However, it was not until the first day of the eleventh month of the fortieth year that Moses addressed the Israelites just as the Lord had instructed him to do.

The Lord your God is about to go ahead of you; he will fight for you, just as you saw him do in Egypt

and in the desert, where you saw him carrying you along like a man carries his son. This he did everywhere you went until you came to this very place."

The exception is Caleb son of Jephunneh; he will see it and I will give him and his descendants the territory on which he has walked, because he has wholeheartedly followed me."

However, Joshua son of Nun, your assistant, will go. Encourage him, because he will enable Israel to inherit the land.

Get up, make your way across Wadi Arnon. Look! I have already delivered over to you Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land. Go ahead! Take it! Engage him in war!

But King Sihon of Heshbon was unwilling to allow us to pass near him because the Lord our God had made him obstinate and stubborn so that he might deliver him over to you this very day.

the Lord our God delivered him over to us and we struck him down, along with his sons and everyone else.

The Lord, however, said to me, "Don't be afraid of him because I have already given him, his whole army, and his land to you. You will do to him exactly what you did to King Sihon of the Amorites who lived in Heshbon."

Commission Joshua, and encourage and strengthen him, because he will lead these people over and will enable them to inherit the land you will see."

In fact, what other great nation has a god so near to them like the Lord our God whenever we call on him?

After you have produced children and grandchildren and have been in the land a long time, if you become corrupt and make an image of any kind and do other evil things before the Lord your God that enrage him,

But if you seek the Lord your God from there, you will find him, if, indeed, you seek him with all your heart and soul.

In your distress when all these things happen to you in the latter days, if you return to the Lord your God and obey him

You have been taught that the Lord alone is God -- there is no other besides him.

Anyone who accidentally killed someone without hating him at the time of the accident could flee to one of those cities and be safe.

You said, "The Lord our God has shown us his great glory and we have heard him speak from the middle of the fire. It is now clear to us that God can speak to human beings and they can keep on living.

You must revere the Lord your God, serve him, and take oaths using only his name.

The Lord commanded us to obey all these statutes and to revere him so that it may always go well for us and he may preserve us, as he has to this day.

So realize that the Lord your God is the true God, the faithful God who keeps covenant faithfully with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations,

but who pays back those who hate him as they deserve and destroys them. He will not ignore those who hate him but will repay them as they deserve!

So you must keep his commandments, live according to his standards, and revere him.

Just like the nations the Lord is about to destroy from your sight, so he will do to you because you would not obey him.

Remember -- don't ever forget -- how you provoked the Lord your God in the desert; from the time you left the land of Egypt until you came to this place you were constantly rebelling against him.

At Horeb you provoked him and he was angry enough with you to destroy you.

Then I again fell down before the Lord for forty days and nights; I ate and drank nothing because of all the sin you had committed, doing such evil before the Lord as to enrage him.

The Lord was also angry enough at Aaron to kill him, but at that time I prayed for him too.

And when he sent you from Kadesh-Barnea and told you, "Go up and possess the land I have given you," you rebelled against the Lord your God and would neither believe nor obey him.

You have been rebelling against him from the very first day I knew you!

I prayed to him: O, Lord God, do not destroy your people, your valued property that you have powerfully redeemed, whom you brought out of Egypt by your strength.

At that time the Lord set apart the tribe of Levi to carry the ark of the Lord's covenant, to stand before the Lord to serve him, and to formulate blessings in his name, as they do to this very day.

Therefore Levi has no allotment or inheritance among his brothers; the Lord is his inheritance just as the Lord your God told him.

Now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you except to revere him, to obey all his commandments, to love him, to serve him with all your mind and being,

Revere the Lord your God, serve him, be loyal to him and take oaths only in his name.

Now, if you pay close attention to my commandments that I am giving you today and love the Lord your God and serve him with all your mind and being,

For if you carefully observe all of these commandments I am giving you and love the Lord your God, live according to his standards, and remain loyal to him,

You must not do like we are doing here today, with everyone doing what seems best to him,

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.

You must not worship the Lord your God the way they do! For everything that is abhorrent to him, everything he hates, they have done when worshiping their gods. They even burn up their sons and daughters before their gods!

You must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer, for the Lord your God will be testing you to see if you love him with all your mind and being.

You must follow the Lord your God and revere only him; and you must observe his commandments, obey him, serve him, and remain loyal to him.

You must not give in to him or even listen to him; do not feel sympathy for him or spare him or cover up for him.

Instead, you must kill him without fail! Your own hand must be the first to strike him, and then the hands of the whole community.

You must stone him to death because he tried to entice you away from the Lord your God, who delivered you from the land of Egypt, that place of slavery.

Thus you must obey the Lord your God, keeping all his commandments that I am giving you today and doing what is right before him.

if you carefully obey him by keeping all these commandments that I am giving you today.

Instead, you must be sure to open your hand to him and generously lend him whatever he needs.

Be careful lest you entertain the wicked thought that the seventh year, the year of cancellation of debts, has almost arrived, and your attitude be wrong toward your impoverished fellow Israelite and you do not lend him anything; he will cry out to the Lord against you and you will be regarded as having sinned.

You must by all means lend to him and not be upset by doing it, for because of this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you attempt.

You should not consider it difficult to let him go free, for he will have served you for six years, twice the time of a hired worker; the Lord your God will bless you in everything you do.

You shall rejoice before him -- you, your son, your daughter, your male and female slaves, the Levites in your villages, the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows among you -- in the place where the Lord chooses to locate his name.

Three times a year all your males must appear before the Lord your God in the place he chooses for the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of Weeks, and the Festival of Temporary Shelters; and they must not appear before him empty-handed.

You must not sacrifice to him a bull or sheep that has a blemish or any other defect, because that is considered offensive to the Lord your God.

When he sits on his royal throne he must make a copy of this law on a scroll given to him by the Levitical priests.

It must be with him constantly and he must read it as long as he lives, so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God and observe all the words of this law and these statutes and carry them out.

The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you -- from your fellow Israelites; you must listen to him.

"But if any prophet presumes to speak anything in my name that I have not authorized him to speak, or speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet must die.

whenever a prophet speaks in my name and the prediction is not fulfilled, then I have not spoken it; the prophet has presumed to speak it, so you need not fear him."

Now this is the law pertaining to one who flees there in order to live, if he has accidentally killed another without hating him at the time of the accident.

Otherwise the blood avenger will chase after the killer in the heat of his anger, eventually overtake him, and kill him, though this is not a capital case since he did not hate him at the time of the accident.

However, suppose a person hates someone else and stalks him, attacks him, kills him, and then flees to one of these cities.

The elders of his own city must send for him and remove him from there to deliver him over to the blood avenger to die.

You must not pity him, but purge out the blood of the innocent from Israel, so that it may go well with you.

If a false witness testifies against another person and accuses him of a crime,

you must do to him what he had intended to do to the accused. In this way you will purge evil from among you.

If a homicide victim should be found lying in a field in the land the Lord your God is giving you, and no one knows who killed him,

Then the Levitical priests will approach (for the Lord your God has chosen them to serve him and to pronounce blessings in his name, and to decide every judicial verdict)

Suppose a man has two wives, one whom he loves more than the other, and they both bear him sons, with the firstborn being the child of the less loved wife.

Rather, he must acknowledge the son of the less loved wife as firstborn and give him the double portion of all he has, for that son is the beginning of his father's procreative power -- to him should go the right of the firstborn.

If a person has a stubborn, rebellious son who pays no attention to his father or mother, and they discipline him to no avail,

his father and mother must seize him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his city.

Then all the men of his city must stone him to death. In this way you will purge out wickedness from among you, and all Israel will hear about it and be afraid.

his body must not remain all night on the tree; instead you must make certain you bury him that same day, for the one who is left exposed on a tree is cursed by God. You must not defile your land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.

If the owner does not live near you or you do not know who the owner is, then you must corral the animal at your house and let it stay with you until the owner looks for it; then you must return it to him.

When you see your neighbor's donkey or ox fallen along the road, do not ignore it; instead, you must be sure to help him get the animal on its feet again.

The elders of that city must then seize the man and punish him.

They will fine him one hundred shekels of silver and give them to the young woman's father, for the man who made the accusation ruined the reputation of an Israelite virgin. She will then become his wife and he may never divorce her as long as he lives.

You must not do anything to the young woman -- she has done nothing deserving of death. This case is the same as when someone attacks another person and murders him,

A person of illegitimate birth may not enter the assembly of the Lord; to the tenth generation no one related to him may do so.

Indeed, he may live among you in any place he chooses, in whichever of your villages he prefers; you must not oppress him.

If a man marries a woman and she does not please him because he has found something offensive in her, then he may draw up a divorce document, give it to her, and evict her from his house.

When she has left him she may go and become someone else's wife.

If a man is found kidnapping a person from among his fellow Israelites, and regards him as mere property and sells him, that kidnapper must die. In this way you will purge evil from among you.

You must by all means return to him at sunset the item he gave you as security so that he may sleep in his outer garment and bless you for it; it will be considered a just deed by the Lord your God.

Then, if the guilty person is sentenced to a beating, the judge shall force him to lie down and be beaten in his presence with the number of blows his wicked behavior deserves.

The judge may sentence him to forty blows, but no more. If he is struck with more than these, you might view your fellow Israelite with contempt.

Then the elders of his city must summon him and speak to him. If he persists, saying, "I don't want to marry her,"

then his sister-in-law must approach him in view of the elders, remove his sandal from his foot, and spit in his face. She will then respond, "Thus may it be done to any man who does not maintain his brother's family line!"

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."

So now, look! I have brought the first of the ground's produce that you, Lord, have given me." Then you must set it down before the Lord your God and worship before him.

Today you have declared the Lord to be your God, and that you will walk in his ways, keep his statutes, commandments, and ordinances, and obey him.

You must obey him and keep his commandments and statutes that I am giving you today."

The Lord will designate you as his holy people just as he promised you, if you keep his commandments and obey him.

The Lord will be unwilling to forgive him, and his intense anger will rage against that man; all the curses written in this scroll will fall upon him and the Lord will obliterate his name from memory.

The Lord will single him out for judgment from all the tribes of Israel according to all the curses of the covenant written in this scroll of the law.

Then if you and your descendants turn to the Lord your God and obey him with your whole mind and being just as I am commanding you today,

The Lord your God will also cleanse your heart and the hearts of your descendants so that you may love him with all your mind and being and so that you may live.

if you obey the Lord your God and keep his commandments and statutes that are written in this scroll of the law. But you must turn to him with your whole mind and being.

I also call on you to love the Lord your God, to obey him and be loyal to him, for he gives you life and enables you to live continually in the land the Lord promised to give to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."

Then the Lord said to Moses, "The day of your death is near. Summon Joshua and present yourselves in the tent of meeting so that I can commission him." So Moses and Joshua presented themselves in the tent of meeting.