Study Desk

Adonai your God will thrust them out ahead of you and drive them out of your sight, so that you will possess their land, as Adonai your God told you.

but cling to Adonai your God, as you have done to this day.

why one man of you has chased a thousand — it is because Adonai your God has fought on your behalf, as he said to you.

"Therefore take great care to love Adonai your God.

know for certain that Adonai your God will stop driving out these nations from your sight. Instead, they will become a snare and a trap for you, whipping your sides and pricking your eyes, until you perish from this good land which Adonai your God has given you.

"Today I am going the way of all the earth. Therefore consider in all your heart and being that not one of all the good things Adonai your God said concerning you has failed to happen; it has all come to pass; nothing of it has failed.

Nevertheless, just as all the good things Adonai your God promised you have come upon you, likewise Adonai will bring upon you all the bad things too, until he has destroyed you from this good land which Adonai your God has given you.

When you violate the covenant of Adonai your God, which he ordered you to obey, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then the anger of Adonai will blaze up against you; and you will perish quickly from the good land which he has given you!"

Y'hoshua gathered all the tribes of Isra'el to Sh'khem; he summoned the leaders, heads, judges and officials of Isra'el; and they presented themselves before God.

Y'hoshua said to all the people, "This is what Adonai the God of Isra'el says: ‘In antiquity your ancestors lived on the other side of the [Euphrates] River — Terach the father of Avraham and Nachor — and they served other gods.

because it is Adonai our God who brought us and our fathers up out of the land of Egypt, from a life of slavery, and did those great signs before our eyes, and preserved us all along the way we traveled and among all the peoples we passed through;

and it was Adonai who drove out from ahead of us all the peoples, the Emori living in the land. Therefore we too will serve Adonai , for he is our God."

Y'hoshua said to the people, "You can't serve Adonai ; because he is a holy God, a jealous God, and he will not forgive your crimes and sins.

"Now," Y'hoshua urged, "put away the foreign gods you have among you, and turn your hearts to Adonai , the God of Isra'el."

The people answered Y'hoshua, "We will serve Adonai our God; we will pay attention to what he says."

Y'hoshua wrote these words in the book of the Torah of God. Then he took a big stone and set it up there under the oak next to the sanctuary of Adonai .

Y'hoshua said to all the people, "See, this stone will be a witness against us; because it has heard all the words of Adonai which he said to us; therefore it will be a witness against you, in case you deny your God."

Adoni-Bezek said: "Seventy kings, with their thumbs and their big toes cut off, gathered food under my table; God has paid me back in accordance with what I did." They brought him to Yerushalayim, and he died there.

They abandoned Adonai , the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, selected from the gods of the peoples around them, and worshipped them; this made Adonai angry.

Thus the people of Isra'el did what was evil from Adonai 's perspective, forgot Adonai their God, and served the ba‘alim and asherim.