1 These are the words which Moses spoke to all Israel [still] on the [east] side of the Jordan [River] in the wilderness, in the Arabah [the deep valley running north and south from the eastern arm of the Red Sea to beyond the Dead Sea], over near Suph, between Paran and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth, and Dizahab.

² It is [only] eleven days’ journey from Horeb by the way of Mount Seir to Kadesh-barnea [on Canaan’s border; yet Israel took forty years to get beyond it].

³ And in the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses spoke to the Israelites according to all that the Lord had given him in commandment to them,

⁴ After He had defeated Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived in Heshbon, and Og king of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth [and] Edrei.

⁵ Beyond (east of) the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses began to explain this law, saying,

⁶ The Lord our God said to us in Horeb, You have dwelt long enough on this mountain.

⁷ Turn and take up your journey and go to the hill country of the Amorites, and to all their neighbors in the Arabah, in the hill country, in the lowland, in the South (the Negeb), and on the coast, the land of the Canaanites, and Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates.

⁸ Behold, I have set the land before you; go in and take possession of the land which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give to them and to their descendants after them.

⁹ I said to you at that time, I am not able to bear you alone.

¹⁰ The Lord your God has multiplied you, and behold, you are this day as the stars of the heavens for multitude.

¹¹ May the Lord, the God of your fathers, make you a thousand times as many as you are and bless you as He has promised you!

¹² How can I bear alone the weariness and pressure and burden of you and your strife?

¹³ Choose wise, understanding, experienced, and respected men according to your tribes, and I will make them heads over you.

¹⁴ And you answered me, The thing which you have spoken is good for us to do.

¹⁵ So I took the heads of your tribes, wise, experienced, and respected men, and made them heads over you, commanders of thousands, and hundreds, and fifties, and tens, and officers according to your tribes.

¹⁶ And I charged your judges at that time: Hear the cases between your brethren and judge righteously between a man and his brother or the stranger or sojourner who is with him.

¹⁷ You shall not be partial in judgment; but you shall hear the small as well as the great. You shall not be afraid of the face of man, for the judgment is God’s. And the case that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.

¹⁸ And I commanded you at that time all the things that you should do.

¹⁹ And when we departed from Horeb, we went through all that great and terrible wilderness which you saw on the way to the hill country of the Amorites, as the Lord our God commanded us, and we came to Kadesh-barnea.

²⁰ And I said to you, You have come to the hill country of the Amorites, which the Lord our God gives us.

²¹ Behold, the Lord your God has set the land before you; go up and possess it, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has said to you. Fear not, neither be dismayed.

²² Then you all came near to me and said, Let us send men before us, that they may search out the land for us and bring us word again by what way we should go up and the cities into which we shall come.

²³ The thing pleased me well, and I took twelve men of you, one for each tribe.

²⁴ And they turned and went up into the hill country, and came to the Valley of Eshcol and spied it out.

²⁵ And they took of the fruit of the land in their hands and brought it down to us and brought us word again, and said, It is a good land which the Lord our God gives us.

²⁶ Yet you would not go up, but rebelled against the commandment of the Lord your God.

²⁷ You were peevish and discontented in your tents, and said, Because the Lord hated us, He brought us forth out of the land of Egypt to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites to destroy us.

²⁸ To what are we going up? Our brethren have made our hearts melt, saying, The people are bigger and taller than we are; the cities are great and fortified to the heavens. And moreover we have seen the [giantlike] sons of the Anakim there.

²⁹ Then I said to you, Dread not, neither be afraid of them.

³⁰ The Lord your God Who goes before you, He will fight for you just as He did for you in Egypt before your eyes,

³¹ And in the wilderness, where you have seen how the Lord your God bore you, as a man carries his son, in all the way that you went until you came to this place.

³² Yet in spite of this word you did not believe (trust, rely on, and remain steadfast to) the Lord your God,

³³ Who went in the way before you to search out a place to pitch your tents, in fire by night, to show you by what way you should go, and in the cloud by day.

³⁴ And the Lord heard your words, and was angered and He swore,

³⁵ Not one of these men of this evil generation shall see that good land which I swore to give to your fathers,

³⁶ Except [Joshua, of course, and] Caleb son of Jephunneh; he shall see it, and to him and to his children I will give the land upon which he has walked, because he has wholly followed the Lord.

³⁷ The Lord was angry with me also for your sakes, and said, You also shall not enter Canaan.

³⁸ But Joshua son of Nun, who stands before you, he shall enter there. Encourage him, for he shall cause Israel to inherit it.

³⁹ Moreover, your little ones whom you said would become a prey, and your children who at this time cannot discern between good and evil, they shall enter Canaan, and to them I will give it and they shall possess it.

⁴⁰ But as for you, turn and journey into the wilderness by way of the Red Sea.

⁴¹ Then you said to me, We have sinned against the Lord. We will go up and fight, as the Lord our God commanded us. And you girded on every man his battle weapons, and thought it a simple matter to go up into the hill country.

⁴² And the Lord said to me, Say to them, Do not go up or fight, for I am not among you—lest you be dangerously hurt by your enemies.

⁴³ So I spoke to you, and you would not hear, but rebelled against the commandment of the Lord, and were presumptuous and went up into the hill country.

⁴⁴ Then the Amorites who lived in that hill country came out against you and chased you as bees do and struck you down in Seir as far as Hormah.

⁴⁵ And you returned and wept before the Lord, but the Lord would not heed your voice or listen to you.

⁴⁶ So you remained in Kadesh; many days you remained there.