When you come before the priest who is serving at that time, you must say to him, ‘Today I acknowledge to the Lord your God that I have entered the land the Lord swore to our fathers to give us.’

“Then the priest will take the container from your hand and place it before the altar of the Lord your God.

You are to respond by saying in the presence of the Lord your God:

My father was a wandering Aramean. He went down to Egypt with a few people and lived there. There he became a great, powerful, and populous nation.

So we called out to Yahweh, the God of our fathers, and the Lord heard our cry and saw our misery, hardship, and oppression.

I have now brought the first of the land’s produce that You, Lord, have given me.

You will then place the container before the Lord your God and bow down to Him.

You, the Levite, and the foreign resident among you will rejoice in all the good things the Lord your God has given you and your household.

Then you will say in the presence of the Lord your God:

I have taken the consecrated portion out of my house; I have also given it to the Levite, the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow, according to all the commands You gave me. I have not violated or forgotten Your commands.

I have not eaten any of it while in mourning, or removed any of it while unclean, or offered any of it for the dead. I have obeyed the Lord my God; I have done all You commanded me.

“The Lord your God is commanding you this day to follow these statutes and ordinances. You must be careful to follow them with all your heart and all your soul.

Today you have affirmed that the Lord is your God and that you will walk in His ways, keep His statutes, commands, and ordinances, and obey Him.

that He will elevate you to praise, fame, and glory above all the nations He has made, and that you will be a holy people to the Lord your God as He promised.”

At the time you cross the Jordan into the land the Lord your God is giving you, you must set up large stones and cover them with plaster.

Write all the words of this law on the stones after you cross to enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as Yahweh, the God of your fathers, has promised you.

Build an altar of stones there to the Lord your God—you must not use any iron tool on them.

Use uncut stones to build the altar of the Lord your God and offer burnt offerings to the Lord your God on it.

There you are to sacrifice fellowship offerings, eat, and rejoice in the presence of the Lord your God.

Moses and the Levitical priests spoke to all Israel, “Be silent, Israel, and listen! This day you have become the people of the Lord your God.

Obey the Lord your God and follow His commands and statutes I am giving you today.”

And these tribes will stand on Mount Ebal to deliver the curse: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali.

“Now if you faithfully obey the Lord your God and are careful to follow all His commands I am giving you today, the Lord your God will put you far above all the nations of the earth.

All these blessings will come and overtake you, because you obey the Lord your God:

The Lord will grant you a blessing on your storehouses and on everything you do; He will bless you in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

The Lord will establish you as His holy people, as He swore to you, if you obey the commands of the Lord your God and walk in His ways.

The Lord will make you the head and not the tail; you will only move upward and never downward if you listen to the Lord your God’s commands I am giving you today and are careful to follow them.

“But if you do not obey the Lord your God by carefully following all His commands and statutes I am giving you today, all these curses will come and overtake you:

“All these curses will come, pursue, and overtake you until you are destroyed, since you did not obey the Lord your God and keep the commands and statutes He gave you.

Because you didn’t serve the Lord your God with joy and a cheerful heart, even though you had an abundance of everything,

They will besiege you within all your gates until your high and fortified walls, that you trust in, come down throughout your land. They will besiege you within all your gates throughout the land the Lord your God has given you.

“You will eat your children, the flesh of your sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you during the siege and hardship your enemy imposes on you.

“If you are not careful to obey all the words of this law, which are written in this scroll, by fearing this glorious and awesome name—Yahweh, your God—

Though you were as numerous as the stars of the sky, you will be left with only a few people, because you did not obey the Lord your God.

you did not eat bread or drink wine or beer—so that you might know that I am Yahweh your God.

“All of you are standing today before the Lord your God—your leaders, tribes, elders, officials, all the men of Israel,

your children, your wives, and the foreigners in your camps who cut your wood and draw your water—

so that you may enter into the covenant of the Lord your God, which He is making with you today, so that you may enter into His oath

and so that He may establish you today as His people and He may be your God as He promised you and as He swore to your fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

but also with those who are standing here with us today in the presence of the Lord our God and with those who are not here today.

Be sure there is no man, woman, clan, or tribe among you today whose heart turns away from the Lord our God to go and worship the gods of those nations. Be sure there is no root among you bearing poisonous and bitter fruit.

Then people will answer, ‘It is because they abandoned the covenant of Yahweh, the God of their fathers, which He had made with them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt.

The hidden things belong to the Lord our God, but the revealed things belong to us and our children forever, so that we may follow all the words of this law.

“When all these things happen to you—the blessings and curses I have set before you—and you come to your senses while you are in all the nations where the Lord your God has driven you,

and you and your children return to the Lord your God and obey Him with all your heart and all your soul by doing everything I am giving you today,

then He will restore your fortunes, have compassion on you, and gather you again from all the peoples where the Lord your God has scattered you.

The Lord your God will bring you into the land your fathers possessed, and you will take possession of it. He will cause you to prosper and multiply you more than He did your fathers.

The Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the hearts of your descendants, and you will love Him with all your heart and all your soul so that you will live.

The Lord your God will put all these curses on your enemies who hate and persecute you.

The Lord your God will make you prosper abundantly in all the work of your hands with children, the offspring of your livestock, and your land’s produce. Indeed, the Lord will again delight in your prosperity, as He delighted in that of your fathers,

when you obey the Lord your God by keeping His commands and statutes that are written in this book of the law and return to Him with all your heart and all your soul.

It is not in heaven so that you have to ask, ‘Who will go up to heaven, get it for us, and proclaim it to us so that we may follow it?’

And it is not across the sea so that you have to ask, ‘Who will cross the sea, get it for us, and proclaim it to us so that we may follow it?’

For I am commanding you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commands, statutes, and ordinances, so that you may live and multiply, and the Lord your God may bless you in the land you are entering to possess.

love the Lord your God, obey Him, and remain faithful to Him. For He is your life, and He will prolong your life in the land the Lord swore to give to your fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

The Lord your God is the One who will cross ahead of you. He will destroy these nations before you, and you will drive them out. Joshua is the one who will cross ahead of you, as the Lord has said.

Be strong and courageous; don’t be terrified or afraid of them. For it is the Lord your God who goes with you; He will not leave you or forsake you.”

when all Israel assembles in the presence of the Lord your God at the place He chooses, you are to read this law aloud before all Israel.

Gather the people—men, women, children, and foreigners living within your gates—so that they may listen and learn to fear the Lord your God and be careful to follow all the words of this law.

Then their children who do not know the law will listen and learn to fear the Lord your God as long as you live in the land you are crossing the Jordan to possess.”

My anger will burn against them on that day; I will abandon them and hide My face from them so that they will become easy prey. Many troubles and afflictions will come to them. On that day they will say, ‘Haven’t these troubles come to us because our God is no longer with us?’

“Take this book of the law and place it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God so that it may remain there as a witness against you.

For I will proclaim Yahweh’s name.
Declare the greatness of our God!

The Rock—His work is perfect;
all His ways are entirely just.
A faithful God, without prejudice,
He is righteous and true.

The Lord alone led him,
with no help from a foreign god.

Then Jeshurun became fat and rebelled—
you became fat, bloated, and gorged.
He abandoned the God who made him
and scorned the Rock of his salvation.

They sacrificed to demons, not God,
to gods they had not known,
new gods that had just arrived,
which your fathers did not fear.

You ignored the Rock who gave you birth;
you forgot the God who gave birth to you.

“I would have said: I will cut them to pieces
and blot out the memory of them from mankind,

See now that I alone am He;
there is no God but Me.
I bring death and I give life;
I wound and I heal.
No one can rescue anyone from My hand.

This is the blessing that Moses, the man of God, gave the Israelites before his death.

He said about Gad:

The one who enlarges Gad’s territory
will be blessed.
He lies down like a lion
and tears off an arm or even a head.

May the bolts of your gate be iron and bronze,
and your strength last as long as you live.

There is none like the God of Jeshurun,
who rides the heavens to your aid,
the clouds in His majesty.

The God of old is your dwelling place,
and underneath are the everlasting arms.
He drives out the enemy before you
and commands, “Destroy!”

Haven’t I commanded you: be strong and courageous? Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”

“Go through the camp and tell the people, ‘Get provisions ready for yourselves, for within three days you will be crossing the Jordan to go in and take possession of the land the Lord your God is giving you to inherit.’”

“Remember what Moses the Lord’s servant commanded you when he said, ‘The Lord your God will give you rest, and He will give you this land.’

until the Lord gives your brothers rest, as He has given you, and they too possess the land the Lord your God is giving them. You may then return to the land of your inheritance and take possession of what Moses the Lord’s servant gave you on the east side of the Jordan.”

We will obey you, just as we obeyed Moses in everything. And may the Lord your God be with you, as He was with Moses.

At nightfall, when the gate was about to close, the men went out, and I don’t know where they were going. Chase after them quickly, and you can catch up with them!”

The men pursued them along the road to the fords of the Jordan, and as soon as they left to pursue them, the gate was shut.

When we heard this, we lost heart, and everyone’s courage failed because of you, for the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on earth below.

and commanded the people: “When you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God carried by the Levitical priests, you must break camp and follow it.

Then Joshua told the Israelites, “Come closer and listen to the words of the Lord your God.”

He said: “You will know that the living God is among you and that He will certainly dispossess before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites

When the feet of the priests who carry the ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the earth, come to rest in the Jordan’s waters, its waters will be cut off. The water flowing downstream will stand up in a mass.”

and the water flowing downstream stood still, rising up in a mass that extended as far as Adam, a city next to Zarethan. The water flowing downstream into the Sea of the Arabah (the Dead Sea) was completely cut off, and the people crossed opposite Jericho.

and said to them, “Go across to the ark of the Lord your God in the middle of the Jordan. Each of you lift a stone onto his shoulder, one for each of the Israelite tribes,

you should tell them, ‘The waters of the Jordan were cut off in front of the ark of the Lord’s covenant. When it crossed the Jordan, the Jordan’s waters were cut off.’ Therefore these stones will always be a memorial for the Israelites.”

For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan before you until you had crossed over, just as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which He dried up before us until we had crossed over.

This is so that all the people of the earth may know that the Lord’s hand is mighty, and so that you may always fear the Lord your God.”

Joshua got up early the next morning. The priests took the ark of the Lord,

The men of Ai struck down about 36 of them and chased them from outside the gate to the quarries, striking them down on the descent. As a result, the people’s hearts melted and became like water.

“Oh, Lord God,” Joshua said, “why did You ever bring these people across the Jordan to hand us over to the Amorites for our destruction? If only we had been content to remain on the other side of the Jordan!

“Go and consecrate the people. Tell them to consecrate themselves for tomorrow, for this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: There are things that are set apart among you, Israel. You will not be able to stand against your enemies until you remove what is set apart.

Joshua got up early the next morning. He had Israel come forward tribe by tribe, and the tribe of Judah was selected.

So Joshua said to Achan, “My son, give glory to the Lord, the God of Israel, and make a confession to Him. I urge you, tell me what you have done. Don’t hide anything from me.”

Achan replied to Joshua, “It is true. I have sinned against the Lord, the God of Israel. This is what I did:

you are to come out of your ambush and seize the city, for the Lord your God has handed it over to you.

He hung the body of the king of Ai on a tree until evening, and at sunset Joshua commanded that they take his body down from the tree. They threw it down at the entrance of the city gate and put a large pile of rocks over it, which remains to this day.

At that time Joshua built an altar on Mount Ebal to the Lord, the God of Israel,

They replied to him, “Your servants have come from a far away land because of the reputation of the Lord your God. For we have heard of His fame, and all that He did in Egypt,