The Song of Moses

1Attend, O heaven, and I will speak; and let the earth hear the words out of my mouth.

2Let my speech be looked for as the rain, and my words come down as dew, as the shower upon the herbage, and as snow upon the grass.

3For I have called on the name of the Lord: assign ye greatness to our God.

4As for God, his works are true, and all his ways are judgment: God is faithful, and there is no unrighteousness in him; just and holy is the Lord.

5They have sinned, not pleasing him; spotted children, a froward and perverse generation.

6Do ye thus recompense the Lord? is the people thus foolish and unwise? did not he himself thy father purchase thee, and make thee, and form thee?

7Remember the days of old, consider the years for past ages: ask thy father, and he shall relate to thee, thine elders, and they shall tell thee.

8When the Most High divided the nations, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the nations according to the number of the angels of God.

9And his people Jacob became the portion of the Lord, Israel was the line of his inheritance.

10He maintained him in the wilderness, in burning thirst and a dry land: he led him about and instructed him, and kept him as the apple of an eye.

11As an eagle would watch over his brood, and yearns over his young, receives them having spread his wings, and takes them up on his back:

12the Lord alone led them, there was no strange god with them.

13He brought them up on the strength of the land; he fed them with the fruits of the fields; they sucked honey out of the rock, and oil out of the solid rock.

14Butter of cows, and milk of sheep, with the fat of lambs and rams, of calves and kids, with fat of kidneys of wheat; and he drank wine, the blood of the grape.

15So Jacob ate and was filled, and the beloved one kicked; he grew fat, he became thick and broad: then he forsook the God that made him, and departed from God his Saviour.

16They provoked me to anger with strange gods; with their abominations they bitterly angered me.

17They sacrificed to devils, and not to God; to gods whom they knew not: new and fresh gods came in, whom their fathers knew not.

18Thou hast forsaken God that begot thee, and forgotten God who feeds thee.

19And the Lord saw, and was jealous; and was provoked by the anger of his sons and daughters,

20and said, I will turn away my face from them, and will show what shall happen to them in the last days; for it is a perverse generation, sons in whom is no faith.

21They have provoked me to jealousy with that which is not God, they have exasperated me with their idols; and I will provoke them to jealousy with them that are no nation, I will anger them with a nation void of understanding.

22For a fire has been kindled out of my wrath, it shall burn to hell below; it shall devour the land, and the fruits of it; it shall set on fire the foundations of the mountains.

23I will gather evils upon them, and will fight with my weapons against them.

24They shall be consumed with hunger and the devouring of birds, and there shall be irremediable destruction: I will send forth against them the teeth of wild beasts, with the rage of serpents creeping on the ground.

25Without, the sword shall bereave them of children, and terror shall issue out of the secret chambers; the young man shall perish with the virgin, the suckling with him who has grown old.

26I said, I will scatter them, and I will cause their memorial to cease from among men.

27Were it not for the wrath of the enemy, lest they should live long, lest their enemies should combine against them; lest they should say, Our own high arm, and not the Lord, has done all these things.

28It is a nation that has lost counsel, neither is there understanding in them.

29They had not sense to understand: let them reserve these things against the time to come.

30How should one pursue a thousand, and two rout tens of thousands, if God had not sold them, and the Lord delivered them up?

31For their gods are not as our God, but our enemies are void of understanding.

32For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and their vine-branch of Gomorrha: their grape is a grape of gall, their cluster is one of bitterness.

33Their wine is the rage of serpents, and the incurable rage of asps.

34Lo! are not these things stored up by me, and sealed among my treasures?

35In the day of vengeance I will recompense, whensoever their foot shall be tripped up; for the day of their destruction is near to them, and the judgments at hand are close upon you.

36For the Lord shall judge his people, and shall be comforted over his servants; for he saw that they were utterly weakened, and failed in the hostile invasion, and were become feeble:

37and the Lord said, Where are their gods on whom they trusted?

38the fat of whose sacrifices ye ate, and ye drank the wine of their drink-offerings? let them arise and help you, and be your protectors.

39Behold, behold that I am he, and there is no god beside me: I kill, and I will make to live: I will smite, and I will heal; and there is none who shall deliver out of my hands.

40For I will lift up my hand to heaven, and swear by my right hand, and I will say, I live for ever.

41For I will sharpen my sword like lightning, and my hand shall take hold of judgment; and I will render judgment to my enemies, and will recompense them that hate me.

42I will make my weapons drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh, it shall glut itself with the blood of the wounded, and from the captivity of the heads of their enemies that rule over them.

43Rejoice, ye heavens, with him, and let all the angels of God worship him; rejoice ye Gentiles, with his people, and let all the sons of God strengthen themselves in him; for he will avenge the blood of his sons, and he will render vengeance, and recompense justice to his enemies, and will reward them that hate him; and the Lord shall purge the land of his people.

44And Moses wrote this song in that day, and taught it to the children of Israel; and Moses went in and spoke all the words of this law in the ears of the people, he and Joshua the son of Naue. 45And Moses finished speaking to all Israel. 46And he said to them, Take heed with your heart to all these words, which I testify to you this day, which ye shall command your sons, to observe and do all the words of this law. 47For this is no vain word to you; for it is your life, and because of this word ye shall live long upon the land, into which ye go over Jordan to inherit it.

Moses’ Death Foretold

48And the Lord spoke to Moses in this day, saying, 49Go up to the mount Abarim, this mountain Nabau which is in the land of Moab over against Jericho, and behold the land of Chanaan, which I give to the sons of Israel: 50and die in the mount whither thou goest up, and be added to thy people; as Aaron thy brother died in mount Or, and was added to his people. 51Because ye disobeyed my word among the children of Israel, at the waters of strife of Cades in the wilderness of Sin; because ye sanctified me not among the sons of Israel. 52Thou shalt see the land before thee, but thou shalt not enter into it.