vow, nor your free will offerings, nor the wave offering of your hand;
Not to eat the flesh of a firstborn animal outside Jerusalem
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
לֹא־תוּכַל לֶאֱכֹל בִּשְׁעָרֶיךָ ... וּבְכֹרֹת בְּקָרְךָ וְצֹאנֶךָ
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
שהזהירנו מלאכול בכור חוץ לירושלים כשהוא תמים. והוא אמרו יתעלה לא תוכל וגו' ובכורות בקרך וצאנך. ולשון ספרי ובכורות זה הבכור לא בא הכתוב אלא לזר שאכל את הבכור בין לפני זריקת דם בין לאחר זריקת דם שעובר בלא תעשה. הנה כבר התבאר לך שזה הלאו כולל שני ענינים, אזהרת הזר מאכול תמים, ואזהרת הכהן מלאכלו חוץ לירושלים, ושני הענינים דינם נתלה בבכור תמים, ומי שעבר על זאת האזהרה לוקה. (שם, הלכות בכורות פ"א):
That He prohibited us from eating a firstborn animal outside of Jerusalem when it is flawless. And that is His, may He be exalted, saying, "You may not, etc. and the firstborn of your cattle and your sheep." And the language of the Sifrei (Sifrei Devarim 72:11) is, "'The firstborn' (Deuteronomy 12:17) - that is the firstborn animal. [...] The verse is only coming [to teach] us about an outsider (a non-priest) who eats the first-born - whether before the sprinkling of the blood or whether after the sprinkling of the blood - he is transgressing a negative commandment." Behold it has been explained to you that this negative statement contains two matters: The prohibition about an outsider eating a flawless [firstborn animal]; and the prohibition about a priest eating it outside of Jerusalem. And the law of [these] two topics is dependent upon [it being] a flawless firstborn animal. And one who transgresses this prohibition is lashed, " (See Parashat Re'eh; Mishneh Torah, Firstlings 1.)
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.
- Requires a standing Temple
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, with modification
- Conservative Not binding
- Reform Not binding
- Reconstructionist Not binding
- Karaite Not binding
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.
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 1.135-144 rationalized it
Josephus
- Ant. 4.70-71 paraphrased it
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 an incompatible method.
Thirty-nine lashes (malkot) for eating consecrated animal flesh outside a designated sanctuary location is grossly disproportionate by any standard of secular criminal law; no cognizable harm to persons or property is produced by the consumption.
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general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
Corporal punishment for a non-violent dietary location offense violates the principle that criminal sanctions must be proportionate to the gravity of identifiable harm.
-
general principle
This framework classifies the relation as abrogated in practice.
The offense is doubly inoperative: the Temple precondition for the consecrated firstborn's sacrifice no longer exists, and rabbinic capital jurisdiction for malkot lapsed with the dissolution of the ordained Sanhedrin; the de jure norm is suspended on both grounds.