Deuteronomy 6-8

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

The Great Commandment

6 “Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the ordinances—that the Lord your God charged me to teach you to observe in the land that you are about to cross into and occupy, ² so that you and your children and your children’s children may fear the Lord your God all the days of your life and keep all his decrees and his commandments that I am commanding you, so that your days may be long.^{(A) 3} Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe them diligently, so that it may go well with you and so that you may multiply greatly in a land flowing with milk and honey, as the Lord, the God of your ancestors, has promised you.^(B)

⁴ “Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone.^{[a](C) 5} You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.^{(D) 6} Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. ⁷ Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise.^{(E) 8} Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem^[b] on your forehead,^{(F) 9} and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.^(G)

Caution against Disobedience

¹⁰ “When the Lord your God has brought you into the land that he swore to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—a land with fine, large cities that you did not build,^{(H) 11} houses filled with all sorts of goods that you did not fill, hewn cisterns that you did not hew, vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant—and when you have eaten your fill,^{(I) 12} take care that you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. ¹³ The Lord your God you shall fear, him you shall serve, and by his name alone you shall swear.^{(J) 14} Do not follow other gods, any of the gods of the peoples who are all around you, ¹⁵ because the Lord your God, who is present with you, is a jealous God. The anger of the Lord your God would be kindled against you and he would destroy you from the face of the earth.^(K)

¹⁶ “Do not put the Lord your God to the test, as you tested him at Massah.^{(L) 17} You must diligently keep the commandments of the Lord your God and his decrees and his statutes that he has commanded you.^{(M) 18} Do what is right and good in the sight of the Lord, so that it may go well with you and so that you may go in and occupy the good land that the Lord swore to your ancestors,^{(N) 19} thrusting out all your enemies from before you, as the Lord has promised.

²⁰ “When your children ask you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the decrees and the statutes and the ordinances that the Lord our God has commanded you?’^{(O) 21} then you shall say to your children, ‘We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt, but the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. ²² The Lord displayed before our eyes great and awesome signs and wonders against Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his household. ²³ He brought us out from there in order to bring us in, to give us the land that he promised on oath to our ancestors. ²⁴ Then the Lord commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our lasting good, so as to keep us alive, as is now the case.^{(P) 25} If we diligently observe this entire commandment before the Lord our God, as he has commanded us, we will be in the right.’^(Q)

A Chosen People

7 “When the Lord your God brings you into the land that you are about to enter and occupy and he clears away many nations before you—the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and mightier than you^(R)— ² and when the Lord your God gives them over to you and you defeat them, then you must utterly destroy them. Make no covenant with them and show them no mercy.^{(S) 3} Do not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons,^{(T) 4} for that would turn away your children from following me, to serve other gods. Then the anger of the Lord would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly.^{(U) 5} But this is how you must deal with them: break down their altars, smash their pillars, cut down their sacred poles,^[c] and burn their idols with fire.^{(V) 6} For you are a people holy to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on earth to be his people, his treasured possession.^(W)

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.^{(X) 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.^{(Y) 9} Know, therefore, that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God who maintains covenant loyalty with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations,^{(Z) 10} and who repays in their own person those who reject him. He does not delay but repays in their own person those who reject him. ¹¹ Therefore, observe diligently the commandment—the statutes and the ordinances—that I am commanding you today.

Blessings for Obedience

¹² “If you heed these ordinances by diligently observing them, the Lord your God will maintain with you the covenant loyalty that he swore to your ancestors;^{(AA) 13} he will love you, bless you, and multiply you; he will bless the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground, your grain and your wine and your oil, the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock, in the land that he swore to your ancestors to give you.^{(AB) 14} You shall be the most blessed of peoples, with neither sterility nor barrenness among you or your livestock.^{(AC) 15} The Lord will turn away from you every illness; all the dread diseases of Egypt that you experienced, he will not inflict on you, but he will lay them on all who hate you.^{(AD) 16} You shall devour all the peoples that the Lord your God is giving over to you, showing them no pity; you shall not serve their gods, for that would be a snare to you.^(AE)

¹⁷ “If you say to yourself, ‘These nations are more numerous than I; how can I dispossess them?’ ¹⁸ do not be afraid of them. Just remember what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt,^{(AF) 19} the great trials that your eyes saw, the signs and wonders, the mighty hand and the outstretched arm by which the Lord your God brought you out. The Lord your God will do the same to all the peoples of whom you are afraid.^{(AG) 20} Moreover, the Lord your God will send swarms of hornets^[d] against them until even the survivors and the fugitives are destroyed.^{(AH) 21} Have no dread of them, for the Lord your God, who is present with you, is a great and awesome God.^{(AI) 22} The Lord your God will clear away these nations before you little by little; you will not be able to make a quick end of them, otherwise the wild animals would become too numerous for you.^{(AJ) 23} But the Lord your God will give them over to you and throw them into great panic until they are destroyed. ²⁴ He will hand their kings over to you, and you shall blot out their name from under heaven; no one will be able to stand against you until you have destroyed them.^{(AK) 25} The images of their gods you shall burn with fire. Do not covet the silver or the gold that is on them and take it for yourself, because you could be ensnared by it, for it is abhorrent to the Lord your God.^{(AL) 26} Do not bring an abhorrent thing into your house, or you will be set apart for destruction like it. You must utterly detest and abhor it, for it is set apart for destruction.

A Warning Not to Forget God in Prosperity

8 “The entire commandment that I command you today you must diligently observe, so that you may live and increase and go in and occupy the land that the Lord promised on oath to your ancestors.^{(AM) 2} Remember the long way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, in order to humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments.^{(AN) 3} He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, with which neither you nor your ancestors were acquainted, in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.^{(AO) 4} The clothes on your back did not wear out, and your feet did not swell these forty years.^{(AP) 5} Know, then, in your heart that, as a parent disciplines a child, so the Lord your God disciplines you.^{(AQ) 6} Therefore keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and by fearing him.^{(AR) 7} For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with flowing streams, with springs and underground waters welling up in valleys and hills,^{(AS) 8} a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey, ⁹ a land where you may eat bread without scarcity, where you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron and from whose hills you may mine copper. ¹⁰ You shall eat your fill and bless the Lord your God for the good land that he has given you.^(AT)

¹¹ “Take care that you do not forget the Lord your God by failing to keep his commandments, his ordinances, and his statutes that I am commanding you today. ¹² When you have eaten your fill and have built fine houses and live in them ¹³ and when your herds and flocks have multiplied and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, ¹⁴ then do not exalt yourself, forgetting the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery,^{(AU) 15} who led you through the great and terrible wilderness, an arid wasteland with poisonous^[e] snakes and scorpions. He made water flow for you from flint rock.^{(AV) 16} He fed you in the wilderness with manna that your ancestors did not know, to humble you and to test you and in the end to do you good.^{(AW) 17} Do not say to yourself, ‘My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth.’ ¹⁸ But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, so that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your ancestors, as he is doing today.^{(AX) 19} If you do forget the Lord your God and follow other gods to serve and worship them, I solemnly warn you today that you shall surely perish.^{(AY) 20} Like the nations that the Lord is destroying before you, so shall you perish, because you would not obey the voice of the Lord your God.