¹These are the words which Moses spoke to the whole of Israel across the Jordan in the desert, in the arid tract opposite Suph, between Paran and Tophel, and Laban and Hazeroth and Di-Zahab, ²it being eleven days' journey from Horeb, by the route of Mount Seir to Kadesh-Barnea. ³Now it came to pass in the fortieth year, in the eleventh month, on the first day of the month, that Moses spoke to the sons of Israel, according to everything that the Lord had commanded him to pass on to them, ⁴after he had defeated Sihon king of the Amorites who lived in Heshbon, and Og king of Bashan who lived in Ashtaroth in Edrei. ⁵Across the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses started to expound this law, and he said, ⁶“The Lord our God spoke to us at Horeb and said, ‘You have dwelt long enough at this mountain. ⁷Wend your way and get yourselves moving and go to the mount of the Amorites and all its neighbouring areas in the arid tract, on the mountain, and in the lowland, and in the south and at the coast of the sea – the land of the Canaanite, and Lebanon – as far as the great river, the River Euphrates. ⁸Look, I have put the land in front of you. Come and take possession of the land about which the Lord swore to your fathers – to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob – that he would give it to them and to their seed after them.’ ⁹And I spoke to you at that time and said, ‘I cannot bear you on my own. ¹⁰The Lord your God has increased you, and here you are today like the stars of the sky in abundance.’ ¹¹(May the Lord, the God of your fathers, increase you to be a thousand times what you are, and may he bless you, as he has said to you.) ¹²‘How can I bear your vexatiousness and your burdensomeness and your strife on my own? ¹³Appoint for yourselves wise, intelligent and knowledgeable men according to your tribes, and I will set them up as your heads.’ ¹⁴And you answered me and said, ‘The matter which you have spoken is right to do.’ ¹⁵So I took the heads of your tribes, wise and knowledgeable men, and I appointed them as heads over you, commanders of a thousand and commanders of a hundred and commanders of fifty and commanders of ten, and officers, according to your tribes. ¹⁶And I instructed your judges at that time, and I said, ‘Hear the case between your brothers and judge justly between a man and his brother and the foreigner with him. ¹⁷You shall not show partiality in judgment: you shall hear the small in the same way as the great; you shall not be afraid of any man, for judgment is of concern to God, and if a case is too hard for you, bring it to me, and I will hear it.’ ¹⁸Then I commanded you at that time as to all the things that you should do. ¹⁹Then we moved from Horeb, and we went through all that great and fearful desert which you have seen – the way of the mount of the Amorites – as the Lord our God commanded us, and we came to Kadesh-Barnea. ²⁰And I said to you, ‘You have come to the mount of the Amorites which the Lord our God is giving us. ²¹See, the Lord your God has put the land in front of you. Go up and take possession of it as the Lord God of your fathers has said to you. Do not fear and do not be afraid.’ ²²And you all approached me and said, ‘We will send men on ahead of us, and they will investigate the land for us and report back to us on the way by which we should go up, and on the cities to which we should go.’ ²³And I approved of the matter, and I took twelve of your men, one man per tribe. ²⁴And they wended their way, and they went up to the mountain, and they came to the Brook of Eshcol, and they spied it out. ²⁵And they took some of the fruit of the land in their hand, and they brought it down to us, and they reported back to us, and they said, ‘The land which the Lord our God is giving us is good.’ ²⁶But you were not willing to go up, and you resisted the instruction of the Lord your God. ²⁷And you rebelled in your tents, and you said, ‘In his hatred of us the Lord has brought us out of the land of Egypt to deliver us into the hand of the Amorite to destroy us. ²⁸To where can we go up? Our brothers have made us faint-hearted, and they said, «The people are greater and more powerful than we are, the cities are large and fortified to the sky, and we have also seen the sons of the Anakites there.» ’ ²⁹But I said to you, ‘Do not be terrified and do not fear them. ³⁰The Lord your God, who goes before you – he will fight for you, just as everything that he did with you in Egypt before your eyes, ³¹and in the desert, where you have seen that the Lord your God put up with you as a man puts up with his own son, in all the way you went, as far as you arriving at this place.’ ³²Yet in this matter you do not believe the Lord your God, ³³who goes before you on the way, to search out a place for you, for you to encamp, in fire at night to show you the way you must go, and in the cloud by day. ³⁴Now when the Lord heard the sound of your words, he became angry, and he swore and said, ³⁵‘Assuredly not a man among these men – this evil generation – will see the good land which I swore to give your fathers, ³⁶except Caleb the son of Jephunneh. He will see it, and I will give him the land which he has trodden on, and his sons, because he has been fully committed to the Lord.’ ³⁷The Lord also became angry with me, because of you, and he said, ‘Neither will you go there. ³⁸Joshua the son of Nun, who is standing before you – he will go there. Strengthen him, because he will enable Israel to inherit it. ³⁹But your little ones, whom you said would be spoil, and your sons who do not currently know good and evil – they will go in there, and I will give it to them, and they will take possession of it. ⁴⁰But as for you, wend your way and move to the desert by the way of the Red Sea.’ ⁴¹Then you answered and said to me, ‘We have sinned against the Lord; we will go up and fight according to everything that the Lord our God commands us.’ And each of you girded on his weapons of war, and you presumed to go up the mountain. ⁴²And the Lord said to me, ‘Say to them, «You shall not go up, and you shall not fight, for I am not in your midst, so that you do not get struck down by your enemies.» ’ ⁴³So I spoke to you, but you would not listen, and you rebelled against the instruction of the Lord, and you acted insolently and went up the mountain. ⁴⁴And the Amorite who lives on that mountain came out against you and pursued you as bees do, and they routed you in Seir and as far as Hormah. ⁴⁵Then you came back and wept before the Lord, but the Lord did not heed you and did not hearken to you. ⁴⁶And you dwelt in Kadesh for many days; such were the days you dwelt there.