1 The Lord your God is going to lead you into the land that you are taking over in order to own it, and will drive out ahead of you many other nations: the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, seven nations that are larger and stronger than you.

2 When the Lord your God has handed them over to you to defeat them, then you must set them apart for destruction.* See footnote under 2:34. Don't make any peace treaty with them and don't show them any mercy. 3 Don't intermarry with them. Don't let your daughters marry their sons or have their daughters marry your sons, 4 because they will lead your children away from following me to worship other gods. Then the Lord will be angry with you, and he will quickly come and kill you.

5 On the contrary, this is what you are to do to them: tear down their altars, knock down their idolatrous pillars, cut down their Asherah poles, and burn down their idols. 6 For you are the Lord your God's holy people. The Lord your God has chosen you to be his own special people, valued above all other peoples on the earth. 7 It wasn't because there were so many of you that the Lord loved you more than any other nation, in fact he chose you though there were so few of you.

8 However, because the Lord loved you and kept the promise he gave to your forefathers, He led you out by his power and rescued you from the prison-house of slavery, from the rule of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. 9 That's why you can be sure that the Lord your God is the true God, the faithful God who keeps his agreement based on trustworthy love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments. 10 But he doesn't hesitate to pay back those who hate him by destroying them.

11 So keep the commandments and rules and regulations that I'm giving you to follow today. 12 If you listen to these regulations and are careful to observe them, then the Lord your God will keep his agreement and the trustworthy love that he promised to your forefathers. 13 He will love you and bless you and give you many descendants. He will bless your children and the crops your land produces—your grain, new wine, and olive oil, the calves of your cattle herds and the lambs of your flocks—in the land that he promised your forefathers to give you.

14 You will be blessed more than any other nation; none of you will be childless, and none of your livestock will fail to have young. 15 The Lord will keep you from having any kind of sickness. He will not let you have any of the terrible diseases you saw in Egypt, but he will let all who hate you suffer from them.

16 You are to destroy all the nations the Lord your God hands over to you. Don't look on them with sympathy. Don't worship their gods, for that will end up being a trap to you. 17 You may say to yourselves, “These nations are stronger than us. How on earth can we drive them out?” 18 But don't be afraid of them. Make sure you remember what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and the whole of Egypt: 19 the amazing tests you witnessed, the signs and miracles, the great power and incredible strength the Lord your God used to lead you out. The Lord your God is going to deal with all the nations you're currently afraid of in the same way.

20 On top of this, the Lord your God will send the hornet† See note under Joshua 24:12, against them until anyone who has survived and anyone hiding from you have been killed. 21 Don't be frightened of these nations, for the Lord your God, who is with you, is a powerful and awesome God. 22 The Lord your God will drive out these nations ahead of you in stages. You won't be able to get rid of them all at the same time, or you'd be overwhelmed by wild animals.‡ See Exodus 23:29. 23 But the Lord your God will hand them over to you and throw them into a terrible panic, until they are wiped out. 24 He will give their defeated kings to you to be killed, and even their names will be forgotten. No one will be able to withstand you; you will completely destroy them.

25 You must burn the idols of their god. Don't desire the silver and gold that covers them. Don't take it or otherwise it will be a trap for you because the Lord your God detests anything to do with idols. 26 Don't bring any detestable idol into your house, otherwise you will treated just like it—by being set apart for destruction. You are to treat idols as totally despicable, and stay far away from them, because they are set apart for destruction.