The Book of Joshua

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- Kapitel 23 -

A long time later, by the time Yahweh had allowed the Israelites to live in peace, without fearing any longer any enemies, Joshua had become very old.

Joshua called for all of Israel’s elders and leaders, together with their judges and officers, to come and listen to him. When they arrived, he began to speak to them: “I am now very old.

We have all seen what Yahweh our God has done to all the nations in this land. Yahweh our God has fought for us.

I have given to you the nations that remain. Their lands will also be your permanent possession for the tribes of Israel, just as are the lands of the people groups that our people destroyed when I was leading them, all those other nations that the Israelites destroyed from the Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea when I was the leader.

Yahweh your God will force those people out from their lands. He will capture their lands from them, in order that you might settle down in those lands. This is what he has promised to do for you.

Pay careful attention so that you obey all that are written in the book of laws that Moses wrote down. Do not disobey them or change any of them.

If you obey the law of Moses, you will not mix our people with those people groups. Do not even mention the names of their gods, and do not use the names of their gods when you make promises or take oaths. Do not worship those gods or bow down to them.

Love Yahweh and trust in him, as you have been doing. Do not stop worshiping him.

Yahweh has forced many great and powerful nations to get out of your way as you advanced. No one has been able to stop you.

Any single soldier among you will be able to cause a thousand men of war in the army of your enemy, to run away, because Yahweh your God fights for you. That is what he promised to do.

So do all you can to love Yahweh your God.

However, if you stop doing what Yahweh desires; if you associate with those people groups who survived the wars with our people, or if you marry them and become their friends, and if they become friends with you,

then you can be sure that Yahweh our God will not help you force them out of your land. They will become like traps that will catch you. They will be like whips that strike your backs, and like thorns that will stick you in the eye. Your people group will become weaker and weaker until you die out in this land, this very good land that Yahweh our God has given to us.

It is almost time for me to die, like everyone else does. You know deep within you, that every single thing that Yahweh promised to do for you, he has done it.

He has given to you all the good things he promised. In the same way, the other things that he promised, things that are not good, will also happen if you do what is evil. In that case he will take your lives and your land away from you.

If you do not obey the covenant between Yahweh and you, and if you leave him and go and worship other gods and bow down to them, Yahweh will become very angry with you, just as a fire starts from a spark. Very quickly he will take away your lives, and he will take away this good land from you, the same land he has now given to you.”

After many days, when the LORD had given rest to Israel from their enemies all around, and Joshua was old and well advanced in years,

Joshua called for all Israel, for their elders and for their heads, and for their judges and for their officers, and said to them, “I am old and well advanced in years.

You have seen all that the LORD your God has done to all these nations because of you; for it is the LORD your God who has fought for you.

Behold, I have allotted to you these nations that remain, to be an inheritance for your tribes, from the Jordan, with all the nations that I have cut off, even to the great sea toward the going down of the sun.

The LORD your God will thrust them out from before you, and drive them from out of your sight. You shall possess their land, as the LORD your God spoke to you.

“Therefore be very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law of Moses, that you not turn away from it to the right hand or to the left;

that you not come among these nations, these that remain among you; neither make mention of the name of their gods, nor cause to swear by them, neither serve them, nor bow down yourselves to them;

but hold fast to the LORD your God, as you have done to this day.

“For the LORD has driven great and strong nations out from before you. But as for you, no man has stood before you to this day.

One man of you shall chase a thousand; for it is the LORD your God who fights for you, as he spoke to you.

Take good heed therefore to yourselves, that you love the LORD your God.

“But if you do at all go back, and hold fast to the remnant of these nations, even these who remain among you, and make marriages with them, and go in to them, and they to you;

know for a certainty that the LORD your God will no longer drive these nations from out of your sight; but they shall be a snare and a trap to you, a scourge in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good land which the LORD your God has given you.

“Behold, today I am going the way of all the earth. You know in all your hearts and in all your souls that not one thing has failed of all the good things which the LORD your God spoke concerning you. All have happened to you. Not one thing has failed of it.

It shall happen that as all the good things have come on you of which the LORD your God spoke to you, so the LORD will bring on you all the evil things, until he has destroyed you from off this good land which the LORD your God has given you,

when you disobey the covenant of the LORD your God, which he commanded you, and go and serve other gods, and bow down yourselves to them. Then the LORD’s anger will be kindled against you, and you will perish quickly from off the good land which he has given to you.”