Deuteronomy 4:32-49

New International Version

The Lord Is God

³²Ask^(A) now about the former days, long before your time, from the day God created human beings on the earth;^(B) ask from one end of the heavens to the other.^(C) Has anything so great^(D) as this ever happened, or has anything like it ever been heard of? ³³Has any other people heard the voice of God^[a] speaking out of fire, as you have, and lived?^(E) ³⁴Has any god ever tried to take for himself one nation out of another nation,^(F) by testings,^(G) by signs^(H) and wonders,^(I) by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm,^(J) or by great and awesome deeds,^(K) like all the things the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?

³⁵You were shown these things so that you might know that the Lord is God; besides him there is no other.^(L) ³⁶From heaven he made you hear his voice^(M) to discipline^(N) you. On earth he showed you his great fire, and you heard his words from out of the fire. ³⁷Because he loved^(O) your ancestors and chose their descendants after them, he brought you out of Egypt by his Presence and his great strength,^(P) ³⁸to drive out before you nations greater and stronger than you and to bring you into their land to give it to you for your inheritance,^(Q) as it is today.

³⁹Acknowledge^(R) and take to heart this day that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other.^(S) ⁴⁰Keep^(T) his decrees and commands,^(U) which I am giving you today, so that it may go well^(V) with you and your children after you and that you may live long^(W) in the land the Lord your God gives you for all time.

Cities of Refuge^(X)

⁴¹Then Moses set aside three cities east of the Jordan, ⁴²to which anyone who had killed a person could flee if they had unintentionally^(Y) killed a neighbor without malice aforethought. They could flee into one of these cities and save their life. ⁴³The cities were these: Bezer in the wilderness plateau, for the Reubenites; Ramoth^(Z) in Gilead, for the Gadites; and Golan in Bashan, for the Manassites.

Introduction to the Law

⁴⁴This is the law Moses set before the Israelites. ⁴⁵These are the stipulations, decrees and laws Moses gave them when they came out of Egypt ⁴⁶and were in the valley near Beth Peor east of the Jordan, in the land of Sihon^(AA) king of the Amorites, who reigned in Heshbon and was defeated by Moses and the Israelites as they came out of Egypt. ⁴⁷They took possession of his land and the land of Og king of Bashan, the two Amorite kings east of the Jordan. ⁴⁸This land extended from Aroer^(AB) on the rim of the Arnon Gorge to Mount Sirion^[b]^(AC) (that is, Hermon^(AD)), ⁴⁹and included all the Arabah east of the Jordan, as far as the Dead Sea,^[c] below the slopes of Pisgah.