Deuteronomy 32
1 “Give ear, O heavens, and I speak; And you hear, O earth, sayings of my mouth!
Give ear, O heavens, to my voice; let the earth take note of the words of my mouth:
2 My doctrine drops as rain; My sayings flow as dew; As storms on the tender grass, And as showers on the herb,
My teaching is dropping like rain, coming down like dew on the fields; like rain on the young grass and showers on the garden plants:
3 For I proclaim the Name of YHWH; Ascribe greatness to our God!
For I will give honour to the name of the Lord: let our God be named great.
4 The Rock—His work [is] perfect, For all His ways [are] just; God of steadfastness, and without iniquity; Righteous and upright [is] He.
He is the Rock, complete is his work; for all his ways are righteousness: a God without evil who keeps faith, true and upright is he.
5 It has done corruptly to Him; Their blemish is not of His sons, A generation perverse and crooked!
They have become false, they are not his children, the mark of sin is on them; they are an evil and hard-hearted generation.
6 Do you act thus to YHWH, O people foolish and not wise? Is He not your Father—He who bought you? He made you, and establishes you.
Is this your answer to the Lord, O foolish people and unwise? Is he not your father who has given you life? He has made you and given you your place.
7 Remember days of old—Understand the years of many generations—Ask your father, and he tells you; Your elderly, and they say to you:
Keep in mind the days of the past, give thought to the years of generations gone by: go to your father and he will make it clear to you, to the old men and they will give you the story.
8 In the Most High causing nations to inherit, In His separating sons of Adam—He sets up the borders of the peoples By the number of the sons of God [[or sons of Israel]].
When the Most High gave the nations their heritage, separating into groups the children of men, he had the limits of the peoples marked out, keeping in mind the number of the children of Israel.
9 For YHWH’s portion [is] His people, Jacob [is] the line of His inheritance.
For the Lord's wealth is his people; Jacob is the land of his heritage.
10 He finds him in a land—a desert, And in a void—a howling wilderness, He turns him around—He causes him to understand—He keeps him as the apple of His eye.
He came to him in the waste land, in the unpeopled waste of sand: putting his arms round him and caring for him, he kept him as the light of his eye.
11 As an eagle wakes up its nest, Flutters over its young ones, Spreads its wings [and] takes them, Carries them on its pinions—
As an eagle, teaching her young to make their flight, with her wings outstretched over them, takes them up on her strong feathers:
12 YHWH alone leads him, And there is no strange god with him.
So the Lord only was his guide, no other god was with him.
13 He makes him ride on high places of earth, And he eats increase of the fields, And He makes him suck honey from a rock, And oil out of the flint of a rock;
He put him on the high places of the earth, his food was the increase of the field; honey he gave him out of the rock and oil out of the hard rock;
14 Butter of the herd, and milk of the flock, With fat of lambs, and rams of sons of Bashan, And male goats, with fat of kidneys of wheat; And of the blood of the grape you drink wine!
Butter from his cows and milk from his sheep, with fat of lambs and sheep of Bashan, and goats, and the heart of the grain; and for your drink, wine from the blood of the grape.
15 And Yeshurun waxes fat, and kicks: You have been fat, you have been thick, You have been covered. And he leaves God who made him, And dishonors the Rock of his salvation.
But Jeshurun became fat and would not be controlled: you have become fat, you are thick and full of food: then he was untrue to the God who made him, giving no honour to the Rock of his salvation.
16 They make Him zealous with strangers, They make Him angry with abominations.
The honour which was his they gave to strange gods; by their disgusting ways he was moved to wrath.
17 They sacrifice to the demons, not God, To gods they have not known, New ones—they came from the vicinity; Your fathers have not feared them!
They made offerings to evil spirits which were not God, to gods who were strange to them, which had newly come up, not feared by your fathers.
18 You forget the Rock that begot you, And neglect God who forms you.
You have no thought for the Rock, your father, you have no memory of the God who gave you birth.
19 And YHWH sees and despises—For the provocation of His sons and His daughters.
And the Lord saw with disgust the evil-doing of his sons and daughters.
20 And He says: I hide My face from them, I see what their latter end [is]; For they [are] a contrary generation, Sons in whom is no steadfastness.
And he said, My face will be veiled from them, I will see what their end will be: for they are an uncontrolled generation, children in whom is no faith.
21 They have made Me jealous by [what is] not God, They made Me angry by their vanities; And I make them jealous by [what is] not a people, I make them angry by a foolish nation.
They have given my honour to that which is not God, moving me to wrath with their false worship: I will give their honour to those who are not a people, moving them to wrath by a foolish nation,
22 For a fire has been kindled in My anger, And it burns to the lowest [part] of Sheol, And consumes earth and its increase, And sets on fire [the] foundations of mountains. (Sheol h7585)
For my wrath is a flaming fire, burning to the deep parts of the underworld, burning up the earth with her increase, and firing the deep roots of the mountains. (Sheol h7585)
23 I heap calamities on them, I consume My arrows on them.
I will send a rain of troubles on them, my arrows will be showered on them.
24 Exhausted by famine, And consumed by heat and bitter destruction—I also send the teeth of beasts on them, With poison of fearful things of the dust.
They will be wasted from need of food, and overcome by burning heat and bitter destruction; and the teeth of beasts I will send on them, with the poison of the worms of the dust.
25 The sword destroys from outside, And out of the inner-chambers—terror, Both youth and virgin, Suckling with man of grey hair.
Outside they will be cut off by the sword, and in the inner rooms by fear; death will take the young man and the virgin, the baby at the breast and the grey-haired man.
26 I have said: I blow them away, I cause their remembrance to cease from man;
I said I would send them wandering far away, I would make all memory of them go from the minds of men:
27 If I do not fear the anger of an enemy, Lest their adversaries know—Lest they say, Our hand is high, And YHWH has not worked all this.
But for the fear that their haters, uplifted in their pride, might say, Our hand is strong, the Lord has not done all this.
28 For they [are] a nation lost to counsels, And there is no understanding in them.
For they are a nation without wisdom; there is no sense in them.
29 If only they were wise, They would deal wisely [with] this, They would attend to their latter end!
If only they were wise, if only this was clear to them, and they would give thought to their future!
30 How does one pursue a thousand, And two cause a myriad to flee, If not that their Rock has sold them, And YHWH has shut them up?
How would it be possible for one to overcome a thousand, and two to send ten thousand in flight, if their rock had not let them go, if the Lord had not given them up?
31 For their rock [is] not as our Rock (And our enemies [are] judges!)
For their rock is not like our Rock, even our haters themselves being judges.
32 For their vine [is] of the vine of Sodom, And of the fields of Gomorrah; Their grapes [are] grapes of gall—They have bitter clusters;
For their vine is the vine of Sodom, from the fields of Gomorrah: their grapes are the grapes of evil, and the berries are bitter:
33 The poison of dragons [is] their wine And the fierce venom of cobras.
Their wine is the poison of dragons, the cruel poison of snakes.
34 Is it not laid up with Me? Sealed among My treasures?
Is not this among my secrets, kept safe in my store-house?
35 Vengeance and retribution [are] Mine, At the due time—their foot slides; For near is a day of their calamity, And things prepared for them have hastened.
Punishment is mine and reward, at the time of the slipping of their feet: for the day of their downfall is near, sudden will be their fate.
36 For YHWH judges His people, And gives comfort over His servants. For He sees the going away of power, And none is restrained and left.
For the Lord will be judge of his people, he will have pity for his servants; when he sees that their power is gone, there is no one, shut up or free.
37 And He has said, Where [are] their gods—The rock in which they trusted?
And he will say, Where are their gods, the rock in which they put their faith?
38 Who eat the fat of their sacrifices, [And] drink the wine of their drink-offering? Let them arise and help you, Let it be a hiding place for you!
Who took the fat of their offerings, and the wine of their drink offering? Let them now come to your help, let them be your salvation.
39 See, now, that I [am] He, And there is no god besides Me; I put to death and I keep alive; I have struck and I heal; And there is not a deliverer from My hand,
See now, I myself am he; there is no other god but me: giver of death and life, wounding and making well: and no one has power to make you free from my hand.
40 For I lift up My hand to the heavens, And have said, I live for all time!
For lifting up my hand to heaven I say, By my unending life,
41 If I have sharpened the brightness of My sword, And My hand lays hold on judgment, I return vengeance to My adversaries, And to those hating Me—I repay!
If I make sharp my shining sword, and my hand is outstretched for judging, I will give punishment to those who are against me, and their right reward to my haters.
42 I make My arrows drunk with blood, And My sword devours flesh, From the blood of the pierced and captive, From the head of the leaders of the enemy.
I will make my arrows red with blood, my sword will be feasting on flesh, with the blood of the dead and the prisoners, of the long-haired heads of my haters.
43 Sing, O nations, [with] His people, For He avenges the blood of His servants, And He turns back vengeance on His adversaries, And has pardoned His land [and] His people.”
Be glad, O you his people, over the nations; for he will take payment for the blood of his servants, and will give punishment to his haters, and take away the sin of his land, for his people.
44 And Moses comes and speaks all the words of this song in the ears of the people, he and Hoshea son of Nun;
So Moses said all the words of this song in the hearing of the people, he and Hoshea, the son of Nun.
45 and Moses finishes to speak all these words to all Israel,
And after saying all this to the people,
46 and says to them, “Set your heart to all the words which I am testifying against you today, that you command your sons to observe to do all the words of this law,
Moses said to them, Let the words which I have said to you today go deep into your hearts, and give orders to your children to do every word of this law.
47 for it [is] not a vain thing for you, for it [is] your life, and by this thing you prolong days on the ground to where you are passing over the Jordan to possess it.”
And this is no small thing for you, but it is your life, and through this you may make your days long in the land which you are going over Jordan to take for your heritage.
48 And YHWH speaks to Moses on this very same day, saying,
That same day the Lord said to Moses,
49 “Go up to this Mount Abarim, Mount Nebo, which [is] in the land of Moab, which [is] on the front of Jericho, and see the land of Canaan which I am giving to the sons of Israel for a possession;
Go up into this mountain of Abarim, to Mount Nebo in the land of Moab opposite Jericho; there you may see the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the children of Israel for their heritage:
50 and die on the mountain to where you are going up, and be gathered to your people, as your brother Aaron has died on Mount Hor and is gathered to his people;
And let death come to you on the mountain where you are going, and be put to rest with your people; as death came to Aaron, your brother, on Mount Hor, where he was put to rest with his people:
51 because you trespassed against Me in the midst of the sons of Israel at the waters of Meribath-Kadesh, the wilderness of Zin, because you did not sanctify Me in the midst of the sons of Israel.
Because of your sin against me before the children of Israel at the waters of Meribath Kadesh in the waste land of Zin; because you did not keep my name holy among the children of Israel.
52 Indeed, you see the land before [you], but you do not go in there to the land which I am giving to the sons of Israel.”
So you will see the land before you, but you will not go into the land which I am giving to the children of Israel.
