Moses Reviews the Covenant
Deuteronomy 4“Now, Israel, listen to the statutes and to the ordinances which I teach y’all to do, so that y’all may live and go in and take possession of the land which YHWH, the God of y’all’s ancestors, is giving y’all. Y’all must not add to the word that I command y’all and do not take away from it, so that y’all may keep the commandments of YHWH y’all’s God which I command y’all. Y’all’s eyes have seen what YHWH did because of Baal Peor, for YHWH your God destroyed everyone who followed Baal Peor from among you. But y’all who were faithful to YHWH y’all’s God are, all y’all are alive today. Look, I have taught y’all statutes and ordinances, even as YHWH my God commanded me, that y’all would do them in the land y’all are entering to take possession of it. So y’all must be sure to do them, for this is y’all’s wisdom and understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” For what great nation is there that has a god so near to them as YHWH our God is whenever we call on him? What great nation is there that has statutes and ordinances so righteous as all this law which I set before y’all today?
Only be careful, and keep your soul diligently, so that you don’t forget the things which your eyes saw, and so they don’t depart from y’all’s heart all the days of your life. You are to teach them to your children and your children’s children— the day that you stood before YHWH your God in Horeb, when YHWH said to me, “Assemble the people to me, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children.” Y’all came near and stood under the mountain. The mountain burned with fire to the heart of the sky, with darkness, cloud, and thick darkness. YHWH spoke to y’all from the midst of the fire: y’all heard the sound of words, but y’all saw no form—only a voice. Hᴇ declared ʜɪꜱ covenant to y’all, which ʜᴇ commanded y’all to follow, that is the Ten Commandments. Hᴇ wrote them on two stone tablets. YHWH commanded me at that time to teach y’all statutes and ordinances, so that y’all would do them in the land y’all are crossing over to possess.===
Idolatry Forbidden
Y’all must guard y’all’s souls carefully, because y’all did not see any form on the day that YHWH spoke to y’all in Horeb from the fire, so that y’all don’t corrupt yourselves* and make a idol in the form of any figure. This includes the likeness of male or female, the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the sky, the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water below the earth. When you lift up your eyes to the sky and see the sun and the moon and the stars, even all the army of the sky, do not be drawn away and worship them and serve them. YHWH your God has allotted them to all the peoples under the whole sky. But YHWH has selected y’all, and brought y’all out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be a people of ʜɪꜱ inheritance, as it is today. Furthermore YHWH was angry with me because of y’all, and swore that I should not go over the Jordan, and that I should not go in to that good land which YHWH your God gives you for an inheritance. Instead I must die in this land. I must not go over the Jordan, but y’all will go over and take possession of that good land. Y’all must be careful not to forget the covenant of YHWH y’all’s God that ʜᴇ made with y’all, and make a idol in the form of anything which YHWH y’all’s God has forbidden for y’all. For YHWH your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God. When you have produced children and grandchildren, and y’all have been in the land a long time, and then y’all corrupt yourselves* and make a idol in the form of anything, and y’all do what is evil in YHWH your God’s sight to provoke ʜɪᴍ to anger, I call heaven and the land to witness against y’all today, that y’all will soon perish-perish from the land that y’all are crossing over the Jordan to possess. Y’all will not live long y’all’s in it, but will be destroyed-destroyed. YHWH will scatter y’all among the peoples, and y’all will be left few in number among the nations where YHWH will drive y’all. There y’all will serve gods made by human hands, wood and stone, which neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. But if y’all will seek YHWH your God from there, you will find ʜɪᴍ when you search after ʜɪᴍ with all your heart and with all your soul. When you are in distress and all these things happen to you in the latter days, if you return to YHWH your God and listen to ʜɪꜱ voice, for YHWH your God is a compassionate God, then ʜᴇ will not fail you or destroy you, or forget the covenant that ʜᴇ swore to your ancestors.
YHWH Alone Is God
For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created humanity on the earth, and from the one end of the sky to the other, whether there has been anything as great as this thing is, or has been heard like it? Did a people ever hear the voice of God speaking out from fire, as you have heard, and live? Or has God tried to go and take a nation for ʜɪᴍꜱᴇʟꜰ from among another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, by war, by a mighty hand, by an outstretched arm, and by great terrors, as YHWH y’all’s God did for y’all in Egypt before your eyes? It was shown to you so that you might know that YHWH is God. There is no one else besides him. Out of heaven he made you to hear his voice, that he might instruct you. On earth he made you to see his great fire; and you heard his words out of the middle of the fire. Because he loved your fathers, therefore he chose their offspring after them, and brought you out with his presence, with his great power, out of Egypt; to drive out nations from before you greater and mightier than you, to bring you in, to give you their land for an inheritance, as it is today. Know therefore today, and take it to heart, that YHWH himself is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath. There is no one else. You are to keep ʜɪꜱ statutes and ʜɪꜱ commandments that I command you today, so that it may go well with you and with your children after you, and that you may prolong your days in the land which YHWH your God gives you for all time.Cities of Refuge
Then Moses set apart three cities beyond the Jordan toward the sunrise, that the man slayer might flee there, who kills his neighbor unintentionally and didn’t hate him in time past, and that fleeing to one of these cities he might live: Bezer in the wilderness, in the plain country, for the Reubenites; and Ramoth in Gilead for the Gadites; and Golan in Bashan for the Manassites.
Introduction to the Law
This is the law which Moses set before the children of Israel. These are the testimonies, and the statutes, and the ordinances which Moses spoke to the children of Israel when they came out of Egypt, beyond the Jordan, in the valley opposite Beth Peor, in the land of Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon, whom Moses and the children of Israel struck when they came out of Egypt. They took possession of his land and the land of Og king of Bashan, the two kings of the Amorites, who were beyond the Jordan toward the sunrise; from Aroer, which is on the edge of the valley of the Arnon, even to Mount Zion (also called Hermon), and all the Arabah beyond the Jordan eastward, even to the sea of the Arabah, under the slopes of Pisgah.