Then I said to you, "You have come to the Amorite hill country which the Lord our God is about to give us.

But when you come close to the Ammonites, do not harass or provoke them because I am not giving you any of the Ammonites' land as your possession; I have already given it to Lot's descendants as their possession.

It is not because of your righteousness, or even your inner uprightness, that you have come here to possess their land. Instead, because of the wickedness of these nations the Lord your God is driving them out ahead of you in order to confirm the promise he made on oath to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

At that same time the Lord said to me, "Carve out for yourself two stone tablets like the first ones and come up the mountain to me; also make for yourself a wooden ark.

for you have not yet come to the final stop and inheritance the Lord your God is giving you.

Then you must come to the place the Lord your God chooses for his name to reside, bringing everything I am commanding you -- your burnt offerings, sacrifices, tithes, the personal offerings you have prepared, and all your choice votive offerings which you devote to him.

and the sign or wonder should come to pass concerning what he said to you, namely, "Let us follow other gods" -- gods whom you have not previously known -- "and let us serve them."

Then the Levites (because they have no allotment or inheritance with you), the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows of your villages may come and eat their fill so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work you do.

When you come to the land the Lord your God is giving you and take it over and live in it and then say, "I will select a king like all the nations surrounding me,"

You must not seek peace and prosperity for them through all the ages to come.

You must go to the priest in office at that time and say to him, "I declare today to the Lord your God that I have come into the land that the Lord promised to our ancestors to give us."

All these blessings will come to you in abundance if you obey the Lord your God:

You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out.

"But if you ignore the Lord your God and are not careful to keep all his commandments and statutes I am giving you today, then all these curses will come upon you in full force:

You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.

The Lord will make the rain of your land powder and dust; it will come down on you from the sky until you are destroyed.

The generation to come -- your descendants who will rise up after you, as well as the foreigner who will come from distant places -- will see the afflictions of that land and the illnesses that the Lord has brought on it.

For I know that after I die you will totally corrupt yourselves and turn away from the path I have commanded you to walk. Disaster will confront you in the days to come because you will act wickedly before the Lord, inciting him to anger because of your actions."

They sacrificed to demons, not God, to gods they had not known; to new gods who had recently come along, gods your ancestors had not known about.