Reiteration of the Call to Obedience

1You must love the Lord your God and do what he requires; keep his statutes, ordinances, and commandments at all times. 2Bear in mind today that I am not speaking to your children who have not personally experienced the judgments of the Lord your God, which revealed his greatness, strength, and power. 3They did not see the awesome deeds he performed in the midst of Egypt against Pharaoh king of Egypt and his whole land, 4or what he did to the army of Egypt, including their horses and chariots, when he made the waters of the Red Sea overwhelm them while they were pursuing you and he annihilated them. 5They did not see what he did to you in the desert before you reached this place, 6or what he did to Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab the Reubenite, when the earth opened its mouth in the middle of the Israelite camp and swallowed them, their families, their tents, and all the property they brought with them. 7I am speaking to you because you are the ones who saw all the great deeds of the Lord!

The Abundance of the Land of Promise

8Now pay attention to all the commandments I am giving you today, so that you may be strong enough to enter and possess the land where you are headed, 9and that you may enjoy long life in the land the Lord promised to give to your ancestors and their descendants, a land flowing with milk and honey. 10For the land where you are headed is not like the land of Egypt from which you came, a land where you planted seed and which you irrigated by hand like a vegetable garden. 11Instead, the land you are crossing the Jordan to occupy is one of hills and valleys, a land that drinks in water from the rains, 12a land the Lord your God looks after. He is constantly attentive to it from the beginning to the end of the year. 13Now, if you pay close attention to my commandments that I am giving you today and love the Lord your God and serve him with all your mind and being, 14then he promises, “I will send rain for your land in its season, the autumn and the spring rains, so that you may gather in your grain, new wine, and olive oil. 15I will provide pasture for your livestock and you will eat your fill.”

Exhortation to Instruction and Obedience

16Make sure you do not turn away to serve and worship other gods! 17Then the anger of the Lord will erupt against you and he will close up the sky so that it does not rain. The land will not yield its produce, and you will soon be removed from the good land that the Lord is about to give you. 18Fix these words of mine into your mind and being, and tie them as a reminder on your hands and let them be symbols on your forehead. 19Teach them to your children and speak of them as you sit in your house, as you walk along the road, as you lie down, and as you get up. 20Inscribe them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates 21so that your days and those of your descendants may be extended in the land which the Lord promised to give to your ancestors, like the days of heaven itself. 22For if you carefully observe all of these commandments I am giving you and love the Lord your God, live according to his standards, and remain loyal to him, 23then he will drive out all these nations ahead of you, and you will dispossess nations greater and stronger than you. 24Every place you set your foot will be yours; your border will extend from the desert to Lebanon and from the River (that is, the Euphrates) as far as the Mediterranean Sea. 25Nobody will be able to resist you; the Lord your God will spread the fear and terror of you over the whole land on which you walk, just as he promised you.

Anticipation of a Blessing and Cursing Ceremony

26Take note – I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse: 27the blessing if you take to heart the commandments of the Lord your God that I am giving you today, 28and the curse if you pay no attention to his commandments and turn from the way I am setting before you today to pursue other gods you have not known. 29When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are to possess, you must pronounce the blessing on Mount Gerizim and the curse on Mount Ebal. 30Are they not across the Jordan River, toward the west, in the land of the Canaanites who live in the Arabah opposite Gilgal near the oak of Moreh? 31For you are about to cross the Jordan to possess the land the Lord your God is giving you, and you will possess and inhabit it. 32Be certain to keep all the statutes and ordinances that I am presenting to you today.