The Song of Moses

1 Listen, you heavens, and I will speak; listen, earth, to the words of my mouth. 2 My teaching shall be soft as rain; let it be received as the dew, and my word be as the breath of the rain that breathes upon the grass, and as the showers of the latter rain upon the grass. 3 For I call on the Name of the Lord: declare the greatness of our God; 4 the Mighty One whose works are perfect; for all His ways are justice; a faithful God from whom no wrongdoing proceeds, He is just and true. 5 They have corrupted themselves, and not Him; children who worship idols, a generation that changes its work, and makes it another. 6 Look, is this how you repay the Lord, you people who have received the law, but have not become wise? Is He not your Father, and you are His who made you and bought you? 7 Remember the days of old, consider the years of generation after generation; ask your fathers, and they will show you, your elders, and they will tell you. 8 When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when He divided humankind, He established the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the sons of Israel. 9 For the Lord's portion is His people, Jacob is the lot of His inheritance. 10 He satisfied their needs in the land of the wilderness, in the dry place where there was no water; He placed them around His Shekinah; He taught them the words of His law; He kept them as the apple of His eye. 11 As the eagle which hurries to his nest, and spreads himself over his young ones, stretching out his wings, takes them, bears them up with the strength of his flight feathers, 12 so the Lord alone prepared them to live in the world He will renew, while the worship of idols shall not be established before Him. 13 He settled them in the strong places of the earth, to eat the captured goods of their enemies: He gave them the captured goods of the rulers of cities, and the wealth of those who lived in strong fortresses. 14 He gave them the captured goods of their kings and sultans, with the riches of their princes, and the strength of the people of their lands, their possessions, the captured goods of their armies and camps, and the blood of their heroes was poured out like water. 15 But Israel grew fat and kicked, he prospered, grew strong and got rich, and forgot the worship of Eloha who made him, and provoked the Almighty who redeemed him. 16 They provoked Him by the worship of idols, by abominations they made Him angry. 17 They sacrificed to demons who can give no help, and fearful things that they had not known, new gods recently made, with which your fathers had no dealings; 18 you have forgotten the Awe-Inspiring One and the Omnipotent who created you; you have abandoned the worship of Eloha who made you. 19 And it was seen before the Lord, and His anger was kindled by the provocation of His sons and daughters before Him. 20 And He said: I will remove My Shekinah from among them; their final end is known to Me; for they are a perverse generation, children who have no faith. 21 They have moved Me to jealousy by that which is not worshipful, they have angered Me by their idolatries; and I will make them jealous by what has not been a people, I will provoke them through a foolish nation. 22 For a burning, strong as fire, shall go out before Me in fury consuming to the lowest hell, to make an end of the earth and its produce, and to destroy the mountains to the end; 23 and I will multiply calamities upon them, I will send My plagues among them; 24 they shall be swollen with hunger, and be eaten by the birds, and be tormented with evil spirits; and I will send the teeth of wild animals among them with the venom of serpents that crawl in the dust. 25 Outside the sword will devour, and inside the rooms death will kill, the youths and the young women, the nursing infants with the aged. 26 I said I would make My anger to remain upon them and destroy them; I will abolish their memory from among humankind: 27 except that the enemy's anger would grow stronger, and the adversary make himself great, and would say: Our hand has prevailed, and all this is not from the Lord. 28 For they are a people that abandons counsel, and there is no understanding in them. 29 If only they were wise, that they had understanding in this, and would consider what will be in their end! 30 How would one pursue a thousand, and two put 10,000 to flight, unless the Mighty One had delivered them up, and the Lord had repaid them! 31 For their strength is not as our Strength, and our enemies are the judges. 32 For their punishment will be like that of the people of Sodom, and their stroke like that of the people of Gomorrah; their plagues will be evil as the heads of serpents, and the retribution of their works like their venom. 33 The cup of their punishment is like the poison of venomous serpents and like the heads of cruel cobras. 34 Are not all their works known before Me, stored in My treasures against the day of judgment? 35 Their punishment is before Me, and I will repay;⁠a in the time of their dispersion from their land; for the day of their ruin draws near, and that which is prepared for them is coming quickly. 36 For the Lord shall decide the judgment of His people, and He will avenge His righteous servants; for it is seen before Him, that in the time when the stroke of their enemies would prevail against them, they will be wavering like those who are abandoned. 37 And He will say: Where are their idols, the mighty things in which they had trusted, 38 which ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let them now rise up and help you, let them be a shield over you. 39 See, now, that I, even I, am He, and there is no God besides Me. I kill and make alive, I wound but also heal, and there is no one who can rescue from My hand. 40 For I have prepared in the heavens the dwelling of My Shekinah, and have said, I live forever. 41 When My sword is revealed like the sight of twofold lightning from one end of the heavens to another, and My hand takes hold on judgment, I will take vengeance on My enemies and repay My adversaries; 42 I will make My arrows drunk with blood, and My sword shall kill the peoples, that by the blood of the slain, and the captives, I may take the crowns from the head of the opponent and the enemy. 43 Give praise, you Gentiles, with His people, because His righteous servants will have been avenged; for He will bring retribution on those who hate Him, and will show mercy to His land and His people.

Moses’ Final Instructions

44 And Moses came and spoke all the words of this hymn before the people, he and Joshua son of Nun. 45 And Moses finished speaking all these words with all Israel, 46 and said to them, Set your heart upon all the words that I have witnessed to you today, so that you may instruct your children to observe and perform all the words of this law. 47 For the word is not given in vain to you; it is your life, and by this word you will live long in the land which you pass over Jordan to inherit.

Moses Is Called to Mount Nebo

48 And the Lord spoke with Moses the same day, saying: 49 Go up to this mountain of Abarim, the mountain of Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, opposite Jericho, and see the land of Canaan which I have given to the sons of Israel for possession; 50 and, dying on the mountain to which you go up, you shall be gathered to your people, as Aaron your brother died on Mount Hor, and was gathered to his people; 51 because you were unfaithful to My Memra in the middle of the children of Israel, at the waters of Meribah, at Petra, in the desert of Zin, and because you did not show My holiness among the children of Israel. 52 For, though you may see the land, yet from there you shall not go in to the land which I have given to the children of Israel.