"The God of gods, the LORD, the God of gods, the LORD is the one who knows! And may Israel itself be aware that if this was an act of rebellion or an act of treachery against the LORD, may he not deliver us today!

that we have built for ourselves an altar to turn away from Him. May the Lord Himself hold us accountable if we intended to offer burnt offerings and grain offerings on it, or to sacrifice fellowship offerings on it.

We swear we have done this because we were worried that in the future your descendants would say to our descendants, 'What relationship do you have with the Lord God of Israel?

seeing that, a boundary, hath Yahweh put between us and you, ye sons of Reuben and ye sons of Gad - even the Jordan, ye have no portion in Yahweh, - so might your sons cause our sons, to cease from revering Yahweh.

"That's why we said, "Let's build an altar for ourselves, not for burnt offerings or sacrifice,

but as a reminder to us and you, and to our descendants who follow us, that we will honor the Lord in his very presence with burnt offerings, sacrifices, and tokens of peace. Then in the future your descendants will not be able to say to our descendants, 'You have no right to worship the Lord.'

We said, 'If in the future they say such a thing to us or to our descendants, we will reply, "See the model of the Lord's altar that our ancestors made, not for burnt offerings or sacrifices, but as a reminder to us and you."'

Far be it from us that we should rebel against the Lord and turn away from following the Lord this day, by building an altar for burnt offering, for grain offering or for sacrifice, besides the altar of the Lord our God which is before His tabernacle [in Shiloh].”

So when Phinehas the priest and the leaders of the congregation and heads of the families of Israel who were with him, heard the words which the sons of Reuben and the sons of Gad and the sons of Manasseh spoke, it pleased them.

Phinehas, son of Eleazar, the priest, said to the Reubenites, Gadites, and the Manassehites, "Today we know that the Lord is among us, because you have not disobeyed the Lord in this. Now you have rescued the Israelites from the Lord's judgment."

And the thing was good in the sight of the children of Israel, and the children of Israel blessed God, and no more said that they would go up in warfare against them, to destroy the land in which the children of Reuben and the children of Gad dwelt.

The Reubenites and Gadites named the altar, "Surely it is a Reminder to us that the Lord is God."

A long time after that, when the Lord had given Israel rest from all their enemies on every side, and Joshua had grown old and advanced in years,

that Joshua called for all Israel, for their elders and their heads and their judges and their officers, and said to them, “I am old, advanced in years.

And you have seen all that the Lord your God has done to all these nations for your sake; for the Lord your God is He who has been fighting for you.

See, I have allotted to you these nations that remain as an inheritance for your tribes, with all the nations which I have cut off, from the Jordan [on the east] to the Great [Mediterranean] Sea toward the setting sun.

The Lord your God will force them back on your account and drive them out before you so that you can take possession of their land, as the Lord your God promised you.

Be very strong! Carefully obey all that is written in the law scroll of Moses so you won't swerve from it to the right or the left,

or associate with these nations that remain near you. You must not invoke or make solemn declarations by the names of their gods! You must not worship or bow down to them!

But that ye stick fast unto the LORD your God, as ye have done unto this day.

One man of you shall chase a thousand: for the LORD your God, he it is that fighteth for you, as he hath promised you.

Take good heed therefore unto yourselves, that ye love the LORD your God.

But if you ever turn away and make alliances with these nations that remain near you, and intermarry with them and establish friendly relations with them,

know for certain that the Lord our God will no longer drive out these nations from before you. They will trap and ensnare you; they will be a whip that tears your sides and thorns that blind your eyes until you disappear from this good land the Lord your God gave you.

"Look, today I am about to die. You know with all your heart and being that not even one of all the faithful promises the Lord your God made to you is left unfulfilled; every one was realized -- not one promise is unfulfilled!

But in the same way every faithful promise the Lord your God made to you has been realized, it is just as certain, if you disobey, that the Lord will bring on you every judgment until he destroys you from this good land which the Lord your God gave you.

when ye transgress the covenant of Jehovah your God which he commanded you, and go and serve other gods, and bow yourselves unto them, so that the anger of Jehovah shall be kindled against you, and ye shall perish quickly from off the good land which he hath given unto you.

I sent Moses also and Aaron, and I plagued Egypt, according to that which I did among them: and afterward I brought you out.

Your fathers cried out to the Lord, so He put darkness between you and the Egyptians, and brought the sea over them, engulfing them. Your own eyes saw what I did to Egypt. After that, you lived in the wilderness a long time.

And I brought you into the land of the Amorites, which dwelt on the other side Jordan; and they fought with you: and I gave them into your hand, that ye might possess their land; and I destroyed them from before you.

I sent the hornet [that is, the terror of you] before you, which drove the two kings of the Amorites out before you; but it was not by your sword or by your bow.

I gave you a land for which you never worked and cities that you didn't build, but that you have lived in. You're eating from vineyards and olive groves that you didn't plant.'

"Now you must fear the LORD and serve him in faithfulness and truth. Throw away the gods that your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt. Instead, serve the LORD.

And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.

And the people answered and said, God forbid that we should forsake the LORD, to serve other gods;

for the Lord our God is He who brought us and our fathers up out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage, and who did these great signs (miracles) in our sight and kept us safe all along the way that we went and among all the peoples among whom we passed.

and Jehovah drove out from before us all the peoples, even the Amorites that dwelt in the land: therefore we also will serve Jehovah; for he is our God.

If ye forsake the LORD, and serve strange gods, then he will turn and do you hurt, and consume you, after that he hath done you good.

Joshua said to the people, "Do you agree to be witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to worship the Lord?" They replied, "We are witnesses!"

Joshua said, "Now put aside the foreign gods that are among you and submit to the Lord God of Israel."

That day Joshua drew up an agreement for the people, and he established rules and regulations for them in Shechem.

And Joshua wrote these words in the Book of the Law of God. Then he took a large stone and set it up there under the oak that was in [the courtyard of] the sanctuary of the Lord.

And Joshua said to all the people, “You see this stone—it will be a witness against us, for it has heard all the words the Lord said to us, and it will be a witness against you, so that you will not deny your God.”

And it came to pass after these things, that Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died, being an hundred and ten years old.

And Israel served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that overlived Joshua, and which had known all the works of the LORD, that he had done for Israel.

The bones of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought up from Egypt, were buried at Shechem in the part of the field that Jacob bought from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, for one hundred pieces of money. So it became the inheritance of the tribe of Joseph.

And Eleazar the son of Aaron died; and they buried him in a hill that pertained to Phinehas his son, which was given him in mount Ephraim.