Deuteronomy
9
- Hear, O Israel. You are now about to cross
the Jordan to go in and dispossess nations greater and stronger than you,
with large cities that have walls up to the sky.
- The people are strong and tall -- Anakites!
You know about them and have heard it said: "Who can stand up against
the Anakites ?"
- But be assured today that the LORD your
God is the one who goes across ahead of you like a devouring fire. He will
destroy them; he will subdue them before you. And you will drive them out
and annihilate them quickly, as the LORD has promised you.
- After the LORD your God has driven them
out before you, do not say to yourself, "The LORD has brought me here
to take possession of this land because of my righteousness." No, it
is on account of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is going to
drive them out before you.
- It is not because of your righteousness
or your integrity that you are going in to take possession of their land;
but on account of the wickedness of these nations, the LORD your God will
drive them out before you, to accomplish what he swore to your fathers, to
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
- Understand, then, that it is not because
of your righteousness that the LORD your God is giving you this good land
to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people.
- Remember this and never forget how you provoked
the LORD your God to anger in the desert. From the day you left Egypt until
you arrived here, you have been rebellious against the LORD.
- At Horeb you aroused the LORD'S wrath so
that he was angry enough to destroy you.
- When I went up on the mountain to receive
the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant that the LORD had made with
you, I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread
and drank no water.
- The LORD gave me two stone tablets inscribed
by the finger of God. On them were all the commandments the LORD proclaimed
to you on the mountain out of the fire, on the day of the assembly.
- At the end of the forty days and forty nights,
the LORD gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant.
- Then the LORD told me, "Go down from
here at once, because your people whom you brought out of Egypt have become
corrupt. They have turned away quickly from what I commanded them and have
made a cast idol for themselves."
- And the LORD said to me, "I have seen
this people, and they are a stiff-necked people indeed !
- Let me alone, so that I may destroy them
and blot out their name from under heaven. And I will make you into a nation
stronger and more numerous than they."
- So I turned and went down from the mountain
while it was ablaze with fire. And the two tablets of the covenant were in
my hands.
- When I looked, I saw that you had sinned
against the LORD your God; you had made for yourselves an idol cast in the
shape of a calf. You had turned aside quickly from the way that the LORD had
commanded you.
- So I took the two tablets and threw them
out of my hands, breaking them to pieces before your eyes.
- Then once again I fell prostrate before
the LORD for forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water,
because of all the sin you had committed, doing what was evil in the LORD'S
sight and so provoking him to anger.
- I feared the anger and wrath of the LORD,
for he was angry enough with you to destroy you. But again the LORD listened
to me.
- And the LORD was angry enough with Aaron
to destroy him, but at that time I prayed for Aaron too.
- Also I took that sinful thing of yours,
the calf you had made, and burned it in the fire. Then I crushed it and ground
it to powder as fine as dust and threw the dust into a stream that flowed
down the mountain.
- You also made the LORD angry at Taberah,
at Massah and at Kibroth Hattaavah.
- And when the LORD sent you out from Kadesh
Barnea, he said, "Go up and take possession of the land I have given
you." But you rebelled against the command of the LORD your God. You
did not trust him or obey him.
- You have been rebellious against the LORD
ever since I have known you.
- I lay prostrate before the LORD those forty
days and forty nights because the LORD had said he would destroy you.
- I prayed to the LORD and said, "O Sovereign
LORD, do not destroy your people, your own inheritance that you redeemed by
your great power and brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand.
- Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob. Overlook the stubbornness of this people, their wickedness and their
sin.
- Otherwise, the country from which you brought
us will say, 'Because the LORD was not able to take them into the land he
had promised them, and because he hated them, he brought them out to put them
to death in the desert.'
- But they are your people, your inheritance
that you brought out by your great power and your outstretched arm."
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