Deuteronomy 32

1 Hear, heavens, and I will speak.
Listen, earth, to what I say.

2 My teaching will drop like rain; my words will fall like dew.
They will be like showers on the grass; they will pour down like rain on young plants.

3 I will announce the name of the Lord. Praise God because he is great!

4 He is like a rock; what he does is perfect, and he is always fair.
He is a faithful God who does no wrong, who is right and fair.

5 They have done evil against him. To their shame they are no longer his children; they are an evil and lying people.

6 This is not the way to repay the Lord, you foolish and unwise people.
He is your Father and Maker, who made you and formed you.

7 Remember the old days. Think of the years already passed.
Ask your father and he will tell you; ask your elders and they will inform you.

8 God Most High gave the nations their lands, dividing up the human race.
He set up borders for the people and even numbered the Israelites.

9 The Lord took his people as his share, the people of Jacob as his very own.

10 He found them in a desert, a windy, empty land.
He surrounded them and brought them up, guarding them as those he loved very much.

11 He was like an eagle building its nest that flutters over its young.
It spreads its wings to catch them and carries them on its feathers.

12 The Lord alone led them, and there was no foreign god helping him.

13 The Lord brought them to the heights of the land and fed them the fruit of the fields.
He gave them honey from the rocks, bringing oil from the solid rock.

14 There were milk curds from the cows and milk from the flock; there were fat sheep and goats.
There were sheep and goats from Bashan and the best of the wheat.
You drank the juice of grapes.

15 Israel grew fat and kicked; they were fat and full and firm.
They left the God who made them and rejected the Rock who saved them.

16 They made God jealous with foreign gods and angry with hateful idols.

17 They made sacrifices to demons, not God, to gods they had never known, new gods from nearby, gods your ancestors did not fear.

18 You left God who is the Rock, your Father, and you forgot the God who gave you birth.

19 The Lord saw this and rejected them; his sons and daughters had made him angry.

20 He said, “I will turn away from them and see what will happen to them.
They are evil people, unfaithful children.

21 They used things that are not gods to make me jealous and worthless idols to make me angry.
So I will use those who are not a nation to make them jealous; I will use a nation that does not understand to make them angry.

22 My anger has started a fire that burns down to the place of the dead.
It will burn up the ground and its crops, and it will set fire to the base of the mountains.

23 “I will pile troubles upon them and shoot my arrows at them.

24 They will be starved and sick, destroyed by terrible diseases.
I will send them vicious animals and gliding, poisonous snakes.

25 In the streets the sword will kill; in their homes there will be terror.
Young men and women will die, and so will babies and gray-haired men.

26 I will scatter them as I said, and no one will remember them.

27 But I didn’t want their enemy to brag; their enemy might misunderstand
and say, ‘We have won! The Lord has done none of this.’ ”

28 Israel has no sense; they do not understand.

29 I wish they were wise and understood this; I wish they could see what will happen to them.

30 One person cannot chase a thousand people, and two people cannot fight ten thousand
unless their Rock has sold them, unless the Lord has given them up.

31 The rock of these people is not like our Rock; our enemies agree to that.

32 Their vine comes from Sodom, and their fields are like Gomorrah.
Their grapes are full of poison; their bunches of grapes are bitter.

33 Their wine is like snake poison, like the deadly poison of cobras.

34 “I have been saving this, and I have it locked in my storehouses.

35 I will punish those who do wrong; I will repay them. Soon their foot will slip,
because their day of trouble is near, and their punishment will come quickly.”

36 The Lord will defend his people and have mercy on his servants.
He will see that their strength is gone, that nobody is left, slaves or free.

37 Then he will say, “Where are their gods? Where is the rock they trusted?

38 Who ate the fat from their sacrifices, and who drank the wine of their drink offerings?
Let those gods come to help you! Let them protect you!

39 “Now you will see that I am the one God! There is no god but me.
I send life and death; I can hurt, and I can heal. No one can escape from me.

40 I raise my hand toward heaven and make this promise: As surely as I live forever,

41 I will sharpen my flashing sword, and I will take it in my hand to judge.
I will punish my enemies and pay back those who hate me.

42 My arrows will be covered with their blood; my sword will eat their flesh.
The blood will flow from those who are killed and the captives. The heads of the enemy leaders will be cut off.”

43 Be happy, nations, with his people, because he will repay you for the blood of his servants.
He will punish his enemies, and he will remove the sin of his land and people.
44 Moses came with Joshua son of Nun, and they spoke all the words of this song for the people to hear.45 When Moses finished speaking these words to all Israel,46 he said to them: “Pay careful attention to all the words I have said to you today, and command your children to obey carefully everything in these teachings.

47 These should not be unimportant words for you, but rather they mean life for you! By these words you will live a long time in the land you are crossing the Jordan River to take as your own.”

Moses Goes Up to Mount Nebo

48 The Lord spoke to Moses again that same day and said,49 “Go up the Abarim Mountains, to Mount Nebo in the country of Moab, across from Jericho. Look at the land of Canaan that I am giving to the Israelites as their own.50 On that mountain that you climb, you will die and join your ancestors, just as your brother Aaron died on Mount Hor and joined his ancestors.51 You both sinned against me at the waters of Meribah Kadesh in the Desert of Zin, and you did not honor me as holy there among the Israelites.52 So now you will only look at the land from far away. You will not enter the land I am giving the people of Israel.”

Deuteronomy 32

1 Give ear, ye heavens, and I will speak; And let the earth hear the words of my mouth.

2 My doctrine shall drop as the rain; My speech shall distil as the dew, As the small rain upon the tender grass, And as the showers upon the herb.

3 For I will proclaim the name of Jehovah: Ascribe ye greatness unto our God.

4 The Rock, his work is perfect; For all his ways are justice: A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, Just and right is he.

5 They have dealt corruptly with him, they are not his children, it is their blemish; They are a perverse and crooked generation.

6 Do ye thus requite Jehovah, O foolish people and unwise? Is not he thy father that hath bought thee? He hath made thee, and established thee.

7 Remember the days of old, Consider the years of many generations: Ask thy father, and he will show thee; Thine elders, and they will tell thee.

8 When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, When he separated the children of men, He set the bounds of the peoples According to the number of the children of Israel.

9 For Jehovah’s portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.

10 He found him in a desert land, And in the waste howling wilderness; He compassed him about, he cared for him, He kept him as the apple of his eye.

11 As an eagle that stirreth up her nest, That fluttereth over her young, He spread abroad his wings, he took them, He bare them on his pinions.

12 Jehovah alone did lead him, And there was no foreign god with him.

13 He made him ride on the high places of the earth, And he did eat the increase of the field; And he made him to suck honey out of the rock, And oil out of the flinty rock;

14 Butter of the herd, and milk of the flock, With fat of lambs, And rams of the breed of Bashan, and goats, With the finest of the wheat; And of the blood of the grape thou drankest wine.

15 But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: Thou art waxed fat, thou art grown thick, thou art become sleek; Then he forsook God who made him, And lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.

16 They moved him to jealousy with strange gods; With abominations provoked they him to anger.

17 They sacrificed unto demons, which were no God, To gods that they knew not, To new gods that came up of late, Which your fathers dreaded not.

18 Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, And hast forgotten God that gave thee birth.

19 And Jehovah saw it, and abhorred them, Because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters.

20 And he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: For they are a very perverse generation, Children in whom is no faithfulness.

21 They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; They have provoked me to anger with their vanities: And I will move them to jealousy with those that are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.

22 For a fire is kindled in mine anger, And burneth unto the lowest Sheol, And devoureth the earth with its increase, And setteth on fire the foundations of the mountains.

23 I will heap evils upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them:

24  They shall be wasted with hunger, and devoured with burning heat And bitter destruction; And the teeth of beasts will I send upon them, With the poison of crawling things of the dust.

25 Without shall the sword bereave, And in the chambers terror; It shall destroy both young man and virgin, The suckling with the man of gray hairs.

26 I said, I would scatter them afar, I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men;

27 Were it not that I feared the provocation of the enemy, Lest their adversaries should judge amiss, Lest they should say, Our hand is exalted, And Jehovah hath not done all this.

28 For they are a nation void of counsel, And there is no understanding in them.

29 Oh that they were wise, that they understood this, That they would consider their latter end!

30 How should one chase a thousand, And two put ten thousand to flight, Except their Rock had sold them, And Jehovah had delivered them up?

31 For their rock is not as our Rock, Even our enemies themselves being judges.

32 For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, And of the fields of Gomorrah: Their grapes are grapes of gall, Their clusters are bitter:

33 Their wine is the poison of serpents, And the cruel venom of asps.

34 Is not this laid up in store with me, Sealed up among my treasures?

35 Vengeance is mine, and recompense, At the time when their foot shall slide: For the day of their calamity is at hand, And the things that are to come upon them shall make haste.

36 For Jehovah will judge his people, And repent himself for his servants; When he seeth that their power is gone, And there is none remaining, shut up or left at large.

37 And he will say, Where are their gods, The rock in which they took refuge;

38 Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink-offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection.

39 See now that I, even I, am he, And there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal; And there is none that can deliver out of my hand.

40 For I lift up my hand to heaven, And say, As I live for ever,

41 If I whet my glittering sword, And my hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to mine adversaries, And will recompense them that hate me.

42 I will make mine arrows drunk with blood, And my sword shall devour flesh; With the blood of the slain and the captives, From the head of the leaders of the enemy.

43 Rejoice, O ye nations, with his people: For he will avenge the blood of his servants, And will render vengeance to his adversaries, And will make expiation for his land, for his people.

44 And Moses came and spake all the words of this song in the ears of the people, he, and Hoshea the son of Nun.45 And Moses made an end of speaking all these words to all Israel;46 And he said unto them, Set your heart unto all the words which I testify unto you this day, which ye shall command your children to observe to do, even all the words of this law.47 For it is no vain thing for you; because it is your life, and through this thing ye shall prolong your days in the land, whither ye go over the Jordan to possess it.

48 And Jehovah spake unto Moses that selfsame day, saying,49 Get thee up into this mountain of Abarim, unto mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, that is over against Jericho; and behold the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel for a possession;50 and die in the mount whither thou goest up, and be gathered unto thy people, as Aaron thy brother died in mount Hor, and was gathered unto his people:51 because ye trespassed against me in the midst of the children of Israel at the waters of Meribah of Kadesh, in the wilderness of Zin; because ye sanctified me not in the midst of the children of Israel.52 For thou shalt see the land before thee; but thou shalt not go thither into the land which I give the children of Israel.