Deuteronomy 29
1THESE were the words of the covenant, which the Lord commanded Moses to state to the children of Israel, in the land of Moab, over and above thecovenant which He had made with them at Choreb.
2Then Moses called all the sons of Israel, and said to them, You have seen all the things which the Lord did in Egypt, before your eyes, to Pharao and his servants, and all his land—
3those great trials which your eyes have seen, those signs, and those great wonders.
4Now hath not the Lord God given you a heart to know, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, even at this day?
5When He led you forty years in the wilderness, your clothes did not grow too old, nor were your shoes worn out from your feet.
6You did not eat bread, nor drink wine, nor strong drink, that you might know that the Lord I Am is your God.
7And when you came to this place, and Seon, king of Esebon, and Og, king of Basan, came out to meet us in battle, we smote them,
8and took their land, and I have given it to Reuben, and Gad, and to the half of the tribe of Manasses:
9you shall therefore be careful to perform all the words of this covenant.
10In order that you might fully comprehend all that you are to do, you have this day stood, all of you, before the Lord your God, the chiefs of your tribes, and your senate, and your judges, and your officers, every man of Israel,
11your wives, and your children, and the stranger who is in your camp, from the hewer of wood to the drawer of water,
12to enter into a covenant with the Lord your God, and into the curses which the Lord thy God this day stateth to thee,
13that He may establish thee a people for Himself.
14So He Himself will be thy God, as He said to thee, and as He hath sworn to thy fathers, Abraham, and Isaak, and Jacob. Now I make this covenant, and this oath,
15not with you only, but both with those who are here this day, with you before the Lord your God, and with those who are not here with you this day.
16Inasmuch as you know how we lived in the land of Egypt,
17and have seen, as we passed through the nations, through which you passed, their abominations and their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which are among them;
18is there any man among you, or any woman, or family, or tribe, whose understanding hath turned them from the Lord your God, to go and serve the gods of those nations? Is there any such root among you, springing up for gall and bitterness?
19Now in case anyone shall hear the words of this curse, and bless himself in his heart, saying, Good luck betide me! I will walk in the error of my own heart, that the sinner may not involve the guiltless in ruin with himself.
20God will not be propitious to him, but most assuredly the anger of the Lord, and His indignation, will then be kindled against that man; and all the curses of this covenant, which are written in this book, shall cleave to him;
21and the Lord will blot out his name from under heaven. The Lord will indeed separate him, from all the children of Israel, according to all the curses of this covenant, which are written in this book of the law.
22And when the generations to come—your children who shall rise up after you, and the stranger who may come from a far distant country, will say—when they shall see the plagues of that land, and the diseases thereof, which the Lord hath sent upon it—
23brimstone and burnt salt—when through the whole land there shall be no sowing—no natural productions, no verdure on it, a destruction like that of Sodom and Gomorra, Adama and Seboim, which the Lord overthrew with wrath and indignation—
24When all the nations shall say, Why hath the Lord dealt thus with this land? What hath occasioned this great fierceness of indignation?
25Then they will say, Because they forsook the covenant of the Lord, the God of their fathers, which He made with their fathers, when He brought them out of the land of Egypt, and went and served strange gods, which they did not know, and which He had not arranged for them,
27therefore the Lord was provoked to wrath against this land, to bring upon it all the curses which are written in the book of the law,
28and the Lord rooted them out from their land, with wrath, and anger, and very great indignation, and cast them out into another land, as at this day.
29The things which are secret are for the Lord our God; but the things which are manifest are for us and our children forever, that we may perform all the words of this law.