Deuteronomy 4
4
Call to Obedience
1“Now, Israel, listen to the statutes and ordinances#Ex 15:25; Lv 26:46; Dt 5:1; 11:32; 12:1; 26:16–17; Jos 24:25; 1Sm 30:25; 1Kg 9:4; Ezr 7:10; Ps 81:4; 147:19; Ezk 11:12; 20:18,25; 36:27; Mal 4:4 I am teaching you to follow, so that you may live,#Lv 25:18; Dt 4:40; 5:16,33; 8:1; 11:9; 25:15; 30:16; 2Kg 18:32; Ezk 18:9; Am 5:14 enter, and take possession of the land the Lord, the God of your ancestors,#Ex 3:13,15–16; Dt 1:11,21; 6:3; 12:1; 27:3; Jos 18:3; 2Ch 13:12; 28:9; 29:5; Ezr 8:28; 10:11 is giving you. 2You must not add anything to what I command you or take anything away from it,#Dt 12:32; Pr 30:6; Mk 7:9–13; Rv 22:18–19 so that you may keep the commands of the Lord your God I am giving you. 3Your eyes have seen what the Lord did at Baal-peor, for the Lord your God destroyed every one of you who followed Baal of Peor.#Ps 106:28; Hs 9:10; 1Co 10:8 4But you who have remained faithful#4:4 Lit have held on to the Lord your God are all alive today. 5Look, I have taught you statutes and ordinances as the Lord my God has commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land you are entering to possess. 6Carefully follow them, for this will show your wisdom and understanding in the eyes of the peoples. When they hear about all these statutes, they will say, ‘This great nation is indeed a wise and understanding people.’ 7For what great nation is there that has a god near to it as the Lord our God is to us whenever we call to him?#1Kg 8:52; Ps 4:3; Is 55:6; Jr 11:14; Hs 11:7; Rm 10:12,14 8And what great nation has righteous statutes and ordinances like this entire law I set before you today?#Dt 11:26,32
9“Only be on your guard and diligently watch yourselves,#Jos 22:5; Pr 13:3; 16:17; 19:16; 22:5 so that you don’t forget#Dt 6:12; 8:11; Pr 3:1; 4:5 the things your eyes have seen and so that they don’t slip from your mind#4:9 Or don’t depart from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and your grandchildren.#Ex 12:26; Dt 6:7,20–25; 11:2–7,18–21; 31:12–13,19–22; 32:46; Jos 4:6,21–22; 8:35; Ps 34:11; 78:5 10The day you stood before the Lord your God#Gn 18:22; 19:27; Lv 9:5; Dt 10:8; 1Sm 6:20; 1Kg 22:21; 2Ch 20:13 at Horeb, the Lord said to me, ‘Assemble the people before me, and I will let them hear my words, so that they may learn to fear me#Dt 5:29; Is 57:11; Jr 5:22; 32:39; Zph 3:7; Mal 3:5 all the days they live on the earth and may instruct their children.’ 11You came near and stood at the base of the mountain,#Ex 24:4; 32:19 a mountain blazing with fire#Ex 3:2; 19:18; Dt 5:23; 9:15; Heb 12:18 into the heavens and enveloped in a totally black cloud.#Gn 15:12; Ex 20:21; Dt 5:22; 2Sm 22:10; 1Kg 8:12; 2Ch 6:1; Ps 18:9; 97:2; Is 60:2; Jr 13:16; Ezk 34:12; Jl 2:2; Zph 1:15 12Then the Lord spoke to you from the fire.#Ex 3:2–4; Dt 4:33,36; 5:4,22–26; 9:10; 10:4; 33:16; Ezk 1:4; Ac 7:30,35 You kept hearing the sound of the words, but didn’t see a form; there was only a voice.#Ex 19:10–19; Dt 5:8; Heb 12:18–19 13He declared his covenant#Ex 2:24; 19:5; Lv 26:9,15,42,44; Dt 7:12; 8:18; 17:2; 31:16,20; Jos 7:11; Jdg 2:1,20; 2Kg 17:15; 18:12; Ps 25:10,14; 78:37; 103:18; 105:8; 106:45; 111:5,9 to you. He commanded you to follow the Ten Commandments,#Ex 34:28; Dt 10:4 which he wrote on two stone tablets.#Ex 34:1,4; Dt 5:22; 10:1,3 14At that time the Lord commanded me to teach you statutes and ordinances for you to follow in the land you are about to cross into and possess.
Worshiping the True God
15“Diligently watch yourselves — because you did not see any form on the day the Lord spoke to you out of the fire at Horeb — 16so you don’t act corruptly and make an idol for yourselves in the shape of any figure: a male or female form, 17or the form of any animal on the earth, any winged creature that flies in the sky, 18any creature that crawls on the ground, or any fish in the waters under the earth. 19When you look to the heavens and see the sun, moon, and stars — all the stars in the sky — do not be led astray to bow in worship to them and serve them.#Dt 17:3; Ezk 8:16; Zph 1:5; Ac 7:42 The Lord your God has provided them for all people everywhere under heaven.#Ps 19:1 20But the Lord selected you and brought you out of Egypt’s iron furnace#1Kg 8:51; Jr 11:4 to be a people for his inheritance, as you are today.
21“The Lord was angry with me on your account.#Dt 1:37 He swore that I would not cross the Jordan and enter the good land#Dt 8:7 the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.#Dt 15:4 22I won’t be crossing the Jordan because I am going to die in this land.#Dt 34:1–8 But you are about to cross over and take possession of this good land. 23Be careful not to forget the covenant of the Lord your God that he made with you, and make an idol for yourselves in the shape of anything he has forbidden you. 24For the Lord your God is a consuming fire,#Ex 24:17; Dt 9:3; 2Sm 22:9; Is 29:6; 30:27,30; 34:14 a jealous God.#Ex 20:5; 34:14; Dt 5:9; 6:15; Jos 24:19; Heb 12:29
25“When you have children and grandchildren and have been in the land a long time, and if you act corruptly, make an idol in the form of anything, and do what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God, angering him, 26I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you today that you will quickly perish#Dt 8:19 from the land you are about to cross the Jordan to possess. You will not live long there, but you will certainly be destroyed. 27The Lord will scatter you among the peoples,#Lv 26:33; Dt 28:64; 1Kg 14:15; Neh 1:8; Est 3:8; Ps 44:11; 106:27; Jr 9:16; 31:10; Ezk 6:8; 11:16–17; 12:15; Zch 1:19,21; 2:6 and you will be reduced to a few survivors#4:27 Lit be left few in number among the nations where the Lord your God will drive you. 28There you will worship man-made gods of wood and stone, which cannot see, hear, eat, or smell. 29But from there, you will search for the Lord your God, and you will find him when you seek him with all your heart and all your soul.#Jr 29:13 30When you are in distress and all these things have happened to you, in the future you will return to the Lord your God and obey him. 31He will not leave you, destroy you, or forget the covenant#Lv 26:45; Dt 5:3; 7:12; 8:18; 31:20 with your ancestors that he swore to them by oath, because the Lord your God is a compassionate God.#Ex 34:6
32“Indeed, ask about the earlier days that preceded you, from the day God created mankind#4:32 Or Adam on the earth and from one end of the heavens to the other: Has anything like this great event ever happened, or has anything like it been heard of? 33Has a people heard God’s voice speaking from the fire as you have, and lived? 34Or has a god attempted to go and take a nation as his own out of another nation, by trials, signs, wonders, and war, by a strong hand and an outstretched arm, by great terrors, as the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? 35You were shown these things so that you would know that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him.#1Kg 8:60; Is 43:11; 44:8; 45:5–6,18–22; 46:9; Dn 3:29; Jl 2:27; Mk 12:32 36He let you hear his voice from heaven to instruct you.#Ex 20:22 He showed you his great fire on earth, and you heard his words from the fire.#Ex 19:18 37Because he loved#Dt 7:6–8; 10:15; 23:5; 33:3; Jr 31:3; Hs 11:1; Mal 1:2 your ancestors, he chose their descendants after them and brought you out of Egypt by his presence and great power, 38to drive out before you nations greater and stronger than you and to bring you in and give you their land as an inheritance,#Lv 20:24 as is now taking place. 39Today, recognize and keep in mind that the Lord is God in heaven above and on earth below; there is no other. 40Keep his statutes and commands, which I am giving you today, so that you and your children after you may prosper and so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you for all time.”
Cities of Refuge
41Then Moses set apart three cities across the Jordan to the east. 42Someone could flee there who committed manslaughter, killing his neighbor accidentally without previously hating him. He could flee to one of these cities and stay alive: 43Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau land, belonging to the Reubenites; Ramoth in Gilead, belonging to the Gadites; or Golan in Bashan, belonging to the Manassites.#Nm 35:6–15; Dt 19:2–13; Jos 20:7–9
Introduction to the Law
44This is the law Moses gave the Israelites. 45These are the decrees, statutes, and ordinances Moses proclaimed to them after they came out of Egypt, 46across the Jordan in the valley facing Beth-peor in the land of King Sihon of the Amorites. He lived in Heshbon, and Moses and the Israelites defeated him after they came out of Egypt. 47They took possession of his land and the land of Og king of Bashan, the two Amorite kings who were across the Jordan to the east, 48from Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Valley as far as Mount Sion (that is, Hermon) 49and all the Arabah on the east side of the Jordan as far as the Dead Sea below the slopes of Pisgah.
Currently Selected:
Deuteronomy 4: CSB
Highlight
Share
Copy
Want to have your highlights saved across all your devices? Sign up or sign in
© 2017 Holman Bible Publishers
Deuteronomy 4
4
1‘And now, Israel, hearken unto the statutes, and unto the judgments which I am teaching you to do, so that ye live, and have gone in, and possessed the land which Jehovah God of your fathers is giving to you.
2Ye do not add to the word which I am commanding you, nor diminish from it, to keep the commands of Jehovah your God which I am commanding you.
3‘Your eyes are seeing that which Jehovah hath done in Baal-Peor, for every man who hath gone after Baal-Peor, Jehovah thy God hath destroyed him from thy midst;
4and ye who are cleaving to Jehovah your God, [are] alive, all of you, to-day.
5‘See, I have taught you statutes and judgments, as Jehovah my God hath commanded me — to do so, in the midst of the land whither ye are going in to possess it;
6and ye have kept and done [them] (for it [is] your wisdom and your understanding) before the eyes of the peoples who hear all these statutes, and they have said, Only, a people wise and understanding [is] this great nation.
7‘For which [is] the great nation that hath God near unto it, as Jehovah our God, in all we have called unto him?
8and which [is] the great nation which hath righteous statutes and judgments according to all this law which I am setting before you to-day?
9‘Only, take heed to thyself, and watch thy soul exceedingly, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they turn aside from thy heart, all days of thy life; and thou hast made them known to thy sons, and to thy sons' sons.
10‘The day when thou hast stood before Jehovah thy God in Horeb — in Jehovah's saying unto me, Assemble to Me the people, and I cause them to hear My words, so that they learn to fear Me all the days that they are alive on the ground, and their sons they teach; —
11and ye draw near and stand under the mountain, and the mountain is burning with fire unto the heart of the heavens — darkness, cloud, yea, thick darkness:
12‘And Jehovah speaketh unto you out of the midst of the fire; a voice of words ye are hearing and a similitude ye are not seeing, only a voice;
13and He declareth to you His covenant, which He hath commanded you to do, the Ten Matters, and He writeth them upon two tables of stone.
14‘And me hath Jehovah commanded at that time to teach you statutes and judgments, for your doing them in the land whither ye are passing over to possess it;
15and ye have been very watchful of your souls, for ye have not seen any similitude in the day of Jehovah's speaking unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire,
16lest ye do corruptly, and have made to you a graven image, a similitude of any figure, a form of male or female —
17a form of any beast which [is] in the earth — a form of any winged bird which flieth in the heavens —
18a form of any creeping thing on the ground — a form of any fish which [is] in the waters under the earth;
19‘And lest thou lift up thine eyes towards the heavens, and hast seen the sun, and the moon, and the stars, all the host of the heavens, and thou hast been forced, and hast bowed thyself to them, and served them, which Jehovah thy God hath apportioned to all the peoples under the whole heavens.
20‘And you hath Jehovah taken, and He is bringing you out from the iron furnace, from Egypt, to be to Him for a people — an inheritance, as [at] this day.
21‘And Jehovah hath shewed himself wroth with me because of your words, and sweareth to my not passing over the Jordan, and to my not going in unto the good land which Jehovah thy God is giving to thee — an inheritance;
22for I am dying in this land; I am not passing over the Jordan, and ye are passing over, and have possessed this good land.
23‘Take heed to yourselves, lest ye forget the covenant of Jehovah your God, which He hath made with you, and have made to yourselves a graven image, a similitude of anything [concerning] which Jehovah thy God hath charged thee:
24for Jehovah thy God is a fire consuming — a zealous God.
25‘When thou begettest sons and sons' sons, and ye have become old in the land, and have done corruptly, and have made a graven image, a similitude of anything, and have done the evil thing in the eyes of Jehovah, to provoke Him to anger: —
26I have caused to testify against you this day the heavens and the earth, that ye do perish utterly hastily from off the land whither ye are passing over the Jordan to possess it; ye do not prolong days upon it, but are utterly destroyed;
27and Jehovah hath scattered you among the peoples, and ye have been left few in number among the nations, whither Jehovah leadeth you,
28and ye have served there gods, work of man's hands, wood and stone, which see not, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell.
29‘And — ye have sought from thence Jehovah thy God, and hast found, when thou seekest Him with all thy heart, and with all thy soul,
30in distress [being] to thee, and all these things have found thee, in the latter end of the days, and thou hast turned back unto Jehovah thy God, and hast hearkened to His voice;
31for a merciful God [is] Jehovah thy God; He doth not fail thee, nor destroy thee, nor forget the covenant of thy fathers, which He hath sworn to them.
32‘For, ask, I pray thee, at the former days which have been before thee, from the day that God prepared man on the earth, and from the [one] end of the heavens even unto the [other] end of the heavens, whether there hath been as this great thing — or hath been heard like it?
33Hath a people heard the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou hast heard, thou — and doth live?
34Or hath God tried to go in to take to Himself, a nation from the midst of a nation, by trials, by signs, and by wonders, and by war, and by a strong hand, and by a stretchedout arm, and by great terrors — according to all that Jehovah your God hath done to you, in Egypt, before your eyes?
35Thou, thou hast been shewn [it], to know that Jehovah He [is] God; there is none else besides Him.
36‘From the heavens He hath caused thee to hear His voice, to instruct thee, and on earth He hath shewed thee His great fire, and His words thou hast heard out of the midst of the fire.
37‘And because that He hath loved thy fathers, He doth also fix on their seed after them, and doth bring thee out, in His presence, by His great power, from Egypt:
38to dispossess nations greater and stronger than thou, from thy presence, to bring thee in to give to thee their land — an inheritance, as [at] this day.
39‘And thou hast known to-day, and hast turned [it] back unto thy heart, that Jehovah He [is] God, in the heavens above, and on the earth beneath — there is none else;
40and thou hast kept His statutes and His commands which I am commanding thee to-day, so that it is well to thee, and to thy sons after thee, and so that thou prolongest days on the ground which Jehovah thy God is giving to thee — all the days.’
41Then Moses separateth three cities beyond the Jordan, towards the sun-rising,
42for the fleeing thither of the man-slayer, who slayeth his neighbour unknowingly, and he is not hating him heretofore, and he hath fled unto one of these cities, and he hath lived:
43Bezer, in the wilderness, in the land of the plain, of the Reubenite; and Ramoth, in Gilead, of the Gadite; and Golan, in Bashan, of the Manassahite.
44And this [is] the law which Moses hath set before the sons of Israel;
45these [are] the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which Moses hath spoken unto the sons of Israel, in their coming out of Egypt,
46beyond the Jordan, in the valley over-against Beth-Peor, in the land of Sihon, king of the Amorite, who is dwelling in Heshbon, whom Moses and the sons of Israel have smitten, in their coming out of Egypt,
47and they possess his land, and the land of Og king of Bashan, two kings of the Amorite who [are] beyond the Jordan, [towards] the sun-rising;
48from Aroer, which [is] by the edge of the brook Arnon, even unto mount Sion, which [is] Hermon —
49and all the plain beyond the Jordan eastward, even unto the sea of the plain, under the springs of Pisgah.
Currently Selected:
:
Highlight
Share
Copy
Want to have your highlights saved across all your devices? Sign up or sign in
maintained by the British and Foreign Bible Society