You must tear down their altars, shatter their sacred pillars,<n id="1" /> burn up their sacred Asherah poles,<n id="2" /> and cut down the images of their gods; you must eliminate their very memory from that place.

<t /><p class="bodytext"><v id="(13:1)" /><n id="1" /> You<n id="2" /> must be careful to do everything I am commanding you. Do not add to it or subtract from it!<n id="3" />

the gods of the surrounding people (whether near you or far from you, from one end of the earth<n id="1" /> to the other).

There must not be a scrap of yeast within your land<n id="1" /> for seven days, nor can any of the meat you sacrifice on the evening of the first day remain until the next morning.<n id="2" />

You must then do as they have determined at that place the <sc>Lordsc> chooses. Be careful to do just as you are taught.

This is how you are to deal with all those cities located far from you, those that do not belong to these nearby nations.p>

You shall do the same to his donkey, his clothes, or anything else your neighbor<n id="1" /> has lost and you have found; you must not refuse to get involved.<n id="2" />

<p class="bodytext">If you build a new house, you must construct a guard rail<n id="1" /> around your roof to avoid being culpable<n id="2" /> in the event someone should fall from it.p>

The <sc>Lordsc> will make the rain of your land powder and dust; it will come down on you from the sky until you are destroyed.p>

Your ox will be slaughtered before your very eyes but you will not eat of it. Your donkey will be stolen from you as you watch and will not be returned to you. Your flock of sheep will be given to your enemies and there will be no one to save you.

<t /><p class="bodytext">&#8220;This commandment I am giving<n id="1" /> you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it too remote.

They<n id="1" /> must not discriminate in judgment, but hear the lowly<n id="2" /> and the great alike. Nor should they be intimidated by human beings, for judgment belongs to God. If the matter being adjudicated is too difficult for them, they should bring it before me for a hearing.p>

What is going to happen to us? Our brothers have drained away our courage<n id="1" /> by describing people who are more numerous<n id="2" /> and taller than we are, and great cities whose defenses appear to be as high as heaven<n id="3" /> itself! Moreover, they said they saw<n id="4" /> Anakites<n id="5" /> there.&#8221;

From Aroer,<n id="1" /> which is at the edge of Wadi Arnon (it is the city in the wadi),<n id="2" /> all the way to Gilead there was not a town able to resist us &#8211; the <sc>Lordsc> our God gave them all to us.

Do not add a thing to what I command you nor subtract from it, so that you may keep the commandments of the <sc>Lordsc> your God that I am delivering to<n id="1" /> you.

<t /><p class="bodytext">Indeed, ask about the distant past, starting from the day God created humankind<n id="1" /> on the earth, and ask<n id="2" /> from one end of heaven to the other, whether there has ever been such a great thing as this, or even a rumor of it.

Anyone who accidentally killed someone<n id="1" /> without hating him at the time of the accident<n id="2" /> could flee to one of those cities and be safe.

<t /><p class="bodytext">When the <sc>Lordsc> your God brings you to the land that you are going to occupy and forces out many nations before you &#8211; Hittites,<n id="1" /> Girgashites,<n id="2" /> Amorites,<n id="3" /> Canaanites,<n id="4" /> Perizzites,<n id="5" /> Hivites,<n id="6" /> and Jebusites,<n id="7" /> seven<n id="8" /> nations more numerous and powerful than you &#8211;

<t /><p class="bodytext">Remember &#8211; don&#8217;t ever forget<n id="1" /> &#8211; how you provoked the <sc>Lordsc> your God in the desert; from the time you left the land of Egypt until you came to this place you were constantly rebelling against him.<n id="2" />

And he said to me, &#8220;Get up, go down at once from here because your people whom you brought out of Egypt have sinned! They have quickly turned from the way I commanded them and have made for themselves a cast metal image.&#8221;<n id="1" />