Driving Out the Nations
1
When the LORD uour God brings you into the land you are entering to possess
and drives out before you many nations - the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites,
Canannites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger
than you -
2
and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have
defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them,
and show them no mercy.
3
Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or
take their daughters for your sons,
4
for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods,
and the LORD's anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you.
5
This is what you are to do to them:
Beak down altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Ashera poles
and burn their idols in the fire.
6
For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has
chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people,
his treasured possesion.
7
The LORD did not set his affection on you and chhose you because you were
numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples.
8
But it was because the LORD loved you and kept the oath he swore to
your forefathers that he brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed
you from the land of slavery, from the power of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
9
Know therefore that the LORD your God is God; he is the faithful God,
keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those
who love him and kep his commands.
10
But those who hate him will repay to their face by destruction;
he will not be slow to repay to their face those who hate him.
11
Therefore, take care to follow the commands, decrees and laws I give you today.
12
If you pay attention to these laws and are careful to follow them,
then the LORD your God will keep his covenant of love with you,
as he swore to your forefathers.
13
He will love you and bless you and increase your numbers. He will the fruit of
your womb, the crops of your land - your grain, new wine and oil -
the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks in the land that
he swore to your forefathers to give you.
14
You will be blessed more than any other people; none of your men or women
will be childless, nor any of your livestock without young.
15
The LORD will keep you free from every disease. He will not inflict on you
the horrible diseases you knew in Egypt, but he will inflict them them on
all who hate you.
16
You must destroy all the peoples the LORD your God gives over to you.
Do not look on them with pity and do not serve their gods,
for that will be a snare o you.
17
You may say to yourselves,
"These nations are stronger than we are. How can we drive them out?"
18
But do not be afraid of them; remember well what the LORD your God
did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt.
19
You saw with your own eyes the great trials, the miraculous signs
and wonders, the mighty hand and outstretched arm, with which the LORD
your God brought you out. The LORD your God will do the same to
all the peoples you now fear.
20
Moreover, the LORD your God will send the hornet among them
until even the survivors who hide from you have perished.
21
Do not be terrified by them, for the LORD your God, who is among you,
is great and awesome God.
22
The LORD your God will drive out those nations before you, little by little.
You will not be allowed to eliminate them all at once, or the wild anmals
will multiply around you.
23
But the LORD your God will deliver them over to you,
throwing them into great confusion until they are destroyed.
24
He will give their kings into your hand, and you will wipe out their names
from under heaven. No one will be able to stand up against you;
you will destroy them.
25
The images of their gods you are to burn in the fire. Do not covet the silver and
gold pn them, and do not take it for yourselves, or you will be ensnared by it,
for it is detestable to the LORD your God.
26
Do not bring a detestable thing into your house or you, like it, will be set apart
for destruction. Utterly abhor and detest it, for it is set apart for destruction.
