Deuteronomy 9
Not Because of Your Righteousness
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Not by Israel’s Righteousness
9:1Hear, Israel: today you are crossing the Jordan to enter and inherit great nations stronger than you, great cities walled up to heaven,
9:2a great, numerous, and tall people, the descendants of Anak, whom you know and about whom you have heard: Who can stand before the descendants of Anak?
9:3Know today that the Lord your God is the One going ahead of you, a consuming fire. He will destroy them and turn them back before you; you will destroy them, as the Lord told you.
9:4When the Lord your God consumes these nations before you, do not say in your heart: Because of my righteous acts the Lord brought me in to inherit this good land. It is because of these nations' impiety that the Lord will destroy them before you.
9:5You are not entering to inherit their land because of your righteousness or your heart's holiness. Rather, the Lord will destroy these nations before you because of their impiety, and to establish His covenant, which He swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
9:6Know today that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to inherit because of your righteous acts, for you are a stiff-necked people.
The Golden Calf
9:7Remember; do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God in the wilderness. From the day you came out of Egypt until you reached this place, you kept disobeying the Lord.
9:8At Horeb you provoked the Lord, and the Lord was angry enough with you to destroy you.
9:9When I went up the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant the Lord established with you, I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I ate no bread and drank no water.
9:10The Lord gave me the two stone tablets written with God's finger. On them were all the words the Lord spoke to you on the mountain on the day of the assembly.
9:11After forty days and forty nights, the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant.
9:12The Lord said to me: Rise; go down quickly from here, for your people whom you brought out of Egypt have acted lawlessly. They have quickly turned aside from the way you commanded them; they have made themselves a cast image.
9:13The Lord said to me: I have spoken to you once and twice, saying: I have seen this people, and look, it is a stiff-necked people.
9:14Let Me destroy them, and I will blot out their name from under heaven. I will make you into a great nation, stronger and more numerous than this one.
9:15I turned and came down the mountain while the mountain burned with fire, with the two tablets in my two hands.
9:16I saw that you had sinned against the Lord your God: you had made yourselves a cast image and had turned aside from the way the Lord commanded you.
9:17I took hold of the two tablets, threw them from my two hands, and shattered them before you.
9:18I pleaded before the Lord a second time, as at first, forty days and forty nights. I ate no bread and drank no water because of all the sins you committed, doing evil before the Lord your God and provoking Him.
9:19I am terrified because of the anger and fury with which the Lord was provoked against you, intending to destroy you. The Lord listened to me at this time also.
9:20The Lord was very angry with Aaron, intending to destroy him; I prayed for Aaron also at that time.
9:21I took your sin, the calf you had made, burned it with fire, and broke it up, grinding it thoroughly until it became fine. It became like dust, and I threw the dust into the torrent descending from the mountain.
The Wilderness Rebellions
9:22At Burning, Testing, and Graves of Desire you kept provoking the Lord your God.
9:23When the Lord sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying: Go up and inherit the land I give you, you disobeyed the word of the Lord your God; you neither believed Him nor listened to His voice.
9:24You have kept disobeying the Lord from the day He became known to you.
Moses’ Intercessory Prayer
9:25I pleaded before the Lord for those forty days and forty nights during which I pleaded, because the Lord had said He would destroy you.
9:26I prayed to God and said: Lord, Lord, King of the gods, do not destroy Your people and Your portion, whom You redeemed by Your great strength and brought out of Egypt by Your great strength, Your mighty hand, and Your uplifted arm.
9:27Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Your servants, to whom You swore by Yourself. Do not look at this people's stubbornness, impieties, or sins,
9:28lest those living in the land from which You brought us out say: Because the Lord could not bring them into the land He promised them, and because He hated them, He brought them out to kill them in the wilderness.
9:29They are Your people and Your portion, whom You brought out of Egypt by Your great strength and Your uplifted arm.
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Saints Translation · Liturgical reading edition · V1 · working draft awaiting specialist review.