25Once you have had children and grandchildren and have grown old on the land, if you ruin things by making an idol, in any form whatsoever, and do what is evil in the eyes of the LORD your God and anger him, 26I call heaven and earth as my witnesses against you today: You will definitely disappear--and quickly--from the land that you are crossing over the Jordan River to possess. You won't extend your time there but will instead be totally destroyed. 27The LORD will scatter you among the nations. Only a very few of you will survive in the countries where the LORD will drag you. 28There you will worship otherv gods, made of wood and stone by human hands--gods that cannot see, listen, eat, or smell. 29You will seek the LORD your God from there, and you will find himw if you seek him with all your heart and with all your being. 30In your distress, when all these things happen to you in the future, you will return to the LORD your God and you will obey his voice, 31because the LORD your God is a compassionate God. He won't let you go, he won't destroy you, and he won't forget the covenant that he swore to your ancestors.
32Now look into it: into days long past, before your time--all the way back to the day God first created human beings on earth, from one end of heaven to the other. Has anything this amazing ever happened? Has anything like it ever been heard of before? 33Has any people ever listened to a god's voice speaking out of fire, as each of you have, and survived? 34Or has any god ever tried to take one nation out of another nation using tests, miracles, wonders, war, a strong hand and outstretched arm, or awesome power like all that the LORD your God did for you in Egypt while you watched? 35You were shown these things so that you would know this: The LORD is the only God. There's no other god except him. 36From heaven he made you hear his voice in order to discipline you. On earth he showed you his great fire. You heard his words from that very fire. 37And because he loved your ancestors and chose their descendants after them, God brought you out of Egypt with his own presence, by his own great power, 38in order to remove larger and stronger nations from before you and bring you into their land, giving it to you as an inheritance. That's where things stand right now. 39Know then today and keep in mind that the LORD is the only God in heaven above or on earth below. There is no other. 40Keep the Lord's regulations and his commandments. I'm commanding them to you today for your well-being and for the well-being of your children after you, so that you may extend your time on the fertile land that the LORD your God is giving you forever.
Cities of refuge
41Then Moses set aside three cities on the eastern side of the Jordan River 42so that anyone who killed someone accidentally and without prior hatred could flee to one of these cities and be safe: 43Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau for the Reubenites, Ramoth in Gilead for the Gadites, and Golan in Bashan for the Manassites.
The second heading: Recounting the Horeb covenant
44Now this is the Instruction that Moses set before the Israelites. 45These are the laws and the regulations and the case laws that Moses spoke to the Israelites when they came out of Egypt. 46This took place across the Jordan River, in the valley opposite Beth-peor, in the land of Sihon the Amorite king who ruled in Heshbon, whom Moses and the Israelites defeated when they came out of Egypt. 47They took possession of his land and the land of Og, Bashan's king--the two Amorite kings across the Jordan River to the east--48from Aroer, which is on the banks of the Arnon River, all the way to Mount Sion,x also known as Hermon, 49and all the desert regions across the Jordan River, on the east, down to the Dead Sea, beneath the slopes of Mount Pisgah.
Ten Commandments
Deuteronomy 5Moses called out to all Israel, saying to them: "Israel! Listen to the regulations and the case laws that I'm recounting in your hearing right now. Learn them and carefully do them. 2The LORD our God made a covenant with us at Mount Horeb. 3The LORD didn't make this covenant with our ancestors but with us--all of us who are here and alive right now. 4The LORD spoke with you face-to-face on the mountain from the very fire itself. 5At that time, I was standing between the LORD and you, declaring to you the LORD's word, because you were terrified of the fire and didn't go up on the mountain."
The LORD said:
6I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
7You must have no other gods beforey me. 8Do not make an idol for yourself--no form whatsoever--of anything in the sky above or on the earth below or in the waters under the earth. 9Do not bow down to them or worship them because I, the LORD your God, am a passionate God. I punish children for their parents' sins--even to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me. 10But I am loyal and gracious to the thousandth generationz of those who love me and keep my commandments.
11Do not use the LORD your God's name as if it were of no significance; the LORD won't forgive anyone who uses his name that way.
12Keep the Sabbath day and treat it as holy, exactly as the LORD your God commanded: 13Six days you may work and do all your tasks, 14but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. Don't do any work on it--not you, your sons or daughters, your male or female servants, your oxen or donkeys or any of your animals, or the immigrant who is living among you--so that your male and female servants can rest just like you. 15Remember that you were a slave in Egypt, but the LORD your God brought you out of there with a strong hand and an outstretched arm. That's why the LORD your God commands you to keep the Sabbath day.
16Honor your father and your mother, exactly as the LORD your God requires, so that your life will be long and so that things will go well for you on the fertile land that the LORD your God is giving you.
17Do not kill.a
18Do not commit adultery.
19Do not steal.
20Do not testify falsely against your neighbor.
21Do not desire and try to take your neighbor's wife.
Do not crave your neighbor's house, field, male or female servant, ox, donkey, or anything else that belongs to your neighbor.
22Those are the words the LORD spoke to your entire assembly with a loud voice while on the mountain, from the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick smoke. He added no more. God wrote them on two stone tablets, then gave them to me.
Moses' intercessory role
23Now once you heard the voice from the darkness while the mountain was blazing with fire, you came to me--more specifically, all the chiefs of your tribes and your elders came--24and you said: "Look here! The LORD our God has shown us his glory and greatness. We've heard his voice come out of the very fire itself. We've seen firsthand that God can speak to a human being and they can survive!25But why should we die? Surely this massive fire will consume us! If we hear any more of the LORD our God's voice, we will die. 26Is there anyone who has heard the living God's voice speaking out of the very fire itself, like we have, and survived?27You go and listen to all that the LORD our God says. Then tell us all that the LORD our God speaks to you. We'll listen and we'll do it."
28The LORD heard what you said, when you said this to me. The LORD then told me: I heard what the people said when they spoke with you. Everything they suggest is good. 29If only their minds were like this: always fearing me and keeping all my commandments so that things would go well for them and their children forever! 30Go and tell them: You may go back to your tents. 31But you, Moses, must stay here with me. I will tell you all the commandments,b the regulations, and the case laws that you must teach the Israelites to do in the land that I am giving them to possess.
32So you must carefully do exactly what the LORD your God commands you.