1
Hear now, O Israel, the decrees and laws I am about to teach you.
Follow them so that you may live and may go in and take possesson
of the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, is giving you.
2
Do not add to what I command you and do not subtract from it,
but keep the commands of the LORD your God that I give you.
3
You saw with your own eyes what the LORD did at Baal Peor. The LORD
your God destroyed from among you everyone who followed the Baal of Peor,
4
but all of you who held fast to the LORD your God are still alive today.
5
See, I have taught you decrees and laws as the LORD my God
commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land
you are entering to take possession of it.
6
Observe them carefully, for this will show your wisdom and understanding
to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees and say,
"Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people."
7
What pther nation is so great as tp have their gods near them the way
the LORD our God is near us whenever we pray to him?
8
And what other nation is so great as to have such righteous decrees and
laws as this body of laws I am setting before you today?
9
Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not
forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your
heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and
to their children after them.
10
Remember the day you stood before the LORD your God at Horeb,
when he said to me, "Assemble the people before me to hear my words
so that they may learn to revere me as long as they live in the land
and may teach them to their children."
11
You came near and stood at the foot of the mountain while it blazed
with fire to the very heavens, with black coulds and deep darkness.
12
Then the LORD spoke to you out of the fire. You heard the sound of
the words but saw no form; there was only a voice.
13
He declared to you his covenant, the Ten Commandments, which he
commanded you to follow and then wrote them on two stone tablets.
14
And the LORD directed me at that time to teach you the decrees and
laws you are to follow in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess.
15
You saw no form of any kind the day the LORD spoke to you at Horeb
out of the fire. Therefore watch yourselves very carefully,
16
so that you do not become corrupt and make for yourselves an idol,
an image of any shape, whether formed like a man or a woman,
17
or like any animal on earth or any bird that flies in the air,
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or like any creature that moves along the ground or any fish in the waters below.
19
And when you look up to the sky and see the sun, the moon and the stars -
all the heavenly array - do not be enticed into bowing down to them and
worshiping things the LORD your God has apportioned to
all the nations under heaven.
20
But as for you, the LORD took you and brought you out of
the iron-smelting furnace, out of Egypt, to be the people of
his inheritance, as you now are.
21
The LORD was angry with me because of you, and he solemnly
swore that I would not cross the Jordan and enter the good land
the LORD your God is giving you as your inheritance.
22
I will die in this land; I will not cross the Jordan; but you are about
to cross over and take possession of that good land.
23
Be careful not to forget the covenant of the LORD your God that
he made with you; do not make for yourselves an idol in the form
of anything the LORD your God has forbidden.
24
For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.
25
After you have had children and grandchildren and have lived in
the land a long time - if you then become corrupt and make any kind of idol,
doing evil in the eyes of rhe LORD your God and provoking him to anger,
26
I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you this day that
you will quickly perish from the land that you are crossing the Jordan
to possess. You will not live there long but will certainly be destroyed.
27
The LORD will scatter you among the peoples, and onlya few of you
will survive among the nations to which the LORD will drive you.
28
There you will worship man-made gods of wood and stone,
which cannot see or hear or eat or smell.
29
But if from there you seek the LORD your God, you will find him
if you look for him with all your heart and with all your soul.
30
When you are in distress and all these things have happened to you,
then in later days you will return to the LORD your God and obey him.
31
For the LORD your God is a merciful God; he will not abandon or
destroy you or forget the covenant with your forefathers, which he
confirmed to them by oath.
32
Ask now about the former days, long before your time, from the day
God created man on the earth; ask from one end of the heavens
to the other. Has anything so great as this ever happened, or has
anything like it ever been heard of?
33
Has any other people heard the voice of God speaking out of fire,
as you have, and lived?
34
Has any god ever tried to take for himself one nation out of another
nation, by testings, by miraculous signs and wonders, by war, by a
mighty hnd and an outstretched arm, or by great and awesome deeds,
like all the things the LORD your God did for you in Egypt before
your very eyes?
35
You were shown these things so that you might know that the LORD
is God; besides him there is no other.
36
From heaven he made you hear his voice to discipline you. On earth
he showed you his great fire, and you heard his words from out of
the fire.
37
Because he loved your forefathers and chose their descendants after
them, he brought you out of Egypt by his Presence and his great
strength,
38
to drive out before you nations greater and stronger than you and to
bring you into their land to give it to you for your inheritance,
as it is today.
39
Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the LORD is God in heaven
above and on the earth below. There is no other.
40
Keep his decrees and commands, which I am giving you today, so that
it may go well with you and your children after you and that you may live
long in the land the LORD your God gives you for all time.
41
Then Moses set aside three cities east of the Jordan,
42
to which anyone who had killed a person could flee if he had unintentionally
killed his neighbor without malice aforethought. He could flee into one of
these cities and save his life.
43
The cities were these: Bezer in the desert plateau, for the Reubenites; Ramoth
in Gilead, for the Gadites; and Golan in Bashan, for the Manassites.
44
This is the law Moses set before the Israelites.
45
These are the stipulations, decrees and laws Moses gave them when
they came out of Egypt
46
and were in the valley near Beth Peor east of the Jordan, in the land
of Sihon king of the Amorites, who reigned in Heshbon and was
defeated by Moses and the Israelites as they came out of Egypt.
47
They took possession of his land and the land of Og king of Bashan,
the two Amorite kings east of the Jordan.
48
This land extended from Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Gorge to Mount
Siyon (that is Hermon),
49
and included all the Arabah east of the Jordan,as far as the Sea of the Arabah,
below the slopes of Pisgah.
