Then everyone else will hear and be afraid, and they will never again do anything evil like this among you.

And the officers shall speak further unto the people, and they shall say, What man is there that is fearful and fainthearted? let him go and return unto his house, lest his brethren's heart faint as well as his heart.

And it shall be when the officers have finished speaking to the soldiers, they shall appoint commanders of armies over them.

If that city accepts your terms of peace and opens its gates to you, then all the people who are found in it shall become your forced labor and shall serve you.

But if they refuse to make peace with you and instead choose war, then attack it.

so that they will not teach you to act in accordance with all the detestable practices which they have done [in worship and service] for their gods, and in this way cause you to sin against the Lord your God.

When thou hast besieged a city long time in making war against it to take it, destroy not the trees thereof, that thou wouldest thrust an axe unto them. For thou mayest eat of them, and therefore destroy them not. For the trees of the fields are no men that they might come against thee to besiege thee.

Only the trees which thou knowest that they be not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down; and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that maketh war with thee, until it be subdued.

Then thy elders and thy judges shall come forth, and they shall measure unto the cities which are round about him that is slain:

The elders of that city will bring the cow down to a continually flowing stream, to a place not tilled or sown, and they will break its neck there by the stream.

Then the priests, the sons of Levi, will come forward, for Yahweh your God has chosen them to serve Him and pronounce blessings in His name, and they are to give a ruling in every dispute and case of assault.

and they shall respond, and say, ‘Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it.

Lord, forgive Your people Israel You redeemed, and do not hold the shedding of innocent blood against them.’ Then they will be absolved of responsibility for bloodshed.

“If a man has two wives, one loved and the other unloved, and both the loved and the unloved have born him sons, and the firstborn son belongs to the unloved wife,

“If any man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or of his mother, and when they reprimand and discipline him, he will not listen to them,

then laid hold on him have his father and his mother, and they have brought him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place,

They shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey us, he is a glutton and a drunkard.’

Then all the men of his city shall stone him with stones and let him die; and so you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all of Israel will hear, and they will fear.

If a bird's nest chance to be before thee in the way in any tree, or on the ground, whether they be young ones, or eggs, and the dam sitting upon the young, or upon the eggs, thou shalt not take the dam with the young:

then [in defense] the father of the young woman shall take, along with her mother, and [together] they must bring out the [evidence of] the virginity of the young woman [to display it] to the elders of the city {at the city gate}.

and behold, he has made baseless charges against her, saying, “I did not find in your daughter the evidence of her virginity.” But this is the evidence of my daughter’s virginity.’ And they shall spread out the garment before the elders of the city.

Then the elders of that city shall take the man, and they shall discipline him.

and they shall fine him a hundred shekels of silver and give it to the father of the young woman, because he publicly defamed a virgin of Israel. And she shall remain his wife; he is not allowed to divorce her as long as he lives.

then they shall bring her out to the doorway of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death because she has committed a deliberate sin in Israel by playing the prostitute in her father’s house. So you shall remove the evil from among you.

“If a man is intimate with a woman who is another man’s wife, they shall both be put to death, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman. So you shall remove the evil from Israel.

Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour's wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you.

“If a man finds a girl who is a virgin, who is not engaged, and seizes her and is intimate with her and they are discovered,

An Ammonite or Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD; even to their tenth generation shall they not enter into the congregation of the LORD for ever:

because they did not meet you with bread (food) and water on the road as you came out of Egypt, and because they hired [to act] against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you.

Don't detest Edomites, since they are related to you. Don't detest Egyptians, either, because you were strangers in their land.

Thou shalt not bring the wages of an unchaste woman, or the hire of a dog, into the house of Yahweh thy God for any vow, - for, an abomination unto Yahweh thy God, are they both.

If a man takes a wife, and after they are married she is unpleasing to him because of some bad quality in her, let him give her a statement in writing and send her away from his house.

Fathers are not put to death for sons, and sons are not put to death for fathers -- each for his own sin, they are put to death.

When you gather the grapes of your vineyard you must not do so a second time; they should go to the resident foreigner, orphan, and widow.

“If there is a controversy between men, and they go to court, and the judges decide [the issue] between them, and they judge in favor of the innocent and condemn the guilty,

With forty stripes shall they beat him; they shall not exceed, lest, if they continue to beat him with many stripes above these, thy brother become despicable in thine eyes.

Thou hast a stone complete and just, thou hast an ephah complete and just, so that they prolong thy days on the ground which Jehovah thy God is giving to thee;

how they met you along the way and cut off all your stragglers in the rear of the march when you were exhausted and tired; they were unafraid of God.

And the Egyptians did us evil, and humbled us, and they will distribute to us hard service.

“When you have finished paying all the tithe of your produce the third year, [which is] the year of tithing, then you shall give it to the Levite, to the stranger, to the orphan, and to the widow, so that they may eat within the gates of your cities and be satisfied.

Then Moses and the Levitical priests spoke to Israel. They said, "Be quiet and listen, Israel! Today you have become the people of the LORD your God.

And {the Levites shall declare}, and they shall say to each man of Israel [with] a loud voice,

And all of these blessings shall come upon you, and {they shall have an effect on you} if you listen to the voice of Yahweh your God:

“The Lord will cause the enemies who rise up against you to be defeated before you; they will come out against you one way, but flee before you seven ways.

So all the peoples of the earth will see that you are called by the name of the Lord, and they will be afraid of you.

"{And then} if you do not listen to the voice of Yahweh your God {by diligently observing} all of his commandments and his statutes that I [am] commanding you {today}, then all of these curses shall come upon you, and they shall overtake you:

The Lord will strike you with consumption [causing you to waste away] and with fever and with inflammation and with fiery heat and with the sword and with blight and with mildew [on your crops]; and they will pursue you until you perish.

And the LORD shall turn the rain of the land unto powder and dust: even from heaven they shall come down upon thee, until thou be brought to nought.

You will put in vines and take care of them, but you will get no wine or grapes from them; for they will be food for worms.

You will have sons and daughters, but they will not be yours [for long], because they will go into captivity.

They will lend to you but you will not lend to them; they will become the head and you will become the tail!

'And come upon thee have all these curses, and they have pursued thee, and overtaken thee, till thou art destroyed, because thou hast not hearkened to the voice of Jehovah thy God, to keep His commands, and His statutes, which he hath commanded thee;

They will be a sign and a wonder to you and your descendants forever.

instead in hunger, thirst, nakedness, and poverty you will serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you. They will place an iron yoke on your neck until they have destroyed you.

and it will eat the offspring of your herd and the produce of your ground until you are destroyed, who will leave you no grain, new wine, or oil, nor the offspring of your herd or the young of your flock until they have caused you to perish.

They will besiege you in all your cities until your high and fortified walls in which you trusted come down throughout your land; and they will besiege you in all your cities throughout your land which the Lord your God has given you.

Moreover, He will bring on you all the diseases of Egypt of which you were afraid, and they will cling to you.

moreover, you have seen their abominations and their idols of wood, stone, silver, and gold, which they had with them);

Now the next generation, your children who come after you and the foreigner who comes from a distant land, when they see the plagues of this land and the diseases with which the Lord has afflicted it, will say,

Then people will say, ‘It is because they abandoned (broke) the covenant of the Lord, the God of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt.

For they went and served other gods and worshiped them, [false] gods whom they have not known and whom He had not allotted (given) to them.

The Lord uprooted them from their land in His anger, rage, and great wrath, and threw them into another land where they are today.’

They are not in heaven, for you to say, Who will go up to heaven for us and give us knowledge of them so that we may do them?

And they are not across the sea, for you to say, Who will go over the sea for us and give us news of them so that we may do them?

Then Moses sent for Joshua, and before the eyes of all Israel said to him, Be strong and take heart: for you are to go with this people into the land which the Lord, by his oath to their fathers, has given them; by your help they will take it for their heritage.

Assemble the people, the men and the women and children and the stranger (resident alien, foreigner) within your cities, so that they may hear and learn and fear the Lord your God [with awe-filled reverence and profound respect], and be careful to obey all the words of this law.

And their sons which knew not shall hear and shall learn to fear Jehovah your God all the days which they lived upon the land which ye pass over Jordan there to possess it.

And Jehovah will say to Moses, Behold thy days draw near to die: call Joshua, and stand ye in the tent of appointment, and I will command him. And Moses will go, and Joshua, and they will stand in the tent of appointment.

The Lord said to Moses, “Behold, you are about to lie down [in death] with your fathers; and this people will arise and play the prostitute (commit apostasy) with the foreign gods [of the people] of the land, where they go to be among them. They will abandon (turn away from) Me and break My covenant which I have made with them.

Then My anger will be kindled and burn against them in that day, and I will abandon (turn away from) them and hide My face from them. They will be devoured, and many evils and troubles will come on them, so that they will say in that day, ‘Is it not because our God is not among us that these evils have come on us?’

But I will certainly hide My face [from them] in that day because of all the evil which they will do, for they will turn to other gods [to worship lifeless idols, to honor handmade relics].

For when I bring them into the land which I have sworn to their fathers, a land [of plenty] flowing with milk and honey, and they have eaten and are satisfied and become prosperous, then they will turn to other gods and serve them, and despise and reject Me and break My covenant.

Then it shall come about, when many evils and troubles have come on them, that this [sacred] song will confront them as a witness; for it will not be forgotten from the mouth of their descendants. For I know their inclination which is developing even now, before I bring them into the land which I have sworn to give them.”

And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished,

For I am sure that after my death, they will utterly mar themselves and turn from the way which I commanded you, and tribulation will come upon you in the latter days, when ye have wrought wickedness in the sight of the LORD to provoke him with the works of your hands."

Then Moses spoke in the hearing of all the congregation of Israel the words of this song, until they were ended:

“They (Israel) have acted corruptly toward Him.
They are not His children, because of their [moral] defect;
But are a perverse and crooked generation.

“Remember the days of old,
Consider the years of many generations.
Ask your father, and he will inform you,
Your elders, and they will tell you.

“They provoked Him to jealousy with strange gods [by denying Him the honor and loyalty that is rightfully and uniquely His];
And with repulsive acts they provoked Him to anger.

“They sacrificed to demons, not to God,
To gods whom they have not known,
New gods who came lately,
Whom your fathers never feared.

“Then He said, ‘I will hide My face from them,
I will see what their end shall be;
For they are a perverse generation,
Sons in whom there is no faithfulness.

‘They have made Me jealous with what is not God;
They have provoked Me to anger with their idols.
So I will make them jealous with those who are not a people;
I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.

‘They will be wasted by hunger, and consumed by plague
And a bitter destruction;
And I will send the teeth of beasts against them,
With the venom of crawling things of the dust.

The sword will make people childless outside, and terror will do so inside; they will destroy both the young man and the virgin, the infant and the gray-haired man.

"I said, 'I want to cut them in pieces. I want to make people forget they ever existed.

Had I not feared the provocation of the enemy,
That their adversaries would misjudge,
That they would say, “Our [own] hand has prevailed,
And the Lord has not done all this.”’

“For they are a nation devoid of counsel,
And there is no understanding in them.

“O that they were wise, that they understood this,
That they could discern their future and ultimate fate!

For of the vine of Sodom their vine is, And of the fields of Gomorrah; Their grapes are grapes of gall -- They have bitter clusters;

"For the LORD will do justice unto his people, and have compassion on his servants. For it shall be seen that their power shall fail, and at the last they shall be prisoned and forsaken.

He will say, "Where are their gods, the rock in whom they sought security,

Whose fat of their sacrifices they shall eat; They shall drink the wine of their libations They shall rise up, and they shall succor you, It shall be for you protection.

he said to them, “Take to heart all the words of warning which I am speaking to you today; and you shall command your children to observe them carefully—to do all the words of this law.

For they are not meaningless words to you but they are your life, and by them you will live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to possess.”

Surely he loves the people; all your holy ones are in your power. And they sit at your feet, each receiving your words.

And to Levi he said, Thy Truth and thy Light to the godly man whom they tried in the trial; thou wilt contend with him at the water of contention.

He said to his father and mother, "I have not seen him," and he did not acknowledge his own brothers or know his own children, for they kept your word, and guarded your covenant.

They will teach Jacob your ordinances and Israel your law; they will offer incense as a pleasant odor, and a whole offering on your altar.

Bless, O Lord, his goods, and be pleased with his efforts; undercut the legs of any who attack him, and of those who hate him, so that they cannot stand.

The good things of the earth and all its wealth, the good pleasure of him who was seen in the burning tree: may they come on the head of Joseph, on the head of him who was prince among his brothers.