Love the Lord Your God
6 These are the commands, decrees and laws the Lord your God directed me to teach
you to observe in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess, 2 so
that you, your children and their children after them may fear the Lord your God as long as you
live by keeping all his decrees and commands that I give you, and so
that you may enjoy long life. 3 Hear, Israel, and
be careful to obey so that it may go well with you and that you may
increase greatly in a land flowing with milk and honey, just as
the Lord, the God of your
ancestors, promised you.
4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our
God, the Lord is one.[a] 5 Love the Lord your God with all your
heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I
give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress
them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk
along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie
them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write
them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
10 When the Lord your
God brings you into the land he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob, to give you—a land with large, flourishing cities you did not
build, 11 houses filled with all kinds of good
things you did not provide, wells you did not dig, and vineyards and olive
groves you did not plant—then when you eat and are satisfied, 12 be careful that you do not
forget the Lord, who
brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
13 Fear the Lord your
God, serve him only and take your oaths in his name. 14 Do not follow other gods, the gods
of the peoples around you; 15 for the Lord your God, who is among you, is
a jealous God and his anger will burn against you, and he will destroy you from
the face of the land. 16 Do not put the Lord your God to the test as
you did at Massah. 17 Be sure to keep the commands
of the Lord your God and
the stipulations and decrees he has given you. 18 Do
what is right and good in the Lord’s
sight, so that it may go well with you and you may go in and take
over the good land the Lord promised
on oath to your ancestors, 19 thrusting out all
your enemies before you, as the Lord said.
20 In the future, when your son asks you, “What is the meaning
of the stipulations, decrees and laws the Lord our
God has commanded you?” 21 tell him: “We were
slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, but the Lord brought
us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. 22 Before our
eyes the Lord sent signs
and wonders—great and terrible—on Egypt and Pharaoh and his whole
household. 23 But he brought us out from there to
bring us in and give us the land he promised on oath to our ancestors. 24 The Lord commanded us to obey all these
decrees and to fear the Lord our
God, so that we might always prosper and be kept alive, as is the case
today. 25 And if we are careful to obey
all this law before the Lord our
God, as he has commanded us, that will be our righteousness.”
Driving Out the Nations
7 When the Lord your
God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out
before you many nations—the
Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites,
Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and
stronger than you— 2 and when the Lord your God has
delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must
destroy them totally.[b] Make no
treaty with them, and show them no mercy. 3 Do
not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take
their daughters for your sons, 4 for they will turn
your children away from following me to serve other gods, and the Lord’s anger will burn against you and
will quickly destroy you. 5 This is what you
are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down
their Asherah poles[c] and burn their
idols in the fire. 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 the face of the earth to be
his people, his treasured possession.
7 The Lord did
not set his affection on you and choose you because you were more
numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all
peoples. 8 But it was because the Lord loved you and kept the
oath he swore to your ancestors that he brought you out with a mighty
hand and redeemed you from the land of slavery, from the power
of Pharaoh king of Egypt. 9 Know therefore that
the Lord your God is
God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a
thousand generations of those who love him and keep his
commandments. 10 But
those who hate him he will repay to their face by destruction;
he will not be slow to
repay to their face those who hate him.
11 Therefore, take care to
follow the commands, decrees and laws I give you today.
12 If you pay attention to these laws and are careful to
follow them, then the Lord your
God will keep his covenant of love with you, as he swore to your ancestors. 13 He
will love you and bless you and increase your numbers. He will bless
the fruit of your womb, the crops of your land—your grain, new
wine and olive oil—the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks
in the land he swore to your ancestors to give you. 14 You
will be blessed more than any other people; none of your men or women will be
childless, nor will any of your livestock be without young. 15 The Lord will keep you free from every
disease. He will not inflict on you the horrible diseases you knew in
Egypt, but he will inflict them on all who hate you. 16 You
must destroy all the peoples the Lord your
God gives over to you. Do not look on them with pity and do not serve
their gods, for that will be a snare to you.
17 You may say to yourselves, “These nations are stronger than we
are. How can we drive them out?” 18 But do not be
afraid of them; remember well what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt. 19 You
saw with your own eyes the great trials, the signs and wonders, the mighty hand and
outstretched arm, with which the Lord your
God brought you out. The Lord your
God will do the same to all the peoples you now fear. 20 Moreover,
the Lord your God will
send the hornet among them until even the survivors who hide from you have
perished. 21 Do not be terrified by them, for
the Lord your God, who
is among you, is a great and awesome God. 22 The Lord your God will drive out those
nations before you, little by little. You will not be allowed to eliminate
them all at once, or the wild animals will multiply around you. 23 But
the Lord your God will
deliver them over to you, throwing them into great confusion until they are
destroyed. 24 He will give their kings into
your hand, and you will wipe out their names from under heaven. No one
will be able to stand up against you; you will destroy them. 25 The
images of their gods you are to burn in the fire. Do not covet the
silver and gold on them, and do not take it for yourselves, or you will be
ensnared by it, for it is detestable to the Lord your God. 26 Do
not bring a detestable thing into your house or you, like it, will be set apart
for destruction. Regard it as vile and utterly detest it, for it is set
apart for destruction.
Do Not Forget the Lord
8 Be careful to follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may
live and increase and may enter and possess the land the Lord promised on oath to your
ancestors. 2 Remember how the Lord your God led you all the
way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order
to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his
commands. 3 He humbled you, causing you to
hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your
ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on
bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. 4 Your
clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty
years. 5 Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so
the Lord your God disciplines
you.
6 Observe the commands of the Lord your
God, walking in obedience to him and revering him. 7 For
the Lord your God is
bringing you into a good land—a land with brooks, streams, and deep springs
gushing out into the valleys and hills; 8 a land
with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive
oil and honey; 9 a land where bread will not
be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and
you can dig copper out of the hills.
10 When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise
the Lord your God for
the good land he has given you. 11 Be careful that
you do not forget the Lord your
God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving
you this day. 12 Otherwise, when you eat and are
satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, 13 and
when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all
you have is multiplied, 14 then your heart will
become proud and you will forget the Lord your
God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 15 He
led you through the vast and dreadful wilderness, that thirsty and
waterless land, with its venomous snakes and scorpions. He brought you
water out of hard rock. 16 He gave you
manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never
known, to humble and test you so that in the end it might go well
with you. 17 You may say to yourself, “My power and the strength of
my hands have produced this wealth for me.” 18 But
remember the Lord your
God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so
confirms his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as it is today.
19 If you ever forget the Lord your God and follow other
gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that
you will surely be destroyed. 20 Like the
nations the Lord destroyed
before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the Lord your God.
Footnotes
- Deuteronomy 6:4 Or The Lord our God is one Lord; or The Lord is our God, the Lord is one; or The Lord is our God, the Lord alone
- Deuteronomy 7:2 The
Hebrew term refers to the irrevocable giving over of things or persons to
the Lord, often by
totally destroying them; also in verse 26.
- Deuteronomy 7:5 That
is, wooden symbols of the goddess Asherah; here and elsewhere in Deuteronomy
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Deuteronomy%206-8&version=NIV