Deuteronomy 4 - New American Standard Bible 1995 (NASB1995)

Israel Urged to Obey God’s Law

4 “Now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the judgments which ^(A)I am teaching you to perform, so that ^(B)you may live and go in and take possession of the land which the Lord, the God of your fathers, is giving you. ^{2 (C)}You shall not add to the word which ^(D)I am commanding you, nor take away from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you. ^{3 (E)}Your eyes have seen what the Lord has done in the case of Baal-peor, for all the men who followed Baal-peor, the Lord your God has destroyed ^[a]them from among you. ⁴ But you who held fast to the Lord your God are alive today, every one of you.

⁵ “See, I have taught you statutes and judgments ^(F)just as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do thus in the land where you are entering to possess it. ⁶ So keep and do them, ^(G)for that is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ ⁷ For ^(H)what great nation is there that has a god ^(I)so near to it as is the Lord our God ^(J)whenever we call on Him? ⁸ Or what great nation is there that has ^(K)statutes and judgments as righteous as this whole law which I am setting before you today?

⁹ “Only ^(L)give heed to yourself and keep your soul diligently, so that you do not forget the things which your eyes have seen and they do not depart from your heart ^(M)all the days of your life; but ^(N)make them known to your sons and your grandsons. ¹⁰ Remember the day you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb, when the Lord said to me, ‘Assemble the people to Me, that I may let them hear My words ^(O)so they may learn to ^[b]fear Me all the days they live on the earth, and that they may ^(P)teach their children.’ ¹¹ You came near and stood at the foot of the mountain, ^(Q)and the mountain burned with fire to the very heart of the heavens: darkness, cloud and thick gloom. ¹² Then the Lord spoke to you from the midst of the fire; you heard the sound of words, but you saw no form—only a voice. ¹³ So He declared to you His covenant which He commanded you to perform, that is, ^(R)the Ten ^[c]Commandments; and ^(S)He wrote them on two tablets of stone. ¹⁴ The Lord commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments, that you might perform them in the land where you are going over to possess it.

¹⁵ “So ^(T)watch yourselves carefully, since you did not see any ^(U)form on the day the Lord spoke to you at Horeb from the midst of the fire, ¹⁶ so that you do not ^(V)act corruptly and ^(W)make a graven image for yourselves in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, ¹⁷ the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of ^(X)any winged bird that flies in the sky, ¹⁸ the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water below the earth. ¹⁹ And beware not to lift up your eyes to heaven and see the sun and the moon and the stars, ^(Y)all the host of heaven, ^(Z)and be drawn away and worship them and serve them, those which the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven. ²⁰ But the Lord has taken you and brought you out of ^(AA)the iron furnace, from Egypt, to ^(AB)be a people for His own possession, as today.

²¹ “^(AC)Now the Lord was angry with me on your account, and swore that I would not cross the Jordan, and that I would not enter the good land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance. ²² For ^(AD)I will die in this land, I shall not cross the Jordan, but you shall cross and take possession of this ^(AE)good land. ²³ So watch yourselves, ^(AF)that you do not forget the covenant of the Lord your God which He made with you, and ^(AG)make for yourselves a graven image in the form of anything against which the Lord your God has commanded you. ²⁴ For the Lord your God is a ^(AH)consuming fire, a ^(AI)jealous God.

²⁵ “When you ^[d]become the father of children and children’s children and have remained long in the land, and ^(AJ)act corruptly, and ^(AK)make an ^[e]idol in the form of anything, and ^(AL)do that which is evil in the sight of the Lord your God so as to provoke Him to anger, ²⁶ I ^(AM)call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you will ^(AN)surely perish quickly from the land where you are going over the Jordan to possess it. You shall not ^[f]live long on it, but will be utterly destroyed. ²⁷ The Lord will ^(AO)scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the Lord drives you. ^{28 (AP)}There you will serve gods, the work of man’s hands, ^(AQ)wood and stone, ^(AR)which neither see nor hear nor eat nor smell. ^{29 (AS)}But from there you will seek the Lord your God, and you will find Him if you search for Him ^(AT)with all your heart and all your soul. ³⁰ When you ^(AU)are in distress and all these things have come upon you, ^(AV)in the latter days ^(AW)you will return to the Lord your God and listen to His voice. ³¹ For the Lord your God is a ^(AX)compassionate God; ^(AY)He will not fail you nor ^(AZ)destroy you nor ^(BA)forget the covenant with your fathers which He swore to them.

³² “Indeed, ^(BB)ask now concerning the former days which were before you, since the ^(BC)day that God created ^[g]man on the earth, and inquire ^(BD)from one end of the heavens to the other. ^(BE)Has anything been done like this great thing, or has anything been heard like it? ^{33 (BF)}Has any people heard the voice of God speaking from the midst of the fire, as you have heard it, and survived? ^{34 (BG)}Or has a god tried to go to take for himself a nation from within another nation ^(BH)by trials, by signs and wonders and by war and ^(BI)by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm and by great terrors, ^[h]as the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? ³⁵ To you it was shown that you might know that the Lord, He is God; ^(BJ)there is no other besides Him. ^{36 (BK)}Out of the heavens He let you hear His voice ^(BL)to discipline you; and on earth He let you see His great fire, and you heard His words from the midst of the fire. ^{37 [i](BM)}Because He loved your fathers, therefore He chose ^[j]their descendants after them. And He ^[k](BN)personally brought you from Egypt by His great power, ³⁸ driving out from before you nations greater and mightier than you, to bring you in and ^(BO)to give you their land for an inheritance, as it is today. ³⁹ Know therefore today, and take it to your heart, that ^(BP)the Lord, He is God in heaven above and on the earth below; there is no other. ^{40 (BQ)}So you shall keep His statutes and His commandments which I am ^[l]giving you today, that ^(BR)it may go well with you and with your children after you, and ^(BS)that you may ^[m]live long on the land which the Lord your God is giving you for all time.”

^{41 (BT)}Then Moses set apart three cities across the Jordan to the ^[n]east, ⁴² that a manslayer might flee there, who unintentionally slew his neighbor without having enmity toward him in time past; and by fleeing to one of these cities he might live: ^{43 (BU)}Bezer in the wilderness on the plateau for the Reubenites, and Ramoth in Gilead for the Gadites, and Golan in Bashan for the Manassites.

⁴⁴ Now this is the law which Moses set before the sons of Israel; ⁴⁵ these are the testimonies and the statutes and the ordinances which Moses spoke to the sons of Israel, when they came out from Egypt, ⁴⁶ across the Jordan, in the valley ^(BV)opposite Beth-peor, in the land of ^(BW)Sihon king of the Amorites who lived at Heshbon, whom Moses and the sons of Israel ^[o]defeated when they came out from Egypt. ⁴⁷ They took possession of his land and the land of ^(BX)Og king of Bashan, the two kings of the Amorites, who were across the Jordan to the ^[p]east, ⁴⁸ from ^(BY)Aroer, which is on the edge of the ^[q]valley of Arnon, even as far as ^(BZ)Mount Sion (that is, Hermon), ⁴⁹ with all the Arabah across the Jordan to the east, even as far as the sea of the Arabah, ^[r]at the foot of the slopes of Pisgah.

Footnotes

1. Deuteronomy 4:3 Lit him
2. Deuteronomy 4:10 Or reverence
3. Deuteronomy 4:13 Lit Words
4. Deuteronomy 4:25 Lit beget
5. Deuteronomy 4:25 Or a graven image
6. Deuteronomy 4:26 Lit prolong your days
7. Deuteronomy 4:32 Or Adam
8. Deuteronomy 4:34 Lit according to all that
9. Deuteronomy 4:37 Lit And instead, because
10. Deuteronomy 4:37 Lit his seed
11. Deuteronomy 4:37 Lit with His presence
12. Deuteronomy 4:40 Lit commanding
13. Deuteronomy 4:40 Lit prolong your days
14. Deuteronomy 4:41 Lit sunrise
15. Deuteronomy 4:46 Lit smote
16. Deuteronomy 4:47 Lit sunrise
17. Deuteronomy 4:48 Or wadi
18. Deuteronomy 4:49 Lit under

Cross references

1. Deuteronomy 4:1 : Deut 1:3
2. Deuteronomy 4:1 : Lev 18:5; Deut 5:33; 8:1; 16:20; 30:16, 19; Ezek 20:11; Rom 10:5
3. Deuteronomy 4:2 : Deut 12:32; Prov 30:6; Rev 22:18
4. Deuteronomy 4:2 : Deut 4:5, 14, 40
5. Deuteronomy 4:3 : Num 25:1-9
6. Deuteronomy 4:5 : Lev 26:46; 27:34
7. Deuteronomy 4:6 : Deut 30:19, 20; 32:46, 47; Job 28:28; Ps 19:7; 111:10; Prov 1:7; 2 Tim 3:15
8. Deuteronomy 4:7 : Deut 4:32-34; 2 Sam 7:23
9. Deuteronomy 4:7 : Ps 34:17, 18; 145:18; 148:14; Is 55:6
10. Deuteronomy 4:7 : Ps 34:18; 85:9
11. Deuteronomy 4:8 : Ps 89:14; 97:2; 119:144, 160, 172
12. Deuteronomy 4:9 : Deut 4:23; 6:12; 8:11, 14, 19; Prov 4:23; 23:19
13. Deuteronomy 4:9 : Deut 6:2; 12:1; 16:3
14. Deuteronomy 4:9 : Gen 18:19; Deut 4:10; 6:7, 20-25; 11:19; 32:46; Ps 78:5, 6; Prov 22:6; Eph 6:4
15. Deuteronomy 4:10 : Deut 14:23; 17:19; 31:12, 13
16. Deuteronomy 4:10 : Deut 4:9
17. Deuteronomy 4:11 : Ex 19:18; Heb 12:18, 19
18. Deuteronomy 4:13 : Ex 34:28; Deut 10:4
19. Deuteronomy 4:13 : Ex 31:18; 34:1, 28
20. Deuteronomy 4:15 : Josh 23:11
21. Deuteronomy 4:15 : Is 40:18
22. Deuteronomy 4:16 : Deut 4:25; 9:12; 31:29
23. Deuteronomy 4:16 : Ex 20:4; Lev 26:1; Deut 5:8, 9; 27:15; Rom 1:23
24. Deuteronomy 4:17 : Rom 1:23
25. Deuteronomy 4:19 : Gen 2:1; Deut 17:3; 2 Kin 17:16; 21:3
26. Deuteronomy 4:19 : Deut 13:5, 10; Job 31:26-28
27. Deuteronomy 4:20 : 1 Kin 8:51; Jer 11:4
28. Deuteronomy 4:20 : Ex 19:5; Deut 7:6; 14:2; 26:18; Titus 2:14; 1 Pet 2:9
29. Deuteronomy 4:21 : Num 20:12; Deut 1:37
30. Deuteronomy 4:22 : Num 27:13, 14
31. Deuteronomy 4:22 : Deut 3:25
32. Deuteronomy 4:23 : Deut 4:9
33. Deuteronomy 4:23 : Deut 4:16
34. Deuteronomy 4:24 : Ex 24:17; Deut 9:3; Is 30:27; 33:14; Heb 12:29
35. Deuteronomy 4:24 : Deut 5:9; 6:15
36. Deuteronomy 4:25 : Deut 4:16
37. Deuteronomy 4:25 : Deut 4:23
38. Deuteronomy 4:25 : 2 Kin 17:17
39. Deuteronomy 4:26 : Deut 30:19; 31:28; 32:1; Is 1:2; Mic 6:2
40. Deuteronomy 4:26 : Deut 7:4; 8:19, 20
41. Deuteronomy 4:27 : Lev 26:33; Deut 28:64; 29:28; Neh 1:8
42. Deuteronomy 4:28 : Deut 28:36, 64; Jer 16:13
43. Deuteronomy 4:28 : Deut 29:17
44. Deuteronomy 4:28 : Ps 115:4-8; 135:15-18; Is 44:12-20
45. Deuteronomy 4:29 : Deut 30:1-3, 10; 2 Chr 15:4; Is 55:6; Jer 29:13
46. Deuteronomy 4:29 : Deut 6:5; 10:12
47. Deuteronomy 4:30 : Ps 18:6; 59:16; 107:6, 13
48. Deuteronomy 4:30 : Deut 31:29; Jer 23:20; Hos 3:5; Heb 1:2
49. Deuteronomy 4:30 : Jer 4:1, 2
50. Deuteronomy 4:31 : Ex 34:6; 2 Chr 30:9; Neh 9:31; Ps 103:8; 111:4; 116:5; Jon 4:2
51. Deuteronomy 4:31 : Deut 31:6, 8; Josh 1:5; 1 Chr 28:20; Heb 13:5
52. Deuteronomy 4:31 : Jer 30:11
53. Deuteronomy 4:31 : Lev 26:45
54. Deuteronomy 4:32 : Deut 32:7; Job 8:8
55. Deuteronomy 4:32 : Gen 1:27; Is 45:12
56. Deuteronomy 4:32 : Deut 28:64; Matt 24:31
57. Deuteronomy 4:32 : Deut 4:7; 2 Sam 7:23
58. Deuteronomy 4:33 : Ex 20:22; Deut 5:24, 26
59. Deuteronomy 4:34 : Ex 14:30; Deut 33:29
60. Deuteronomy 4:34 : Deut 7:19
61. Deuteronomy 4:34 : Deut 5:15; 6:21; Ps 136:12
62. Deuteronomy 4:35 : Ex 8:10; 9:14; Deut 4:39; 32:12, 39; 1 Sam 2:2; Is 43:10-12; 44:6-8; 45:5-7; Mark 12:32
63. Deuteronomy 4:36 : Ex 19:9, 19; 20:18, 22; Deut 4:33; Neh 9:13; Heb 12:25
64. Deuteronomy 4:36 : Deut 8:5
65. Deuteronomy 4:37 : Deut 7:7, 8; 10:15; 33:3
66. Deuteronomy 4:37 : Ex 33:14; Is 63:9
67. Deuteronomy 4:38 : Num 32:4; 34:14, 15
68. Deuteronomy 4:39 : Deut 4:35; Josh 2:11
69. Deuteronomy 4:40 : Lev 22:31; Deut 4:2; Ps 105:45
70. Deuteronomy 4:40 : Deut 4:1; 5:16, 29, 33; 6:3, 18; 12:25, 28; 22:7
71. Deuteronomy 4:40 : Ex 23:26; Deut 32:47
72. Deuteronomy 4:41 : Num 35:6; Deut 19:2-13; Josh 20:7-9
73. Deuteronomy 4:43 : Josh 20:8
74. Deuteronomy 4:46 : Deut 3:29
75. Deuteronomy 4:46 : Num 21:21-25
76. Deuteronomy 4:47 : Deut 1:4; 3:3, 4
77. Deuteronomy 4:48 : Deut 2:36; 3:12
78. Deuteronomy 4:48 : Deut 3:9; Ps 133:3