12aGather the people together, men and women and little ones, and the stranger who is within your gates, that they may hear and that they may learn to fear the Lord your God and carefully observe all the words of this law,
13 and that their children, awho have not known it, bmay hear and learn to fear the Lord your God as long as you live in the land which you cross the Jordan to possess.”
Prediction of Israel’s Rebellion
14 Then the Lord said to Moses, a“Behold, the days approach when you must die; call Joshua, and present yourselves in the tabernacle of meeting, that bI may inaugurate him.” So Moses and Joshua went and presented themselves in the tabernacle of meeting.
15 Now athe Lord appeared at the tabernacle in a pillar of cloud, and the pillar of cloud stood above the door of the tabernacle.
16 And the Lord said to Moses: “Behold, you will1 rest with your fathers; and this people will arise and bplay the harlot with the gods of the foreigners of the land, where they go tobe among them, and they will cforsake Me and dbreak My covenant which I have made with them.
17 Then My anger shall be aaroused against them in that day, and bI will forsake them, and I will chide My face from them, and they shall be1 devoured. And many evils and troubles shall befall them, so that they will say in that day, d‘Have not these evils come upon us because our God isenot among us?’
18 And aI will surely hide My face in that day because of all the evil which they have done, in that they have turned to other gods.
19 “Now therefore, write down this song for yourselves, and teach it to the children of Israel; put it in their mouths, that this song may be aa witness for Me against the children of Israel.
20 When I have brought them to the land flowing with milk and honey, of which I swore to their fathers, and they have eaten and filled themselves aand grown fat, bthen they will turn to other gods and serve them; and they will provoke Me and break My covenant.
21 Then it shall be, awhen many evils and troubles have come upon them, that this song will testify against them as a witness; for it will not be forgotten in the mouths of their descendants, for bI know the inclination cof their behavior today, even before I have brought them to the land of which I swore togivethem.”
22 Therefore Moses wrote this song the same day, and taught it to the children of Israel.
23aThen He inaugurated Joshua the son of Nun, and said, b“Be strong and of good courage; for you shall bring the children of Israel into the land of which I swore to them, and I will be with you.”
24 So it was, when Moses had completed writing the words of this law in a book, when they were finished,
25 that Moses commanded the Levites, who bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying:
The transaction recorded in these verses may be regarded as the solemn inauguration of Joshua to the office to which he had some time before Numbers 27:22 been called, and his recognition in it by God, which were manifested by his being summoned into the tabernacle with Moses while the Lord appeared in the pillar of cloud (compare Numbers 11:25; Numbers 12:5).
Deuteronomy 31:16
The future apostasy of the people is announced in the presence of Joshua that the latter might be fully aware of the danger and strive in his day to avert it. This he faithfully did (compare Joshua 24:31); but we find him in his own last address to Israel repeating Joshua 23:15-16 the self-same prediction and warning.
Deuteronomy 31:19
A witness for me against them - i. e., an attestation from their own mouths at once of God' s benefits, their own duties, and their deserts when they should fall away. Being in verse it would be the more easily learned and kept in memory. The use of songs for such didactic purposes was not unknown to the legislators of antiquity. Compare also the advice of Paul, "teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs" Colossians 3:16.
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