Joshua 24

1 And Joshua gathers all the tribes of Israel to Shechem, and calls for [the] elderly of Israel, and for his heads, and for his judges, and for his authorities, and they station themselves before God.

Then Joshua got all the tribes of Israel together at Shechem; and he sent for the responsible men of Israel and their chiefs and their judges and their overseers; and they took their place before God.

2 And Joshua says to all the people, “Thus said YHWH, God of Israel: Beyond the River your fathers have dwelt of old—Terah father of Abraham and father of Nachor—and they serve other gods;

And Joshua said to all the people, These are the words of the Lord, the God of Israel: In the past your fathers, Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor, were living on the other side of the River: and they were worshipping other gods.

3 and I take your father Abraham from beyond the River, and cause him to go through all the land of Canaan, and multiply his seed, and give Isaac to him.

And I took your father Abraham from the other side of the River, guiding him through all the land of Canaan; I made his offspring great in number, and gave him Isaac.

4 And I give Jacob and Esau to Isaac; and I give Mount Seir to Esau, to possess it; and Jacob and his sons have gone down to Egypt.

And to Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau: to Esau I gave Mount Seir, as his heritage; but Jacob and his children went down to Egypt.

5 And I send Moses and Aaron, and plague Egypt, as I have done in its midst, and afterward I have brought you out.

And I sent Moses and Aaron, troubling Egypt by all the signs I did among them: and after that I took you out.

6 And I bring out your fathers from Egypt, and you go to the sea, and the Egyptians pursue after your fathers, with chariot and with horsemen, to the Red Sea;

I took your fathers out of Egypt: and you came to the Red Sea; and the Egyptians came after your fathers to the Red Sea, with their war-carriages and their horsemen.

7 and they cry to YHWH, and He sets thick darkness between you and the Egyptians, and brings the sea over him, and covers them, and your eyes see that which I have done in Egypt; and you dwell in a wilderness [for] many days.

And at their cry, the Lord made it dark between you and the Egyptians, and made the sea go over them, covering them with its waters; your eyes have seen what I did in Egypt: then for a long time you were living in the waste land.

8 And I bring you into the land of the Amorite who is dwelling beyond the Jordan, and they fight with you, and I give them into your hand, and you possess their land, and I destroy them out of your presence.

And I took you into the lands of the Amorites on the other side of Jordan; and they made war on you, and I gave them into your hands and you took their land; and I sent destruction on them before you.

9 And Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab, rises and fights against Israel, and sends and calls for Balaam son of Beor, to revile you,

Then Balak, the son of Zippor, king of Moab, went up to war against Israel; and he sent for Balaam, the son of Beor, to put a curse on you:

10 and I have not been willing to listen to Balaam, and he greatly blesses you, and I deliver you out of his hand.

But I did not give ear to Balaam; and so he went on blessing you; and I kept you safe from him.

11 And you pass over the Jordan, and come to Jericho, and the possessors of Jericho fight against you—the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Girgashite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite—and I give them into your hand.

Then you went over Jordan and came to Jericho: and the men of Jericho made war on you, the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Hivites and the Jebusites: and I gave them up into your hands.

12 And I send the hornet before you, and it casts them out from your presence—two kings of the Amorite—not by your sword, nor by your bow.

And I sent the hornet before you, driving out the two kings of the Amorites before you, not with your sword and your bow.

13 And I give a land to you for which you have not labored, and cities which you have not built, and you dwell in them; you are eating of vineyards and olive-yards which you have not planted.

And I gave you a land on which you had done no work, and towns not of your building, and you are now living in them; and your food comes from vine-gardens and olive-gardens not of your planting.

14 And now, fear YHWH, and serve Him, in perfection and in truth, and turn aside the gods which your fathers served beyond the River, and in Egypt, and serve YHWH;

So now, go in fear of the Lord, and be his servants with true hearts: put away the gods worshipped by your fathers across the River and in Egypt, and be servants of the Lord.

15 and if [it is] wrong in your eyes to serve YHWH—choose for yourselves today whom you serve—whether the gods whom your fathers served, which [are] beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorite in whose land you are dwelling; but me and my house—we serve YHWH.”

And if it seems evil to you to be the servants of the Lord, make the decision this day whose servants you will be: of the gods whose servants your fathers were across the River, or of the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living: but I and my house will be the servants of the Lord.

16 And the people answer and say, “Far be it from us to forsake YHWH, to serve other gods;

Then the people in answer said, Never will we give up the Lord to be the servants of other gods;

17 for our God YHWH [is] He who is bringing us and our fathers up out of the land of Egypt, out of a house of servants, and who has done these great signs before our eyes, and keeps us in all the way in which we have gone, and among all the peoples through whose midst we passed;

For it is the Lord our God who has taken us and our fathers out of the land of Egypt, out of the prison-house, and who did all those great signs before our eyes, and kept us safe on all our journeys, and among all the peoples through whom we went:

18 and YHWH casts out the whole of the peoples, even the Amorite inhabiting the land, from our presence; we also serve YHWH, for He [is] our God.”

And the Lord sent out from before us all the peoples, the Amorites living in the land: so we will be the servants of the Lord, for he is our God.

19 And Joshua says to the people, “You are not able to serve YHWH, for He [is] a most holy God; He [is] a zealous God; He does not bear with your transgression and with your sins.

And Joshua said to the people, You are not able to be the servants of the Lord, for he is a holy God, a God who will not let his honour be given to another: he will have no mercy on your wrongdoing or your sins.

20 When you forsake YHWH, and have served gods of a stranger, then He has turned back and done harm to you, and consumed you, after that He has done good to you.”

If you are turned away from the Lord and become the servants of strange gods, then turning against you he will do you evil, cutting you off, after he has done you good.

21 And the people say to Joshua, “No, but we serve YHWH!”

And the people said to Joshua, No! But we will be the servants of the Lord.

22 And Joshua says to the people, “You are witnesses against yourselves, that you have chosen YHWH for yourselves, to serve Him,” and they say, “Witnesses!”

And Joshua said to the people, You are witnesses against yourselves that you have made the decision to be the servants of the Lord. And they said, We are witnesses.

23 “And now, turn aside the gods of the stranger which [are] in your midst, and incline your heart to YHWH, God of Israel.”

Then, he said, put away the strange gods among you, turning your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel.

24 And the people say to Joshua, “We serve our God YHWH, and we listen to His voice.”

And the people said to Joshua, We will be the servants of the Lord our God, and we will give ear to his voice.

25 And Joshua makes a covenant with the people on that day, and lays a statute and an ordinance on it, in Shechem.

So Joshua made an agreement with the people that day, and gave them a rule and a law in Shechem.

26 And Joshua writes these words in the Scroll of the Law of God, and takes a great stone, and raises it up there under the oak which [is] in the sanctuary of YHWH.

And Joshua put these words on record, writing them in the book of the law of God; and he took a great stone, and put it up there under the oak-tree which was in the holy place of the Lord.

27 And Joshua says to all the people, “Behold, this stone is for a witness against us, for it has heard all the sayings of YHWH which He has spoken with us, and it has been for a witness against you, lest you lie against your God.”

And Joshua said to all the people, See now, this stone is to be a witness against us; for all the words of the Lord have been said to us in its hearing: so it will be a witness against you if you are false to the Lord your God.

28 And Joshua sends the people away, each to his inheritance.

Then Joshua let the people go away, every man to his heritage.

29 And it comes to pass, after these things, that Joshua son of Nun, servant of YHWH, dies, a son of one hundred and ten years,

Now after these things, the death of Joshua, the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, took place, he being then a hundred and ten years old.

30 and they bury him in the border of his inheritance, in Timnath-Serah, which [is] in the hill-country of Ephraim, on the north of the hill of Gaash.

And they put his body in the earth in the land of his heritage in Timnath-serah, in the hill-country of Ephraim, to the north of Mount Gaash.

31 And Israel serves YHWH all [the] days of Joshua, and all [the] days of the elderly who prolonged days after Joshua, and who knew all the work of YHWH which He did to Israel.

And Israel was true to the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the older men who were still living after Joshua's death, and had seen what the Lord had done for Israel.

32 And the bones of Joseph, which the sons of Israel brought up out of Egypt, they buried in Shechem, in the portion of the field which Jacob bought from the sons of Hamor father of Shechem, with one hundred kesitah; and they are for an inheritance to the sons of Joseph.

And the bones of Joseph, which the children of Israel had taken up from Egypt, they put in the earth in Shechem, in the property which Jacob had got from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, for a hundred shekels: and they became the heritage of the children of Joseph.

33 And Eleazar son of Aaron died, and they bury him in a hill of his son Phinehas, which was given to him in the hill-country of Ephraim.

Then the death of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, took place; and his body was put in the earth in the hill of Phinehas his son, which had been given to him in the hill-country of Ephraim.