Deuteronomy 29

The Covenant in Moab

1These are the words of the covenant that the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, besides the covenant that he made with them at Horeb.

You Have Seen What the LORD Did in Egypt

2Moses called to all Israel and said to them:

“You yourselves have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh, to all his servants, and to all his land— 3the great trials that your eyes saw, the signs, and those great wonders. 4Yet the LORD has not given you a heart to know, eyes to see, or ears to hear, to this day. 5I led you forty years in the wilderness. Your garments did not wear out upon you, and your sandal did not wear out upon your foot. 6You did not eat bread and did not drink wine or strong drink, so that you might know that I am the LORD your God. 7When you came to this place, Sihon king of Heshbon and Og king of Bashan came out to meet us for battle, and we struck them. 8We took their land and gave it as an inheritance to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh. 9So keep the words of this covenant and do them, so that you may act wisely in all that you do.

You Stand Today before the LORD

10“You are standing today, all of you, before the LORD your God: your heads, your tribes, your elders, your officers, every man of Israel, 11your little children, your wives, and the resident alien who is in the midst of your camp, from the one who cuts your wood to the one who draws your water, 12so that you may enter into the covenant of the LORD your God and into his oath that the LORD your God is making with you today, 13in order to establish you today as his people and that he may be your God, as he spoke to you and as he swore to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 14And not with you alone am I making this covenant and this oath, 15but with whoever is standing here with us today before the LORD our God and with whoever is not here with us today.

Do Not Turn to the Gods of the Nations

16“For you yourselves know how we lived in the land of Egypt and how we passed through the midst of the nations through which you passed. 17You saw their detestable things and their idols of wood and stone, silver and gold, that were among them. 18Lest there be among you a man or woman, clan or tribe, whose heart turns away today from the LORD our God to go and serve the gods of those nations; lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit; 19and when he hears the words of this oath, he blesses himself in his heart, saying, ‘I will have peace, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart,’ so as to sweep away the watered with the thirsty. 20The LORD will not be willing to forgive him, but then the anger of the LORD and his jealousy will smoke against that man, and all the oath written in this book will lie upon him, and the LORD will wipe out his name from under the heavens. 21The LORD will separate him for harm from all the tribes of Israel, according to all the oaths of the covenant written in this book of instruction.

The Land Will Become Sulfur and Salt

22“The generation to come, your children who rise after you, and the foreigner who comes from a distant land will say, when they see the plagues of that land and the sicknesses with which the LORD has afflicted it— 23all its land sulfur and salt, a burning waste, not sown, not sprouting, and no plant rising in it, like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger and fury— 24all the nations will say, ‘Why did the LORD do this to this land? What is the heat of this great anger?’ 25Then they will say, ‘Because they abandoned the covenant of the LORD, the God of their ancestors, which he made with them when he brought them out from the land of Egypt. 26They went and served other gods and bowed down to them, gods whom they had not known and whom he had not allotted to them. 27Then the anger of the LORD burned against that land, to bring upon it every curse written in this book. 28The LORD uprooted them from their ground in anger, fury, and great wrath and threw them into another land, as it is this day.’

The Hidden Things Belong to the LORD

29“The hidden things belong to the LORD our God, but the revealed things belong to us and to our children forever, so that we may do all the words of this instruction.