"Bring with you your brothers, the tribe of Levi, the tribe of your father, so that they may join with you and minister to you while you and your sons with you are before the tent of the testimony.

I myself have chosen your brothers the Levites from among the Israelites. They are given to you as a gift from the Lord, to perform the duties of the tent of meeting.

But you and your sons with you are responsible for your priestly duties, for everything at the altar and within the curtain. And you must serve. I give you the priesthood as a gift for service; but the unauthorized person who approaches must be put to death."

You are to eat it as a most holy offering; every male may eat it. It will be holy to you.

And those that must be redeemed you are to redeem when they are a month old, according to your estimation, for five shekels of silver according to the sanctuary shekel (which is twenty gerahs).

But you must not redeem the firstborn of a cow or a sheep or a goat; they are holy. You must splash their blood on the altar and burn their fat for an offering made by fire for a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

But I have given to the Levites for an inheritance the tithes of the Israelites that are offered to the Lord as a raised offering. That is why I said to them that among the Israelites they are to have no inheritance."

"You are to speak to the Levites, and you must tell them, 'When you receive from the Israelites the tithe that I have given you from them as your inheritance, then you are to offer up from it as a raised offering to the Lord a tenth of the tithe.

Thus you are to offer up a raised offering to the Lord of all your tithes which you receive from the Israelites; and you must give the Lord's raised offering from it to Aaron the priest.

"'This is the law: When a man dies in a tent, anyone who comes into the tent and all who are in the tent will be ceremonially unclean seven days.

These are the waters of Meribah, because the Israelites contended with the Lord, and his holiness was maintained among them.

So when we cried to the Lord, he heard our voice and sent a messenger, and has brought us up out of Egypt. Now we are here in Kadesh, a town on the edge of your country.

Woe to you, Moab. You are ruined, O people of Chemosh! He has made his sons fugitives, and his daughters the prisoners of King Sihon of the Amorites.

And he sent messengers to Balaam son of Beor at Pethor, which is by the Euphrates River in the land of Amaw, to summon him, saying, "Look, a nation has come out of Egypt. They cover the face of the earth, and they are settling next to me.

So now, please come and curse this nation for me, for they are too powerful for me. Perhaps I will prevail so that we may conquer them and drive them out of the land. For I know that whoever you bless is blessed, and whoever you curse is cursed."

And God came to Balaam and said, "Who are these men with you?"

But God said to Balaam, "You must not go with them; you must not curse the people, for they are blessed."

The angel of the Lord said to him, "Why have you beaten your donkey these three times? Look, I came out to oppose you because what you are doing is perverse before me.

Then he uttered this oracle: "The oracle of Balaam son of Beor; the oracle of the man whose eyes are open;

How beautiful are your tents, O Jacob, and your dwelling places, O Israel!

They are like valleys stretched forth, like gardens by the river's side, like aloes that the Lord has planted, and like cedar trees beside the waters.

Then he uttered this oracle: "The oracle of Balaam son of Beor; the oracle of the man whose eyes are open;

These are the Ephraimites by their families: from Shuthelah, the family of the Shuthelahites; from Beker, the family of the Bekerites; from Tahan, the family of the Tahanites.

These are the Benjaminites, according to their families, and according to those numbered of them, 45,600.

These are the Danites by their families: from Shuham, the family of the Shuhamites. These were the families of Dan, according to their families.

These are the families of the Asherites, according to those numbered of them, 53,400.

And these are the Levites who were numbered according to their families: from Gershon, the family of the Gershonites; of Kohath, the family of the Kohathites; from Merari, the family of the Merarites.

These are the families of the Levites: the family of the Libnites, the family of the Hebronites, the family of the Mahlites, the family of the Mushites, the family of the Korahites. Kohath became the father of Amram.

These are those who were numbered by Moses and Eleazar the priest, who numbered the Israelites in the plains of Moab along the Jordan River opposite Jericho.

Then the daughters of Zelophehad son of Hepher, the son of Gilead, the son of Machir, the son of Manasseh of the families of Manasseh, the son Joseph came forward. Now these are the names of his daughters: Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah.

and if he has no daughter, then you are to give his inheritance to his brothers;

and if he has no brothers, then you are to give his inheritance to his father's brothers;

and if his father has no brothers, then you are to give his inheritance to his relative nearest to him from his family, and he will possess it. This will be for the Israelites a legal requirement, as the Lord commanded Moses.'"

For each of the seven lambs you are to offer one-tenth of an ephah,

On the seventh day you are to have a holy assembly, you must do no regular work.

"'Also, on the day of the first fruits, when you bring a new grain offering to the Lord during your Feast of Weeks, you are to have a holy assembly. You must do no ordinary work.

You are to offer them with their drink offerings in addition to the continual burnt offering and its grain offering -- they must be unblemished.

"'On the first day of the seventh month, you are to hold a holy assembly. You must not do your ordinary work, for it is a day of blowing trumpets for you.

"'On the tenth day of this seventh month you are to have a holy assembly. You must humble yourselves; you must not do any work on it.

"'On the fifteenth day of the seventh month you are to have a holy assembly; you must do no ordinary work, and you must keep a festival to the Lord for seven days.

"'On the eighth day you are to have a holy assembly; you must do no ordinary work on it.

These are the statutes that the Lord commanded Moses, relating to a man and his wife, and a father and his young daughter who is still living in her father's house.

everything that may stand the fire, you are to pass through the fire, and it will be ceremonially clean, but it must still be purified with the water of purification. Anything that cannot withstand the fire you must pass through the water.

You are to take it from their half-share and give it to Eleazar the priest for a raised offering to the Lord.

From the Israelites' half-share you are to take one portion out of fifty of the people, the cattle, the donkeys, and the sheep -- from every kind of animal -- and you are to give them to the Levites, who are responsible for the care of the Lord's tabernacle."

Now look, you are standing in your fathers' place, a brood of sinners, to increase still further the fierce wrath of the Lord against the Israelites.

These are the journeys of the Israelites, who went out of the land of Egypt by their divisions under the authority of Moses and Aaron.

Moses recorded their departures according to their journeys, by the commandment of the Lord; now these are their journeys according to their departures.

They traveled from Marah and came to Elim; in Elim there are twelve fountains of water and seventy palm trees, so they camped there.

"These are the names of the men who are to allocate the land to you as an inheritance: Eleazar the priest and Joshua son of Nun.

These are the names of the men: from the tribe of Judah, Caleb son of Jephunneh;

These are the ones whom the Lord commanded to divide up the inheritance among the Israelites in the land of Canaan.

These are the commandments and the decisions that the Lord commanded the Israelites through the authority of Moses, on the plains of Moab by the Jordan River opposite Jericho.

The Lord our God spoke to us at Horeb and said, "You have stayed in the area of this mountain long enough.

The Lord your God has increased your population to the point that you are now as numerous as the very stars of the sky.

Indeed, may the Lord, the God of your ancestors, make you a thousand times more numerous than you are now, blessing you just as he said he would!

So all of you approached me and said, "Let's send some men ahead of us to scout out the land and bring us back word as to how we should attack it and what the cities are like there."

What is going to happen to us? Our brothers have drained away our courage by describing people who are more numerous and taller than we are, and great cities whose defenses appear to be as high as heaven itself! Moreover, they said they saw Anakites there."

The Amorite inhabitants of that area confronted you and chased you like a swarm of bees, striking you down from Seir as far as Hormah.

Instruct these people as follows: 'You are about to cross the border of your relatives the descendants of Esau, who inhabit Seir. They will be afraid of you, so watch yourselves carefully.

These people, as well as the Anakites, are also considered Rephaites; the Moabites call them Emites.

"Today you are going to cross the border of Moab, that is, of Ar.

They are a people as powerful, numerous, and tall as the Anakites. But the Lord destroyed the Rephaites in advance of the Ammonites, so they dispossessed them and settled down in their place.

This is exactly what he did for the descendants of Esau who lived in Seir when he destroyed the Horites before them so that they could dispossess them and settle in their area to this very day.

At that time I instructed you as follows: "The Lord your God has given you this land for your possession. You warriors are to cross over before your fellow Israelites equipped for battle.

I also commanded Joshua at the same time, "You have seen everything the Lord your God did to these two kings; he will do the same to all the kingdoms where you are going.

But you who remained faithful to the Lord your God are still alive to this very day, every one of you.

Look! I have taught you statutes and ordinances just as the Lord my God told me to do, so that you might carry them out in the land you are about to enter and possess.

Moreover, at that same time the Lord commanded me to teach you statutes and ordinances for you to keep in the land which you are about to enter and possess.

You, however, the Lord has selected and brought from Egypt, that iron-smelting furnace, to be his special people as you are today.

So I must die here in this land; I will not cross the Jordan. But you are going over and will possess that good land.

I invoke heaven and earth as witnesses against you today that you will surely and swiftly be removed from the very land you are about to cross the Jordan to possess. You will not last long there because you will surely be annihilated.

These cities are Bezer, in the desert plateau, for the Reubenites; Ramoth in Gilead for the Gadites; and Golan in Bashan for the Manassehites.

These are the stipulations, statutes, and ordinances that Moses spoke to the Israelites after he had brought them out of Egypt,

He did not make this covenant with our ancestors but with us, we who are here today, all of us living now.

You are to work and do all your tasks in six days,

But as for you, remain here with me so I can declare to you all the commandments, statutes, and ordinances that you are to teach them, so that they can carry them out in the land I am about to give them."

Walk just as he has commanded you so that you may live, that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land you are going to possess.

Now these are the commandments, statutes, and ordinances that the Lord your God instructed me to teach you so that you may carry them out in the land where you are headed

When your children ask you later on, "What are the stipulations, statutes, and ordinances that the Lord our God commanded you?"

When the Lord your God brings you to the land that you are going to occupy and forces out many nations before you -- Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and powerful than you --

For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. He has chosen you to be his people, prized above all others on the face of the earth.

If you obey these ordinances and are careful to do them, the Lord your God will faithfully keep covenant with you as he promised your ancestors.

If you think, "These nations are more numerous than I -- how can I dispossess them?"

The Lord your God will give them over to you; he will throw them into a great panic until they are destroyed.

a land where you may eat food in plenty and find no lack of anything, a land whose stones are iron and from whose hills you can mine copper.

Listen, Israel: Today you are about to cross the Jordan so you can dispossess the nations there, people greater and stronger than you who live in large cities with extremely high fortifications.

Understand, therefore, that it is not because of your righteousness that the Lord your God is about to give you this good land as a possession, for you are a stubborn people!

Moreover, he said to me, "I have taken note of these people; they are a stubborn lot!

Stand aside and I will destroy them, obliterating their very name from memory, and I will make you into a stronger and more numerous nation than they are."

They are your people, your valued property, whom you brought out with great strength and power.

Then I turned, went down the mountain, and placed the tablets into the ark I had made -- they are still there, just as the Lord commanded me.

I am speaking to you because you are the ones who saw all the great deeds of the Lord!

Now pay attention to all the commandments I am giving you today, so that you may be strong enough to enter and possess the land where you are headed,

For the land where you are headed is not like the land of Egypt from which you came, a land where you planted seed and which you irrigated by hand like a vegetable garden.

Instead, the land you are crossing the Jordan to occupy is one of hills and valleys, a land that drinks in water from the rains,

When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are to possess, you must pronounce the blessing on Mount Gerizim and the curse on Mount Ebal.

Are they not across the Jordan River, toward the west, in the land of the Canaanites who live in the Arabah opposite Gilgal near the oak of Moreh?

For you are about to cross the Jordan to possess the land the Lord your God is giving you, and you will possess and inhabit it.

These are the statutes and ordinances you must be careful to obey as long as you live in the land the Lord, the God of your ancestors, has given you to possess.