Exodus 20:3

20:3 “You shall have no ¹  other gods before me. ² 

Exodus 23:13

23:13 “Pay attention to do ³  everything I have told you, and do not even mention ⁴  the names of other gods – do not let them be heard on your lips. ⁵ 

Exodus 34:14

34:14 For you must not worship ⁶  any other god, ⁷  for the Lord, whose name ⁸  is Jealous, is a jealous God.

Deuteronomy 4:23-24

4:23 Be on guard so that you do not forget the covenant of the Lord your God that he has made with you, and that you do not make an image of any kind, just as he ⁹  has forbidden ¹⁰  you. 4:24 For the Lord your God is a consuming fire; he is a jealous God. ¹¹ 

Deuteronomy 5:7

5:7 You must not have any other gods ¹²  besides me. ¹³ 

Deuteronomy 6:14-15

6:14 You must not go after other gods, those ¹⁴  of the surrounding peoples, 6:15 for the Lord your God, who is present among you, is a jealous God and his anger will erupt against you and remove you from the land. ¹⁵ 

Joshua 24:14-24

24:14 Now ¹⁶  obey ¹⁷  the Lord and worship ¹⁸  him with integrity and loyalty. Put aside the gods your ancestors ¹⁹  worshiped ²⁰  beyond the Euphrates ²¹  and in Egypt and worship ²²  the Lord. 24:15 If you have no desire ²³  to worship ²⁴  the Lord, choose today whom you will worship, ²⁵  whether it be the gods whom your ancestors ²⁶  worshiped ²⁷  beyond the Euphrates, ²⁸  or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living. But I and my family ²⁹  will worship ³⁰  the Lord!”

24:16 The people responded, “Far be it from us to abandon the Lord so we can ³¹  worship ³²  other gods! 24:17 For the Lord our God took us and our fathers out of slavery ³³  in the land of Egypt ³⁴  and performed these awesome miracles ³⁵  before our very eyes. He continually protected us as we traveled and when we passed through nations. ³⁶  24:18 The Lord drove out from before us all the nations, including the Amorites who lived in the land. So we too will worship ³⁷  the Lord, for he is our God!”

24:19 Joshua warned ³⁸  the people, “You will not keep worshiping ³⁹  the Lord, for ⁴⁰  he is a holy God. ⁴¹  He is a jealous God who will not forgive ⁴²  your rebellion or your sins. 24:20 If ⁴³  you abandon the Lord and worship ⁴⁴  foreign gods, he will turn against you; ⁴⁵  he will bring disaster on you and destroy you, ⁴⁶  though he once treated you well.” ⁴⁷ 

24:21 The people said to Joshua, “No! We really will ⁴⁸  worship ⁴⁹  the Lord!” 24:22 Joshua said to the people, “Do you agree to be witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to worship the Lord?” ⁵⁰  They replied, “We are witnesses!” ⁵¹  24:23 Joshua said, ⁵²  “Now put aside the foreign gods that are among you and submit to ⁵³  the Lord God of Israel.”

24:24 The people said to Joshua, “We will worship ⁵⁴  the Lord our God and obey him.” ⁵⁵ 

Joshua 24:1

Israel Renews its Commitment to the Lord

24:1 Joshua assembled all the Israelite tribes at Shechem. He summoned Israel’s elders, rulers, judges, and leaders, and they appeared before God.

Joshua 7:3-4

7:3 They returned and reported to Joshua, ⁵⁶  “Don’t send the whole army. ⁵⁷  About two or three thousand men are adequate to defeat Ai. ⁵⁸  Don’t tire out the whole army, for Ai is small.” ⁵⁹ 

7:4 So about three thousand men went up, but they fled from the men of Ai.

Joshua 7:1

Achan Sins and is Punished

7:1 But the Israelites disobeyed the command about the city’s riches. ⁶⁰  Achan son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, ⁶¹  son of Zerah, from the tribe of Judah, stole some of the riches. ⁶²  The Lord was furious with the Israelites. ⁶³ 

Joshua 18:21

18:21 These cities belonged to the tribe ⁶⁴  of Benjamin by its clans: Jericho, ⁶⁵  Beth Hoglah, Emek Keziz,

Joshua 18:2

18:2 seven Israelite tribes had not been assigned their allotted land. ⁶⁶ 

Joshua 17:1

17:1 The tribe of Manasseh, Joseph’s firstborn son, was also allotted land. ⁶⁷  The descendants of Makir, Manasseh’s firstborn and the father of Gilead, received land, for they were warriors. ⁶⁸  They were assigned Gilead and Bashan. ⁶⁹ 

Joshua 17:1

17:1 The tribe of Manasseh, Joseph’s firstborn son, was also allotted land. ⁷⁰  The descendants of Makir, Manasseh’s firstborn and the father of Gilead, received land, for they were warriors. ⁷¹  They were assigned Gilead and Bashan. ⁷² 

Joshua 21:4-5

21:4 The first lot belonged to ⁷³  the Kohathite clans. The Levites who were descendants of Aaron the priest were allotted thirteen cities from the tribes of Judah, Simeon, and Benjamin. 21:5 The rest of Kohath’s descendants were allotted ten cities from the clans of the tribe of Ephraim, and from the tribe of Dan and the half-tribe of Manasseh.

Joshua 23:5-7

23:5 The Lord your God will drive them out from before you and remove them, ⁷⁴  so you can occupy ⁷⁵  their land as the Lord your God promised ⁷⁶  you. 23:6 Be very strong! Carefully obey ⁷⁷  all that is written in the law scroll of Moses so you won’t swerve from it to the right or the left, 23:7 or associate with these nations that remain near ⁷⁸  you. You must not invoke or make solemn declarations by the names of their gods! ⁷⁹  You must not worship ⁸⁰  or bow down to them!

Joshua 23:2

23:2 So Joshua summoned all Israel, including the elders, rulers, judges, and leaders, and told them: “I am very old.

Joshua 1:4-5

1:4 Your territory will extend from the wilderness in the south to Lebanon in the north. It will extend all the way to the great River Euphrates in the east (including all of Syria) ⁸¹  and all the way to the Mediterranean Sea ⁸²  in the west. ⁸³  1:5 No one will be able to resist you ⁸⁴  all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not abandon you or leave you alone.

Ezekiel 36:25

36:25 I will sprinkle you with pure water ⁸⁵  and you will be clean from all your impurities. I will purify you from all your idols.

Hosea 14:8

14:8 O Ephraim, I do not want to have anything to do ⁸⁶  with idols anymore!

I will answer him and care for him.

I am like ⁸⁷  a luxuriant cypress tree; ⁸⁸ 

your fruitfulness comes from me! ⁸⁹ 

Zephaniah 1:5

1:5 I will remove ⁹⁰  those who worship the stars in the sky from their rooftops, ⁹¹ 

those who swear allegiance to the Lord ⁹²  while taking oaths in the name of ⁹³  their ‘king,’ ⁹⁴ 

Matthew 6:24

6:24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate ⁹⁵  the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise ⁹⁶  the other. You cannot serve God and money. ⁹⁷ 

Matthew 6:1

Pure-hearted Giving

6:1 “Be ⁹⁸  careful not to display your righteousness merely to be seen by people. ⁹⁹  Otherwise you have no reward with your Father in heaven.

Matthew 5:20-21

5:20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness goes beyond that of the experts in the law ¹⁰⁰  and the Pharisees, ¹⁰¹  you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Anger and Murder

5:21 “You have heard that it was said to an older generation, ¹⁰²  ‘Do not murder,’ ¹⁰³  and ‘whoever murders will be subjected to judgment.’

[20:3]  ¹ tn The possession is expressed here by the use of the lamed (ל) preposition and the verb “to be”: לֹא־יִהְיֶה לְךָ (lo’ yihyeh lÿkha, “there will not be to you”). The negative with the imperfect expresses the emphatic prohibition; it is best reflected with “you will not” and has the strongest expectation of obedience (see GKC 317 §107.o). As an additional way of looking at this line, U. Cassuto suggests that the verb is in the singular in order to say that they could not have even one other god, and the word “gods” is plural to include any gods (Exodus, 241).

[20:3]  ² tn The expression עַל־פָּנָי (’al-panay) has several possible interpretations. S. R. Driver suggests “in front of me,” meaning obliging me to behold them, and also giving a prominence above me (Exodus, 193-94). W. F. Albright rendered it “You shall not prefer other gods to me” (From the Stone Age to Christianity, 297, n. 29). B. Jacob (Exodus, 546) illustrates it with marriage: the wife could belong to only one man while every other man was “another man.” They continued to exist but were not available to her. The point is clear from the Law, regardless of the specific way the prepositional phrase is rendered. God demands absolute allegiance, to the exclusion of all other deities. The preposition may imply some antagonism, for false gods would be opposed to Yahweh. U. Cassuto adds that God was in effect saying that anytime Israel turned to a false god they had to know that the Lord was there – it is always in his presence, or before him (Exodus, 241).

[23:13]  ³ tn The phrase “to do” is added; in Hebrew word order the line says, “In all that I have said to you you will watch yourselves.” The verb for paying attention is a Niphal imperfect with an imperatival force.

[23:13]  ⁴ tn Or “honor,” Hiphil of זָכַר (zakhar). See also Exod 20:25; Josh 23:7; Isa 26:13.

[23:13]  ⁵ tn Heb “mouth.”

[34:14]  ⁶ tn Heb “bow down.”

[34:14]  ⁷ sn In Exod 20:3 it was “gods.”

[34:14]  ⁸ sn Here, too, the emphasis on God’s being a jealous God is repeated (see Exod 20:5). The use of “name” here is to stress that this is his nature, his character.

[4:23]  ⁹ tn Heb “the Lord your God.” See note on “he” in 4:3.

[4:23]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “commanded.”

[4:24]  ¹¹ tn The juxtaposition of the Hebrew terms אֵשׁ (’esh, “fire”) and קַנָּא (qanna’, “jealous”) is interesting in light of Deut 6:15 where the Lord is seen as a jealous God whose anger bursts into a destructive fire. For God to be “jealous” means that his holiness and uniqueness cannot tolerate pretended or imaginary rivals. It is not petty envy but response to an act of insubordination that must be severely judged (see H. Peels, NIDOTTE 3:937-40).

[5:7]  ¹² tn Heb “there must not be for you other gods.” The expression “for you” indicates possession.

[5:7]  ¹³ tn Heb “upon my face,” or “before me” (עַל־פָּנָיַ, ’al-panaya). Some understand this in a locative sense: “in my sight.” The translation assumes that the phrase indicates exclusion. The idea is that of placing any other god before the Lord in the sense of taking his place. Contrary to the view of some, this does not leave the door open for a henotheistic system where the Lord is the primary god among others. In its literary context the statement must be taken in a monotheistic sense. See, e.g., 4:39; 6:13-15.

[6:14]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “from the gods.” The demonstrative pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons to avoid redundancy.

[6:15]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “lest the anger of the Lord your God be kindled against you and destroy you from upon the surface of the ground.” Cf. KJV, ASV “from off the face of the earth.”

[24:14]  ¹⁶ sn Joshua quotes the Lord’s words in vv. 2b-13 (note that the Lord speaks in the first person in these verses); in vv. 14-15 Joshua himself exhorts the people (note the third person references to the Lord).

[24:14]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “fear.”

[24:14]  ¹⁸ tn Or “and serve.”

[24:14]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “your fathers.”

[24:14]  ²⁰ tn Or “served.”

[24:14]  ²¹ tn Heb “the river,” referring to the Euphrates. This has been specified in the translation for clarity; see v. 3.

[24:14]  ²² tn Or “and serve.”

[24:15]  ²³ tn Heb “if it is bad in your eyes.”

[24:15]  ²⁴ tn Or “to serve.”

[24:15]  ²⁵ tn Or “will serve.”

[24:15]  ²⁶ tn Heb “your fathers.”

[24:15]  ²⁷ tn Or “served.”

[24:15]  ²⁸ tn Heb “the river,” referring to the Euphrates. This has been specified in the translation for clarity; see v. 3.

[24:15]  ²⁹ tn Heb “house.”

[24:15]  ³⁰ tn Or “will serve.”

[24:16]  ³¹ tn Heb “to.”

[24:16]  ³² tn Or “can serve.”

[24:17]  ³³ tn Heb “of the house of slavery.”

[24:17]  ³⁴ tn Heb “for the Lord our God, he is the one who brought up us and our fathers from the land of Egypt, from the house of slaves.”

[24:17]  ³⁵ tn Or “great signs.”

[24:17]  ³⁶ tn Heb “and he guarded us in all the way in which we walked and among all the peoples through whose midst we passed.”

[24:18]  ³⁷ tn Or “will serve.”

[24:19]  ³⁸ tn Heb “said to.”

[24:19]  ³⁹ tn Heb “you are not able to serve.”

[24:19]  ⁴⁰ sn For an excellent discussion of Joshua’s logical argument here, see T. C. Butler, Joshua (WBC), 274-75.

[24:19]  ⁴¹ tn In the Hebrew text both the divine name (אֱלֹהִים, ’elohim) and the adjective (קְדֹשִׁים, qÿdoshim, “holy”) are plural. Normally the divine name, when referring to the one true God, takes singular modifiers, but this is a rare exception where the adjective agrees grammatically with the honorific plural noun. See GKC §124.i and IBHS 122.

[24:19]  ⁴² tn Heb “lift up” or “take away.”

[24:20]  ⁴³ tn Or “when.”

[24:20]  ⁴⁴ tn Or “and serve.”

[24:20]  ⁴⁵ tn The words “against you” are added for clarification.

[24:20]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “bring you to an end.”

[24:20]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “after he did good for you.”

[24:21]  ⁴⁸ tn The translation assumes that כִּי (ki) is emphatic. Another option is to take it as explanatory, “No, for we will….”

[24:21]  ⁴⁹ tn Or “will serve.”

[24:22]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen for yourselves the Lord to serve him.”

[24:22]  ⁵¹ sn Like witnesses in a court of law, Israel’s solemn vow to worship the Lord will testify against them in the divine court if the nation ever violates its commitment.

[24:23]  ⁵² tn The words “Joshua said” are supplied for clarification.

[24:23]  ⁵³ tn Heb “bend your heart toward.” The term לֵבָב (levav, “heart”) probably here refers to the people’s volition or will.

[24:24]  ⁵⁴ tn Or “will serve.”

[24:24]  ⁵⁵ tn Heb “and listen to his voice.”

[7:3]  ⁵⁶ tn Heb “and they returned to Joshua and said to him.”

[7:3]  ⁵⁷ tn Heb “Don’t let all the people go up.”

[7:3]  ⁵⁸ tn Heb “Let about two thousand men or about three thousand men go up to defeat Ai.”

[7:3]  ⁵⁹ tn Heb “all the people for they are small.”

[7:1]  ⁶⁰ tn Heb “But the sons of Israel were unfaithful with unfaithfulness concerning what was set apart [to the Lord].”

[7:1]  ⁶¹ tn 1 Chr 2:6 lists a “Zimri” (but no Zabdi) as one of the five sons of Zerah (cf. also 1 Chr 7:17, 18).

[7:1]  ⁶² tn Heb “took from what was set apart [to the Lord].”

[7:1]  ⁶³ tn Heb “the anger of the Lord burned against the sons of Israel.”

[18:21]  ⁶⁴ tn Heb “the sons,” here referring to the tribe.

[18:21]  ⁶⁵ map For location see Map5 B2; Map6 E1; Map7 E1; Map8 E3; Map10 A2; Map11 A1.

[18:2]  ⁶⁶ tn Heb “there were left among the sons of Israel who had not divided up their inheritance seven tribes.”

[17:1]  ⁶⁷ tn Heb “and the lot belonged to the tribe of Manasseh, for he was the firstborn of Joseph.”

[17:1]  ⁶⁸ tn Heb “to Makir, the firstborn of Manasseh, the father of Gilead, for he was a man of war.”

[17:1]  ⁶⁹ tn Heb “Gilead and Bashan belonged to him.”

[17:1]  ⁷⁰ tn Heb “and the lot belonged to the tribe of Manasseh, for he was the firstborn of Joseph.”

[17:1]  ⁷¹ tn Heb “to Makir, the firstborn of Manasseh, the father of Gilead, for he was a man of war.”

[17:1]  ⁷² tn Heb “Gilead and Bashan belonged to him.”

[21:4]  ⁷³ tn Heb “came out for.”

[23:5]  ⁷⁴ tn The Hebrew text reads, “from before you.” This has not been included in the translation because it is redundant in English.

[23:5]  ⁷⁵ tn Or “take possession of.”

[23:5]  ⁷⁶ tn Heb “said to.”

[23:6]  ⁷⁷ tn Heb “Be strong so you can be careful to do.”

[23:7]  ⁷⁸ tn Heb “with.”

[23:7]  ⁷⁹ tn Heb “and in the name of their gods you must not invoke and you must not make solemn declarations.” The words “and you must not make solemn declarations” are omitted in the LXX and may represent a later scribal addition to elucidate the immediately preceding command. The Hiphil of שָׁבַע (shava’) without an object occurs only here and in Josh 6:26.

[23:7]  ⁸⁰ tn Or “serve.”

[1:4]  ⁸¹ tn Heb “all the land of the Hittites.” The expression “the land of the Hittites” does not refer to Anatolia (modern Turkey), where the ancient Hittite kingdom of the second millennium b.c. was located, but rather to Syria, the “Hatti land” mentioned in inscriptions of the first millennium b.c. (see HALOT 1:363). The phrase is omitted in the LXX and may be a scribal addition.

[1:4]  ⁸² tn Heb “the Great Sea,” the typical designation for the Mediterranean Sea.

[1:4]  ⁸³ tn Heb “From the wilderness and this Lebanon even to the great river, the River Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, even to the great sea [at] the place where the sun sets, your territory will be.”

[1:5]  ⁸⁴ tn Heb “A man will not stand before you.” The second person pronouns in this verse are singular, indicating Joshua is the addressee.

[36:25]  ⁸⁵ sn The Lord here uses a metaphor from the realm of ritual purification. For the use of water in ritual cleansing, see Exod 30:19-20; Lev 14:51; Num 19:18; Heb 10:22.

[14:8]  ⁸⁶ tn The Hebrew expression מַה־לִּי עוֹד (mah-li ’od) is a formula of repudiation/emphatic denial that God has anything in common with idols: “I want to have nothing to do with […] any more!” Cf., e.g., Judg 11:12; 2 Sam 16:10; 19:23; 1 Kgs 17:18; 2 Kgs 3:13; 2 Chr 35:21; Jer 2:18; Ps 50:16; BDB 553 s.v. מָה 1.d.(c).

[14:8]  ⁸⁷ tn The term “like” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity, as in the majority of English versions (including KJV).

[14:8]  ⁸⁸ tn Cf. KJV “a green fir tree”; NIV, NCV “a green pine tree”; NRSV “an evergreen cypress.”

[14:8]  ⁸⁹ tn Heb “your fruit is found in me”; NRSV “your faithfulness comes from me.”

[1:5]  ⁹⁰ tn The words “I will remove” are repeated from v. 4b for stylistic reasons. In the Hebrew text vv. 4b-6 contain a long list of objects for the verb “I will remove” in v. 4b. In the present translation a new sentence was begun at the beginning of v. 5 in keeping with the tendency of contemporary English to use shorter sentences.

[1:5]  ⁹¹ tn Heb “those who worship on their roofs the host of heaven.” The “host of heaven” included the sun, moon, planets, and stars, all of which were deified in the ancient Near East.

[1:5]  ⁹² tc The MT reads, “those who worship, those who swear allegiance to the Lord.” The original form of the LXX omits the phrase “those who worship”; it may have been accidentally repeated from the preceding line. J. J. M. Roberts prefers to delete as secondary the phrase “those who swear allegiance” (J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah [OTL], 168).

[1:5]  ⁹³ tn Heb “those who swear by.”

[1:5]  ⁹⁴ tn The referent of “their king” is unclear. It may refer sarcastically to a pagan god (perhaps Baal) worshiped by the people. Some English versions (cf. NEB, NASB, NRSV) prefer to emend the text to “Milcom,” the name of an Ammonite god (following some LXX mss, Syriac, and Vulgate) or “Molech,” a god to whom the Israelites offered their children (cf. NIV, NLT). For a discussion of the options, see Adele Berlin, Zephaniah (AB 25A), 75-77.

[6:24]  ⁹⁵ sn The contrast between hate and love here is rhetorical. The point is that one will choose the favorite if a choice has to be made.

[6:24]  ⁹⁶ tn Or “and treat [the other] with contempt.”

[6:24]  ⁹⁷ tn Grk “God and mammon.”

[6:1]  ⁹⁸ tc ‡ Several mss (א L Z Θ Ë¹ 33 892 1241 1424 al) have δέ (de, “but, now”) at the beginning of this verse; the reading without δέ is supported by B D W 0250 ˹³ Ï lat. A decision is difficult, but apparently the conjunction was added by later scribes to indicate a transition in the thought-flow of the Sermon on the Mount. NA²⁷ has δέ in brackets, indicating reservations about its authenticity.

[6:1]  ⁹⁹ tn Grk “before people in order to be seen by them.”

[5:20]  ¹⁰⁰ tn Or “that of the scribes.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 2:4.

[5:20]  ¹⁰¹ sn See the note on Pharisees in 3:7.

[5:21]  ¹⁰² tn Grk “to the ancient ones.”

[5:21]  ¹⁰³ sn A quotation from Exod 20:13; Deut 5:17.