⁴ “When the Lord your God thrusts them out before you, do not say to yourself, ‘It is because of my righteousness that the Lord has brought me in to occupy this land’; it is rather because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is dispossessing them before you.^(A)

¹⁷ Do not say to yourself, ‘My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth.’

Child-Sacrifice, Divination, and Magic Prohibited

⁹ “When you come into the land that the Lord your God is giving you, you must not learn to imitate the abhorrent practices of those nations.^{(A) 10} No one shall be found among you who makes a son or daughter pass through fire, or who practices divination, or is a soothsayer, or an augur, or a sorcerer,^{(B) 11} or one who casts spells, or who consults ghosts or spirits, or who seeks oracles from the dead. ¹² For whoever does these things is abhorrent to the Lord; it is because of such abhorrent practices that the Lord your God is driving them out before you.^{(C) 13} You must remain completely loyal to the Lord your God. ¹⁴ Although these nations that you are about to dispossess do give heed to soothsayers and diviners, as for you, the Lord your God does not permit you to do so.

⁵ It is not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you are going in to occupy their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations the Lord your God is dispossessing them before you, in order to fulfill the promise that the Lord made on oath to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.^(A)

⁹ who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to his own purpose and grace, and this grace was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began,^[a](A)

⁷ For who sees anything different in you?^[a] What do you have that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive?^(A)

²⁴ “Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, for by all these practices the nations I am casting out before you have defiled themselves.^{(A) 25} Thus the land became defiled, and I punished it for its iniquity, and the land vomited out its inhabitants.^{(B) 26} But you shall keep my statutes and my ordinances and commit none of these abominations, either the native-born or the alien who resides among you ²⁷ (for the inhabitants of the land, who were before you, committed all of these abominations, and the land became defiled); ²⁸ otherwise the land will vomit you out for defiling it, as it vomited out the nation that was before you. ²⁹ For whoever commits any of these abominations shall be cut off from their people. ³⁰ So keep my charge not to commit any of these abominations that were done before you and not to defile yourselves by them: I am the Lord your God.”^(C)

³¹ You must not do the same for the Lord your God, because every abhorrent thing that the Lord hates they have done for their gods. They would even burn their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods.^(A)

⁷ “It was not because you were more numerous than any other people that the Lord set his heart on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples.^{(A) 8} It was because the Lord loved you and kept the oath that he swore to your ancestors that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.^(B)

¹⁶ And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.”^(A)