Chapter 9.
Hear, O Israel, thou art to pass over Jordan this day, to go in to possess
nations greater and mightier than thyself, cities great and fenced up to heaven,
a people great and tall, the children of the Anakims, whom thou knowest,
and of whom thou hast heard say, Who can stand before the children of Anak?
Understand, therefore, this day, that the Lord thy God is he which goeth
over before thee, as a consuming fire he shall destroy them, and he shall bring
them down before thy face.
So shalt thou drive them out, and destroy them quickly, as the Lord hath said unto
thee, Speak not thou in thine heart, after that the Lord thy God hath cast them
out from before thee, saying, For my righteousness the Lord hath brought me in
to possess this land, but for the wickedness of these nations the Lord doth
drive them out from before thee.
Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go
to possess their land, but for the wickedness of these nations the Lord thy
God doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which the
Lord swear unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Understand, therefore, that the Lord thy God giveth thee not this good land to
possess it for thy righteousness, for thou art a stiff-necked people.
Remember, and forget not, how thou provokest the Lord thy God to wrath in the
wilderness.
From the day that thou didst depart out of the land of Egypt until ye came unto this
place, ye have been rebellious against the Lord.
Also in Horeb ye provoked the Lord to wrath, so that the Lord was angry with you
to have destroyed you.
When I was gone up unto the mount to receive the tables of stone, even the
tables of the covenant which the Lord made with you, then I abode in the mount forty
days and forty nights.
I neither did eat bread nor drink water, and the Lord delivered unto me two tables
of stone written with the finger of God, and on them was written according to all
the words which the Lord spake with you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in
the day of the assembly.
And it came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights that the Lord gave
me the two tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant.
And the Lord said unto me, Arise, get thee down quickly from hence,
for thy people which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted
themselves.
They are quickly turned aside out of the way which I commanded them.
They have made them a molten image.
Furthermore the Lord spake unto me, saying, I have seen this people,
and behold, it is a stiff-necked people.
Let me alone that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven,
and I will make of thee a nation mightier and greater than they.
So I turned and came down from the mount, and the mount burned with fire,
and the two tables of the covenant were in my two hands.
And I looked, and behold, ye had sinned against the Lord your God and had made you
a molten calf.
Ye had turned aside quickly out of the way which the Lord had commanded you,
and I took the two tables and cast them out of my two hands and break them before
your eyes.
And I fell down before the Lord, as at the first forty days and forty
nights.
I did neither eat bread nor drink water because of all your sins which ye sinned
in doing wickedly in the sight of the Lord to provoke him to anger.
For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure wherewith the Lord was wroth
against you to destroy you.
But the Lord hearkened unto me at that time also, and the Lord was very angry
with Aaron to have destroyed him.
And I prayed for Aaron also the same time.
And I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped
it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust.
And I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the mount,
and at Taborah, and at Massah, and at Kibrothatehah.
Ye provoked the Lord to wrath.
Likewise, when the Lord sent you from Kadesh Barnea, saying, Go up, and possess
the land which I have given you.
Then ye rebelled against the commandment of the Lord your God, and ye believed him
not, nor hearkened to his voice.
Ye have been rebellious against the Lord from the day that I knew you.
Thus I fell down before the Lord forty days and forty nights, as I fell down at
the first, because the Lord had said he would destroy you.
I prayed therefore unto the Lord, and said, O Lord God, destroy not thy
people and thine inheritance, which thou hast redeemed through thy greatness,
which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand.
Remember thy servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Look not unto the stubbornness of this people, nor to their wickedness,
nor to their sin, lest the land whence thou broughtest us out say, Because the
Lord was not able to bring them into the land which he promised them, and because
he hated them, he hath brought them out to slay them in the wilderness.
Yet they are thy people and thine inheritance, which thou broughtest out by
thy mighty power and by thy stretched out arm.
Amen.