Joshua 24

1 [Many years later], Joshua summoned representatives of all the tribes of Israel. He gathered together the elders, the leaders, the judges, and the other officials at Shechem [city]. He told them to listen to what God wanted to tell them.

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 Joshua said to all of them, “This is what Yahweh, the God we Israeli people worship, is saying: ‘Long ago, your ancestors, including Abraham’s father Terah and Abraham’s younger brother Nahor, lived on the east side of the Euphrates River.

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 But I took your ancestor Abraham from that land east of the Euphrates River, and I led him as he lived in various places in this land of Canaan, and I enabled him to have many descendants. First, I enabled him to have a son, Isaac.

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 When Isaac grew up, I enabled him to have twin sons, Jacob and Esau. I enabled Esau to live in the hilly area in Seir region, but many years later Jacob and his sons and their families went down to live in 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 “[Many years later], I sent Moses and his older brother Aaron to help your people, and I caused [the people of] Egypt to suffer very much because of what I did there. Then I enabled your ancestors to leave Egypt.

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

6 When I brought your ancestors out of Egypt, they came to the Red Sea. The Egyptian army pursued them, some riding in chariots and others on horses, and they also arrived at 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 Then [your ancestors] pleaded with me to help them. So he caused (darkness/a very dark cloud) to come between your ancestors and the Egyptian army, so that the Egyptian army could not see your ancestors. I separated the water in the Red Sea so that your ancestors could cross it, but when the Egyptian army tried to cross in the same way to pursue them, I caused the water to come back and cover them, and the Egyptian soldiers all drowned, as your ancestors watched and were amazed [IDM]. But after that, you lived in the desert for many years.

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 “Then I brought your [ancestors] to the area where the groups who were descendants of Amor lived, east of the Jordan River. They fought against you, but I enabled you to defeat them [IDM]. I [enabled you to] destroy them so that you could live in their land [IDM].

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 Then, Zippor’s son Balak, the King of Moab, (decided that his army would fight against/opposed) the Israelis. He summoned Beor’s son Balaam and asked him to curse 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 But I would not do what Balaam asked, so he (blessed/said that I would do great things for) you four times, and I did not enable the army of Moab to defeat you [IDM].

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

11 “Then you all crossed the Jordan River and came to Jericho. The people of Jericho prepared to fight against you, [and the armies of] the descendants of Amor, Periz, Canaan, Heth, Girgash, Hiv, and Jebus [all prepared to do the same thing] but I enabled you to defeat [IDM] them all.

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 I am the one who caused them to panic as you advanced and enabled you to defeat them, as I had enabled you to do earlier to the two kings of the groups who were descendants of Amor. You did not defeat them by using your own bows and arrows and swords; [it was I who defeated them].

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 So I gave you a land that you had not tilled/planted, and I gave you cities that you did not build. [Now] you live in those [cities] and you eat the grapes from the grapevines that you did not plant, and you eat olives from trees that you did not plant.’”

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 [Then Joshua said to the people], “[Because of all that] Yahweh [has done for you], revere him, and serve/worship him very faithfully. Throw away the idols that your ancestors worshiped on the east/other side of the Euphrates River and in Egypt. Serve only Yahweh.

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 But if you do not want to serve/worship Yahweh, you should decide today what [gods] you will serve/worship. You should decide whether you will serve/worship the gods that your ancestors who lived on the other/east side of the Euphrates River served, or whether you will serve/worship the gods that the descendants of Amor, who previously lived in the land where you are now living, [serve/worship]. But as for me and my family [MTY], we will serve/worship Yahweh!”

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 The Israeli people answered, “We will never quit [serving/worshiping] Yahweh! We would never [think of] [IDM] serving/worshiping other gods!

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

17 It was our God, Yahweh, who brought our parents and grandparents up out of Egypt. [He rescued them] from that land where they were slaves. As he rescued them, they saw him perform great miracles. He protected them all the time when they were traveling. He protected them from all the people-groups through whose territory they traveled.

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 As our forefathers advanced, Yahweh expelled the descendants of Amor and the other people-groups who lived in this land. Yahweh is our God, so [we are saying that] we also will serve/worship him.”

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 Joshua replied to the people, “[I think that] you are not able to serve/worship Yahweh, because he is a holy God. He will not forgive your sinning and rebelling [against him]. He demands that you serve/worship only him [IDM].

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 He has been good to you [in the past], but if you turn away from him and serve/worship foreign/other gods, he will turn [against you] and he will cause you to experience disasters. He will punish [IDM] you severely!”

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 But the people replied to Joshua, “No, [we will not turn away from worshiping/serving Yahweh] We will serve/worship Yahweh!”

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

22 Then Joshua said, “You yourselves are saying that you have decided to serve/worship Yahweh.” They replied, “Yes, we are saying that.”

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 Then Joshua said, “Since [you have decided] that, you must throw away all the other gods/idols that you have among you. You must also promise that you will wholeheartedly give yourselves to Yahweh, the God whom we Israelis [serve/worship].”

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

24 The people replied, “We will serve/worship Yahweh, our God, and obey him.”

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 That day, Joshua established an agreement between the people and Yahweh. He wrote for them all the laws that they were required to obey.

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

26 He wrote all those laws on a scroll. He called it ‘The laws of God’. Then he [told some men to] set up a large stone there at Shechem, under the [large] oak tree near the place where [they worshiped] Yahweh.

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 He said to all the people, “Look! [It is as though] this stone has heard everything that Yahweh said to you [and that you promised Yahweh]. It will serve as a witness against you if you rebel 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 Then Joshua sent the people away, and all of them returned to their own areas/homes.

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

29 Some time after that, Nun’s son Joshua, the faithful servant of Yahweh, died. He was 110 years old when he died.

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 The Israeli people buried his body on his own property in Timnath-Serah [town] town. It is north of Gaash Mountain in the hilly area of the tribe who were descendants of Ephraim.

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 The Israeli people served/worshiped Yahweh as long as Joshua was alive. After Joshua died, they continued serving/worshiping Yahweh while the elders who had experienced everything that Yahweh had done for the Israeli people were still alive.

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 Joseph’s bones, which the Israeli people had brought with them from Egypt, were also buried at Shechem. The people buried them in the piece of land that Jacob had bought long ago for 100 pieces of silver from Hamor, the father of Shechem. That piece of land was in the area that was given to the people who were descendants of Ephraim and Manasseh, Joseph’s sons.

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 Eleazar, the Supreme Priest, the son of Aaron, also died. They buried his body at Gibeah, in the area that had been given to Eleazar’s son Phinehas, in the hilly area that belonged to the people who were descendants 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.