Assurance of Victory

1Hear, O Israel: Thou art to pass over Jordan this day, to go in to possess nations greater and mightier than thyself, cities great and fortified up to heaven, 2A people great and tall, the children of the Anakims, whom thou knowest, and of whom thou hast heard it said, Who can stand before the children of Anak! 3Understand therefore this day, that the LORD thy God is he who goeth over before thee; as a consuming fire he shall destroy them, and he shall bring them down before thy face: so shalt thou drive them out, and destroy them quickly, as the LORD hath said to thee.

4Speak not thou in thy heart, after that the LORD thy God hath cast them out from before thee, saying, For my righteousness the LORD hath brought me in to possess this land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD doth drive them out from before thee. 5Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thy heart dost thou go to possess their land: but for the wickedness of these nations, the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which the LORD swore to thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

6Understand therefore, that the LORD thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it for thy righteousness; for thou art a stiff-necked people.

The Golden Calf

(Exodus 32:1-6)

7Remember, and forget not, how thou provokedst the LORD thy God to wrath in the wilderness: from the day that thou didst depart from the land of Egypt, until ye came to this place, ye have been rebellious against the LORD. 8Also in Horeb ye provoked the LORD to wrath, so that the LORD was angry with you to have destroyed you. 9When I ascended the mount, to receive the tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I abode in the mount forty days and forty nights, I neither ate bread, nor drank water: 10And the LORD delivered to me two tables of stone written with the finger of God; and on them was written according to all the words which the LORD spoke with you in the mount, from the midst of the fire, in the day of the assembly. 11And it came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant. 12And the LORD said to me, Arise, go down quickly from hence; for thy people which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted themselves; they are quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them; they have made them a molten image. 13Furthermore, the LORD spoke to me, saying, I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people: 14Let me alone, that I may destroy them, and blot out their name from under heaven: and I will make of thee a nation mightier and greater than they.

15So I turned and came down from the mount, and the mount burned with fire: and the two tables of the covenant were in my two hands. 16And I looked, and behold, ye had sinned against the LORD your God, and had made you a molten calf: ye had turned aside quickly from the way which the LORD had commanded you. 17And I took the two tables, and cast them out of my two hands, and broke them before your eyes. 18And I fell down before the LORD, as at the first, forty days and forty nights: I neither ate bread, nor drank water, because of all your sins which ye sinned, in doing wickedly in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger. 19(For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure with which the LORD was wroth against you to destroy you.) But the LORD hearkened to me at that time also. 20And the LORD was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him: and I prayed for Aaron also at the same time. 21And I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust: and I cast the dust of it into the brook that descended from the mount.

22And at Taberah, and at Massah, and Kibroth-hattaavah, ye provoked the LORD to wrath. 23Likewise when the LORD sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying, Go up and possess the land which I have given you; then ye rebelled against the commandment of the LORD your God, and ye believed him not, nor hearkened to his voice. 24Ye have been rebellious against the LORD from the day that I knew you.

25Thus I fell down before the LORD forty days and forty nights, as I fell down at the first; because the LORD had said he would destroy you. 26I prayed therefore to the LORD, and said, O Lord GOD, destroy not thy people and thy inheritance, which thou hast redeemed through thy greatness, which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand. 27Remember thy servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; look not to the stubbornness of this people, nor to their wickedness, nor to their sin: 28Lest the land from which thou hast brought us should say, Because the LORD was not able to bring them into the land which he promised them, and because he hated them, he hath brought them out to slay them in the wilderness. 29Yet they are thy people and thy inheritance which thou hast brought out by thy mighty power and by thy out-stretched arm.