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Deuteronomy 4
Deut
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Chapter 4
4. THE SECOND DISCOURSE OF MOSES
The apostasy at Peor. Where true wisdom lies
1
‘And now, Israel, take notice of the laws and customs that I teach you today, and observe them, that you may have life and may enter and take possession of the land that Yahweh the God of your fathers is giving you.
2
You must add nothing to what I command you, and take nothing from it, but keep the commandments of Yahweh your God just as I lay them down for you.
3
You can see with your own eyes what Yahweh has done at Baal-peor; all the followers of the Baal of Peor have been wiped out from among you by Yahweh your God;
4
but all of you who stayed faithful to Yahweh your God are still alive today.
5
See, as Yahweh my God has commanded me, I teach you the laws and customs that you are to observe in the land you are to enter and make your own.
6
Keep them, observe them, and they will demonstrate to the peoples your wisdom and understanding. When they come to know of all these laws they will exclaim, “No other people is as wise and prudent as this great nation”.
7
And indeed, what great nation is there that has its gods so near as Yahweh our God is to us whenever we call to him?
8
And what great nation is there that has laws and customs to match this whole Law that I put before you today?
The revelation at Horeb; its demands
9
‘But take care what you do and be on your guard. Do not forget the things your eyes have seen, nor let them slip from your heart all the days of your life; rather, tell them to your children and to your children’s children.
10
The day you stood at Horeb in the presence of Yahweh your God, Yahweh said to me, “Call the people round me that I may let them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days they live on earth, and teach this to their children”.
11
So you came and stood at the foot of the mountain, and the mountain flamed to the very sky, a sky darkened by cloud, murky and thunderous.
12
Then Yahweh spoke to you from the midst of the fire; you heard the sound of words but saw no shape, there was only a voice.
13
And Yahweh revealed his covenant to you and commanded you to observe it, the Ten Sayings which he inscribed on two tablets of stone.
14
He ordered me then to teach you the laws and customs that you were to observe in the land towards which you are going to make it your own.[*a]
15
‘Take great care what you do, therefore: since you saw no shape on that day at Horeb when Yahweh spoke to you from the midst of the fire,
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see that you do not act perversely, making yourselves a carved image in the shape of anything at all: whether it be in the likeness of man or of woman,
17
or of any beast on the earth, or of any bird that flies in the heavens,
18
or of any reptile that crawls on the ground, or of any fish in the waters under the earth.
19
When you raise your eyes to heaven, when you see the sun, the moon, the stars, all the array of heaven, do not be tempted to worship them and serve them. Yahweh your God has allotted them to all the peoples under heaven,
20
but as for you, Yahweh has taken you, and brought you out from the furnace of iron, from Egypt, to be a people all his own, as you still are today.
Of punishment to come, and of conversion
21
‘Yahweh has been angry with me on your account; he has sworn that I shall not cross the Jordan or enter the prosperous land which Yahweh your God is giving you as your heritage.
22
Yes, I am to die in this country; I shall not go across this Jordan; you will go over and take possession of that rich land.
23
Take care therefore not to forget the covenant which Yahweh your God has made with you, by making a carved image of anything that Yahweh your God has forbidden you;
24
for Yahweh your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.
25
‘When you have begotten children and grandchildren and you have lived long in the land, if you act perversely, making a carved image in one shape or another, doing what displeases Yahweh and angers him,
26
on that day I will call heaven and earth to witness against you; and at once you will vanish from the land which you are crossing the Jordan to possess. You shall not live there long; you shall be utterly destroyed.
27
Yahweh will scatter you among the peoples, and only a small number of you will remain among the nations where Yahweh will have driven you.
28
There you will pay service to gods that human hands have made, of wood and of stone, that cannot see or hear, eat or smell.
29
‘But you will seek Yahweh your God from there, and if you seek him with all your heart and with all your soul, you shall find him.
30
In your distress, all that I have said will overtake you, but at the end of days[*b] you will return to Yahweh your God and listen to his voice.
31
For Yahweh your God is a merciful God and will not desert or destroy you or forget the covenant he made on oath with your fathers.
The splendour of the divine election
32
‘Put this question, then, to the ages that are past, that went before you, from the time God created man on earth: Was there ever a word so majestic, from one end of heaven to the other? Was anything ever heard?
33
Did ever a people hear the voice of the living God speaking from the heart of the fire, as you heard it, and remain alive?
34
Has any god ventured to take to himself one nation from the midst of another by ordeals, signs, wonders, war with mighty hand and outstretched arm, by fearsome terrors – all this that Yahweh your God did for you before your eyes in Egypt?
35
This he showed you so that you might know that Yahweh is God indeed and that there is no other.
36
He let you hear his voice out of heaven for your instruction; on earth he let you see his great fire, and from the heart of the fire you heard his word.
37
Because he loved your fathers and chose their descendants after them, he brought you out from Egypt, openly showing his presence and his great power,
38
driving out in front of you nations greater and more powerful than yourself, and brought you into their land to give it you for your heritage, as it is still today.
39
Understand this today, therefore, and take it to heart: Yahweh is God indeed, in heaven above as on earth beneath, he and no other.
40
Keep his laws and commandments as I give them to you today, so that you and your children may prosper and live long in the land that Yahweh your God gives you for ever.’
Its time and place
41
Then Moses set apart three cities to the east, beyond the Jordan,
42
where a man might find refuge who had killed his fellow unwittingly and with no previous feud against him: by taking flight to one of these cities he could save his life.
43
These were, for the Reubenites, Bezer in the wilderness on the tableland; for the Gadites, Ramoth in Gilead; for the Manassites, Golan in Bashan.
44
This is the Law which Moses put before the sons of Israel.
45
These are the decrees and laws and customs that Moses proclaimed to the sons of Israel when they came out of Egypt,
46
beyond the Jordan in the valley near Beth-peor, in the land of Sihon the Amorite king who lived at Heshbon. Moses and the sons of Israel had defeated him when they came out of Egypt,
47
and had taken possession of his land and of the land of Og king of Bashan – two kings of the Amorites to the east beyond the Jordan,
48
from Aroer on the height above the wadi Arnon as far as Mount Sirion (which is Hermon) –
49
and of all the Arabah east of the Jordan as far as the Sea of the Arabah, at the foot of the slopes of Pisgah.
Chapters of Deuteronomy
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
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