Deuteronomy 9
Christian Standard Bible Anglicised
Warning against Self-Righteousness
9 ‘Listen, Israel: Today you are about to cross the Jordan to enter and drive out nations greater and stronger than you,(A) with large cities fortified to the heavens.(B) 2 The people are strong and tall, the descendants of the Anakim.(C) You know about them and you have heard it said about them, “Who can stand up to the sons of Anak? ”(D) 3 But understand that today the Lord your God will cross over ahead of you(E) as a consuming fire;(F) he will devastate and subdue them before you. You will drive them out and destroy them swiftly,(G) as the Lord has told you. 4 When the Lord your God drives them out before you, do not say to yourself, “The Lord brought me in to take possession of this land because of my righteousness.”(H) Instead, the Lord will drive out these nations before you because of their wickedness.(I) 5 You are not going to take possession of their land because of your righteousness or your integrity. Instead, the Lord your God will drive out these nations before you because of their wickedness, in order to fulfil the promise he swore to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 6 Understand that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land(J) to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people.(K)
Israel’s Rebellion and Moses’s Intercession
7 ‘Remember(L) and do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God in the wilderness. You have been rebelling against the Lord from the day you left the land of Egypt until you reached this place. 8 You provoked the Lord at Horeb, and he was angry enough with you to destroy you. 9 When I went up the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant(M) the Lord made with you, I stayed on the mountain for forty days and forty nights. I did not eat food or drink water. 10 On the day of the assembly the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, inscribed by God’s finger.(N) The exact words were on them, which the Lord spoke to you from the fire on the mountain.(O) 11 The Lord gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant, at the end of the forty days and forty nights.
12 ‘The Lord said to me, “Get up and go down immediately from here. For your people whom you brought out of Egypt have acted corruptly. They have quickly turned from the way that I commanded them; they have made a cast image for themselves.”(P) 13 The Lord also said to me, “I have seen this people, and indeed, they are a stiff-necked people. 14 Leave me alone, and I will destroy them and blot out their name under heaven.(Q) Then I will make you into a nation stronger and more numerous than they.”
15 ‘So I went back down the mountain, while it was blazing with fire, and the two tablets of the covenant were in my hands. 16 I saw how you had sinned against the Lord your God; you had made a calf image for yourselves. You had quickly turned from the way the Lord had commanded for you. 17 So I took hold of the two tablets and threw them from my hands, shattering them before your eyes.(R) 18 I fell down like the first time in the presence of the Lord for forty days and forty nights; I did not eat food or drink water because of all the sin you committed, doing what was evil in the Lord’s sight and angering him. 19 I was afraid of the fierce anger the Lord had directed against you,(S) because he was about to destroy you. But again the Lord listened to me on that occasion.(T) 20 The Lord was angry enough with Aaron to destroy him. But I prayed for Aaron at that time also. 21 I took the sinful calf you had made and burned it. I crushed it, thoroughly grinding it to powder as fine as dust, and threw its dust into the stream that came down from the mountain.(U)
22 ‘You continued to provoke the Lord at Taberah, Massah, and Kibroth-hattaavah.(V) 23 When the Lord sent you from Kadesh-barnea, he said, “Go up and possess the land I have given you”; you rebelled against the command of the Lord your God. You did not believe or obey him.(W) 24 You have been rebelling against the Lord ever since I have[a] known you.(X)
25 ‘I fell down in the presence of the Lord for forty days and forty nights because the Lord had threatened to destroy you. 26 I prayed to the Lord:
Lord God, do not annihilate your people, your inheritance, whom you redeemed(Y) through your greatness and brought out of Egypt with a strong hand. 27 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Disregard this people’s stubbornness, and their wickedness and sin. 28 Otherwise, those in the land you brought us from will say, “Because the Lord wasn’t able to bring them into the land he had promised them, and because he hated them, he brought them out to kill them in the wilderness.”(Z) 29 But they are your people, your inheritance, whom you brought out by your great power and outstretched arm.(AA)
Footnotes
- 9:24 Sam, LXX read since he has
Deuteronomy 9
Wycliffe Bible
9 Hear thou, Israel; thou shalt pass (the) Jordan today, that thou wield the most nations, and stronger than thou; great cities, and walled till to heaven; (Hear, O Israel; thou shalt cross over the Jordan River today, to take over nations greater and stronger than thou; yea, great cities, that be walled unto the heavens;)
2 a great people, and high; the sons of Anakim, which thyself hast seen, and heard, which no man may against-stand in the contrary part. (a great and tall people; the sons of the Anakim, that is, the giants, whom thou hast seen, and heard, and whom no one can stand against.)
3 Therefore thou shalt know today that thy Lord God himself shall pass before thee; he is a fire devouring and wasting, that shall all-break them, and he shall do them away, and destroy them before thy face swiftly, as he spake to thee. (And so know thou today that the Lord thy God himself shall go ahead of thee; he is a devouring and wasting fire, and he shall all-break them before thy face, and then ye shall do them away, and swiftly destroy them, as he promised thee.)
4 Say thou not in thine heart, when thy Lord God hath done them away in thy sight, For my rightwiseness the Lord hath brought me in hither, that I should wield the land; since these nations be done away for their wickednesses. (But when the Lord thy God hath done them away before thee, do not thou say in thy heart, Because of my righteousness, the Lord hath brought me here, so that I could take this land; since these nations shall be done away because of their own wickednesses.)
5 For not for thy rightwiseness, and for the equity of thine heart thou shalt enter, that thou wield their land; but for they did wickedly, they were done away (by thy Lord God), when thou enteredest, and that the Lord should [ful]fill his word which he promised under an oath to thy fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. (For it is not because of thy own righteousness, or the integrity of thy own heart, that thou shalt enter to take their land; but they shall be done away before thee by the Lord thy God, because they did wickedly, and so that the Lord would fulfill his word which he promised under an oath to thy fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.)
6 Therefore know thou that not for thy rightwisenesses thy Lord God hath given to thee this best land into possession, since thou art a people of most hard noll. (And so know thou that the Lord thy God hath not given thee this best land for a possession because of thy own righteousness, since thou art a most stubborn, or a stiff-necked, people.)
7 Have thou (in) mind, and forget not (Remember, and do not forget), how in the wilderness thou stirredest thy Lord God to great wrath; (and) from that day in which thou wentest out of Egypt till to this place, thou hast striven ever[more] against the Lord.
8 For why also in Horeb, thou stirredest him (to wrath), and he was wroth, and would have done thee away, (Yea, also at Mount Sinai, thou stirredest him to anger, and he was so angry that he would have done thee away;)
9 and when I went up into the hill, that I should take (the) two tables of stone, the tables of (the) covenant which the Lord made with you, and I abode in the hill forty days and forty nights, and I ate not bread, and I drank not water. (and when I went up the mountain, so that I could receive the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant which the Lord made with you, I stayed on the mountain for forty days and forty nights, and I ate no bread, and I drank no water.)
10 And the Lord gave to me two tables of stone, ever either written with God’s finger, and containing all the words which he spake to you in the hill, from the midst of the fire, when the company of people was gathered together. (And the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, each written with the finger of God, and containing all the words which he spoke to you from the midst of the fire, when the congregation of the people was gathered together there at the mountain.)
11 And when forty days and so many nights had passed, the Lord gave to me (the) two tables of stone, (the) tables of the bond of peace; (And so when forty days and as many nights had passed, the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, yea, the tablets of the covenant;)
12 and he said to me, Rise thou, and go down from hence soon, for thy people, that thou hast led out of Egypt, have forsaken swiftly the way that thou showedest to them, and they have made to them[selves] a molten calf. (and he said to me, Rise thou up, and quickly go down from here, for thy people, whom thou hast led out of Egypt, have already forsaken the way that thou hast shown them, and they have cast an idol for themselves, yea, a metal calf.)
13 And again the Lord said to me, I see that this people is of an hard noll; (And again the Lord said to me, I see that this people be stubborn/be stiff-necked;)
14 suffer thou me, that I all-break him, and do away his name from under heaven; and I shall ordain thee on a folk which is greater and stronger than this folk. (allow me to all-break them, and do away their name from under heaven; and then I shall ordain thee upon a nation which shall be greater and stronger than this nation.)
15 And when I came down from the hill burning, and I held with either hand the two tables of the bond of peace, (And when I came down from the burning mountain, and I held in my hands the two tablets of the covenant,)
16 and I saw, that ye had sinned to your Lord God, and had made to you a molten calf, and that ye had forsaken swiftly the way of God that he had showed to you, (and I saw that ye had sinned against the Lord your God, and had cast an idol, yea, a metal calf, for yourselves, and that ye had already forsaken the way of God that he had shown you,)
17 then I threw down the tables from mine hands, and I brake those tables in your sight. (then I threw down the tablets from my hands, and I broke those tablets in front of you.)
18 And I felled down before the Lord as before, in forty days and forty nights, and I ate not bread, and drank not water, for all your sins which ye did against the Lord, and stirred him to great wrath; (And I fell down before the Lord as I did before, for forty days and forty nights, and I ate no bread, and drank no water, for all your sins which ye did against the Lord, and so had stirred him to such great anger;)
19 for I dreaded the indignation and the wrath of the Lord, by which he was stirred against you, and would do you away. And the Lord heard me also in this time praying for you (But once again the Lord listened to me praying for you).
20 Also the Lord was wroth greatly against Aaron, and would have all-broken him, and I prayed in like manner for him. (And the Lord was also greatly angered with Aaron, and would have killed him, and I prayed for him in like manner.)
21 Forsooth I took your sin which ye made, that is, the calf, and burnt it in fire, and I all-brake it into gobbets, and drove (it) utterly into dust, and I cast it forth into the strand, that came down from the hill. (And I took that sinful thing which ye had made, that is, the idol of the calf, and I burned it with fire, and I broke it all up into pieces, and drove it down utterly into dust, and then I threw it forth into the river that came down from the mountain.)
22 Also in the burning, and in the temptation at the waters of against-saying, and in the Sepulchres of Covetousness, ye stirred the Lord (to wrath); (And ye also stirred the Lord to anger at Taberah, and at Massah, and at Kibrothhattaavah;)
23 and when I sent you from Kadeshbarnea, and said, Go ye up, and wield ye the land which I have given to you, and ye despised the commandment of your Lord God, and ye believed not to him, neither ye would hear his voice; (and again when the Lord sent you out from Kadeshbarnea, saying, Go ye up, and take ye the land which I have given you, and ye disobeyed the command of the Lord your God, and ye did not trust him, nor would ye listen to his voice;)
24 but ever[more] ye were rebel, from the day in which I began to know you. (but ye were always rebellious against the Lord, yea, from the day in which I first began to know you.)
25 And I lay before the Lord forty days and forty nights, in which I besought him meekly, that he should not do away you, as he menaced. (And so for forty days and forty nights I lay before the Lord, in which time I meekly besought him not to destroy you, as he had threatened.)
26 And I prayed him, and said, Lord God, destroy not thy people, and thine heritage, which thou again-boughtest in thy greatness, which thou leddest out of Egypt in (a) strong hand. (And I prayed to him, and said, Lord God, do not destroy thy people, and thy inheritance, whom thou hast bought back, or hast redeemed, or ransomed, by thy great power, and whom thou hast led out of Egypt with thy strong hand.)
27 Have thou mind of thy servants, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; behold thou not the hardness of this people, and the wickedness, and the sin thereof, (Remember thy servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; do not thou look upon the stubbornness of this people, and their wickedness, and their sin,)
28 lest peradventure the dwellers of the land, out of which thou leddest us, say, The Lord might not bring them into the land which he promised to them, and he hated them; therefore he led them out that he should slay them in (the) wilderness; (lest the inhabitants of the land, out of which thou hast led us, shall say, The Lord could not bring them into the land that he promised them, and because he hated them, he hath led them out so that he could kill them in the wilderness;)
29 and Lord, they be thy people, and thine heritage, which thou leddest out in thy great strength, and in thine arm stretched forth. (but Lord, they be thy people, and thy inheritance, whom thou hast led out with thy great strength, and thy outstretched arm.)
Deuteronomy 9
New English Translation
Theological Justification of the Conquest
9 Listen, Israel: Today you are about to cross the Jordan so you can dispossess the nations there, people greater and stronger than you who live in large cities with extremely high fortifications.[a] 2 They include the Anakites,[b] a numerous[c] and tall people whom you know about and of whom it is said, “Who is able to resist the Anakites?” 3 Understand today that the Lord your God who goes before you is a devouring fire; he will defeat and subdue them before you. You will dispossess and destroy them quickly just as he[d] has told you. 4 Do not think to yourself after the Lord your God has driven them out before you, “Because of my own righteousness the Lord has brought me here to possess this land.” It is because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is driving them out ahead of you. 5 It is not because of your righteousness, or even your inner uprightness,[e] that you have come here to possess their land. Instead, because of the wickedness of these nations, the Lord your God is driving them out ahead of you in order to confirm the promise he[f] made on oath to your ancestors,[g] to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 6 Understand, therefore, that it is not because of your righteousness that the Lord your God is about to give you this good land as a possession, for you are a stubborn[h] people!
The History of Israel’s Stubbornness
7 Remember—don’t ever forget[i]—how you provoked the Lord your God in the wilderness; from the time you left the land of Egypt until you came to this place you were constantly rebelling against him.[j] 8 At Horeb you provoked him and he was angry enough with you to destroy you. 9 When I went up the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant that the Lord made with you, I remained there[k] forty days and nights, eating and drinking nothing. 10 The Lord gave me the two stone tablets, written by the very finger[l] of God, and on them was everything[m] he[n] said to you at the mountain from the midst of the fire at the time of that assembly. 11 Now at the end of the forty days and nights the Lord presented me with the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant. 12 And he said to me, “Get up, go down at once from here because your people whom you brought out of Egypt have sinned! They have quickly turned from the way I commanded them and have made for themselves a cast metal image.”[o] 13 Moreover, he said to me, “I have taken note of these people; they are a stubborn[p] lot! 14 Stand aside[q] and I will destroy them, obliterating their very name from memory,[r] and I will make you into a stronger and more numerous nation than they are.”
15 So I turned and went down the mountain while it[s] was blazing with fire; the two tablets of the covenant were in my hands. 16 When I looked, you had indeed sinned against the Lord your God and had cast for yourselves a metal calf;[t] you had quickly turned aside from the way he[u] had commanded you! 17 I grabbed the two tablets, threw them down,[v] and shattered them before your very eyes. 18 Then I again fell down before the Lord for forty days and nights; I ate and drank nothing because of all the sin you had committed, doing such evil before the Lord as to enrage him. 19 For I was terrified at the Lord’s intense anger[w] that threatened to destroy you. But he[x] listened to me this time as well. 20 The Lord was also angry enough at Aaron to kill him, but at that time I prayed for him[y] too. 21 As for your sinful thing[z] that you had made, the calf, I took it, melted it down,[aa] ground it up until it was as fine as dust, and tossed the dust into the stream that flows down the mountain. 22 Moreover, you continued to provoke the Lord at Taberah,[ab] Massah,[ac] and Kibroth Hattaavah.[ad] 23 And when he[ae] sent you from Kadesh Barnea and told you, “Go up and possess the land I have given you,” you rebelled against the Lord your God[af] and would neither believe nor obey him. 24 You have been rebelling against him[ag] from the very first day I knew you!
Moses’ Plea on Behalf of God’s Reputation
25 I lay flat on the ground before the Lord for forty days and nights,[ah] for he[ai] had said he would destroy you. 26 I prayed to him:[aj] O, Sovereign Lord,[ak] do not destroy your people, your valued property[al] that you have powerfully redeemed,[am] whom you brought out of Egypt by your strength.[an] 27 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; ignore the stubbornness, wickedness, and sin of these people. 28 Otherwise the people of the land[ao] from which you brought us will say, “The Lord was unable to bring them to the land he promised them, and because of his hatred for them he has brought them out to kill them in the wilderness.” 29 They are your people, your valued property,[ap] whom you brought out with great strength and power.[aq]
Footnotes
- Deuteronomy 9:1 tn Heb “fortified to the heavens” (so NRSV); NLT “cities with walls that reach to the sky.” This is hyperbole.
- Deuteronomy 9:2 sn Anakites. See note on this term in Deut 1:28.
- Deuteronomy 9:2 tn Heb “great and tall.” Many English versions understand this to refer to physical size or strength rather than numbers (cf. “strong,” NIV, NCV, NRSV, NLT).
- Deuteronomy 9:3 tn Heb “the Lord.” The pronoun has been used in the translation in keeping with contemporary English style to avoid redundancy.
- Deuteronomy 9:5 tn Heb “uprightness of your heart” (so NASB, NRSV). The Hebrew word צְדָקָה (tsedaqah, “righteousness”), though essentially synonymous here with יֹשֶׁר (yosher, “uprightness”), carries the idea of conformity to an objective standard. The term יֹשֶׁר has more to do with an inner, moral quality (cf. NAB, NIV “integrity”). Neither, however, was grounds for the Lord’s favor. As he states in both vv. 4-5, the main reason he allowed Israel to take this land was the sinfulness of the Canaanites who lived there (cf. Gen 15:16).
- Deuteronomy 9:5 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:5 tn Heb “fathers.”
- Deuteronomy 9:6 tn Heb “stiff-necked” (so KJV, NAB, NIV).sn The Hebrew word translated stubborn means “stiff-necked.” The image is that of a draft animal that is unsubmissive to the rein or yoke and refuses to bend its neck to draw the load. This is an apt description of OT Israel (Exod 32:9; 33:3, 5; 34:9; Deut 9:13).
- Deuteronomy 9:7 tn By juxtaposing the positive זְכֹר (zekhor, “remember”) with the negative אַל־תִּשְׁכַּח (ʾal tishkakh, “do not forget”), Moses makes a most emphatic plea.
- Deuteronomy 9:7 tn Heb “the Lord” (likewise in the following verse with both “him” and “he”). See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:9 tn Heb “in the mountain.” The demonstrative pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons.
- Deuteronomy 9:10 sn The very finger of God. This is a double figure of speech (1) in which God is ascribed human features (anthropomorphism) and (2) in which a part stands for the whole (synecdoche). That is, God, as Spirit, has no literal finger nor, if he had, would he write with his finger. Rather, the sense is that God himself—not Moses in any way—was responsible for the composition of the Ten Commandments (cf. Exod 31:18; 32:16; 34:1).
- Deuteronomy 9:10 tn Heb “according to all the words.”
- Deuteronomy 9:10 tn Heb “the Lord” (likewise at the beginning of vv. 12, 13). See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:12 tc Heb “a casting.” The MT reads מַסֵּכָה (massekhah, “a cast thing”) but some mss and Smr add עֵגֶל (ʿegel, “calf”), “a molten calf” or the like (Exod 32:8). Perhaps Moses here omits reference to the calf out of contempt for it.
- Deuteronomy 9:13 tn Heb “stiff-necked.” See note on the word “stubborn” in 9:6.
- Deuteronomy 9:14 tn Heb “leave me alone.”
- Deuteronomy 9:14 tn Heb “from under heaven.”
- Deuteronomy 9:15 tn Heb “the mountain.” The translation uses a pronoun for stylistic reasons to avoid redundancy.
- Deuteronomy 9:16 tn On the phrase “metal calf,” see note on the term “metal image” in v. 12.
- Deuteronomy 9:16 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:17 tn The Hebrew text includes “from upon my two hands,” but as this seems somewhat obvious and redundant, it has been left untranslated for stylistic reasons.
- Deuteronomy 9:19 tn Heb “the anger and the wrath.” Although many English versions translate as two terms, this construction is a hendiadys which serves to intensify the emotion (cf. NAB, TEV “fierce anger”).
- Deuteronomy 9:19 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:20 tn Heb “Aaron.” The pronoun is used in the translation to avoid redundancy.
- Deuteronomy 9:21 tn Heb “your sin.” This is a metonymy in which the effect (sin) stands for the cause (the metal calf).
- Deuteronomy 9:21 tn Heb “burned it with fire.”
- Deuteronomy 9:22 sn Taberah. By popular etymology this derives from the Hebrew verb בָעַר (baʿar, “to burn”), thus, here, “burning.” The reference is to the Lord’s fiery wrath against Israel because of their constant complaints against him (Num 11:1-3).
- Deuteronomy 9:22 sn Massah. See note on this term in Deut 6:16.
- Deuteronomy 9:22 sn Kibroth Hattaavah. This place name means in Hebrew “burial places of appetite,” that is, graves that resulted from overindulgence. The reference is to the Israelites stuffing themselves with the quail God had provided and doing so with thanklessness (Num 11:31-35).
- Deuteronomy 9:23 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:23 tn Heb “the mouth of the Lord your God,” that is, against the commandment that he had spoken.
- Deuteronomy 9:24 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:25 tn The Hebrew text includes “when I prostrated myself.” Since this is redundant, it has been left untranslated.
- Deuteronomy 9:25 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:26 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 9:3.
- Deuteronomy 9:26 tn Heb “Lord Yahweh” (אֲדֹנָי יְהוִה, ʾadonay yehvih). The phrase is customarily rendered by Jewish tradition as “Lord God” (אֲדֹנָי אֱלֹהִים, ʾadonay ʾelohim).
- Deuteronomy 9:26 tn Heb “your inheritance”; NLT “your special (very own NRSV) possession.” Israel is compared to landed property that one would inherit from his ancestors and pass on to his descendants.
- Deuteronomy 9:26 tn Heb “you have redeemed in your greatness.”
- Deuteronomy 9:26 tn Heb “by your strong hand.”
- Deuteronomy 9:28 tc The MT reads only “the land.” Smr supplies עַם (ʿam, “people”) and LXX and its dependents supply “the inhabitants of the land.” The truncated form found in the MT is adequate to communicate the intended meaning; the words “the people of” are supplied in the translation for clarity.
- Deuteronomy 9:29 tn Heb “your inheritance.” See note at v. 26.
- Deuteronomy 9:29 tn Heb “an outstretched arm.”
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2001 by Terence P. Noble
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