1 When Yahweh, your God, has brought you into the land where you are going and which you will conquer; when he drives away before you many peoples—the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites and the Canaanites, the Periz zites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites—seven nations that are much more nu merous and more powerful than you;
2 when he has given them into your hand and you defeat them, you must destroy them all according to the law of anathema.
3 Do not make any covenant with them or have compassion on them.
4 Do not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their sons, or taking their daughters for your sons, because they would seduce your children to abandon me and adore strange gods for which the anger of Yahweh would burn against you, and then he would destroy you. ［Ex 34,13］
5 On the contrary, this is what you must do: destroy their altars and break their sacred pillars into pieces, demolish their poles and burn their idols.
How God rewards his faithful ones
6 You are a people consecrated to Yahweh, your God. Yahweh has chosen you from among all the peoples on the face of the earth, that you may be his own people.
7 Yahweh has bound himself to you and has chosen you, not because you are the most numerous among all the peoples (on the contrary, you are the least).
8 Rather, he has chosen you be cause of his love for you and to ful fill the oath he made to your fathers. Therefore, with a firm hand Yah weh brought you out from slavery in Egypt, from the power of Pha raoh.
9 So know that Yahweh, your God, is the true and faithful God. He keeps his covenant, and his love reaches to the thousandth generation for those who love him and fulfill his commandments,
10 but he punishes in their own persons those who hate him and he repays them without delay.
11 So keep the commandments, the norms and the laws that today I command you to practice.
12 If you ob serve these norms, if you keep and practice them, Yahweh will be faithful to his Covenant and will show you the love he promised to your fathers.
13 He will love you, bless you and multiply you.
He will bless you with many children and abundant harvests: wheat, wine and oil; he will multiply the young of your cattle and of your sheep in the land that he promised your fathers he would give you.
14 You shall be more favored than all the peoples; there will be no sterile male or female among your people or in your livestock.
15 Yahweh will remove from you all infirmities, he will not let any of the plagues of Egypt which you have known fall upon you. But he will inflict them upon those who hate you.
16 So, destroy all the peoples which Yahweh, your God, will put in your po wer. Do not have pity on them or serve their gods: this would be a trap for you.
17 Perhaps you will say in your heart: “These nations are more numerous than I am, how then am I going to drive them away?”
18 Do not be afraid, remember what Yahweh, your God, has done with Pharaoh and with the Egyptians,
19 those terrible trials which you saw with your eyes and the marvels and signs, the strong hand and outstretched arm with which Yahweh, your God, has freed you.
20 He will do the same with all the people whom you fear. Yahweh will even send wasps to destroy those who remain and hide themselves to escape from you.
21 Do not be afraid of them because Yahweh, your God, is in your midst. He is a great and terrible God.
22 It is he who will drive out these nations little by little before your eyes. If you were to de stroy them all at once, the wild beasts would multiply and cause you trouble.
23 Yahweh, your God, will give these people over to you and he will fill them with fear until they all perish.
24 Yahweh will give their kings into your hands so that you may strike out their name from under heaven, and nothing will stand be fore you until you have destroyed them.
25 Burn the images of their gods and do not covet the gold or silver that covers them. Do not take it for yourself lest you be trapped by it, because Yah weh hates it.
26 None of these shall enter your house, for as they are accursed, the curse might return to you. Regard these as abomina ble because they are indeed “anathema” or accursed.