21. Then the tribes of Reuben and Gad and half of the tribe of Manasseh answered the heads of the divisions of Israel.
22. They said, “The Lord is ⌊the only true⌋ God! The Lord is ⌊the only true⌋ God! He knows, so let Israel know! If our act is rebellious or unfaithful to the Lord,
23. don’t spare us today. If we built an altar with the intention of no longer following him, and if we built it for making burnt offerings, grain offerings, or fellowship offerings, let the Lord punish us.
24. “We were worried because of the situation we’re in. We thought sometime in the future your children might say to our children, ‘What relationship do you have with the Lord God of Israel?
25. The Lord has made the Jordan River a dividing line between us and you, the descendants of Reuben and Gad. You have no connection with the Lord!’ So your descendants would stop our descendants from worshiping the Lord.
26. Then we said, ‘Let’s build an altar for ourselves. It will not be for burnt offerings or sacrifices,
27. but it will stand as a witness between us for generations to come. It will stand as a witness that we may worship in the presence of the Lord with our burnt offerings, sacrifices, and fellowship offerings.’ Then your descendants cannot say to our descendants, ‘You have no connection with the Lord!’
28. So we thought, if this statement is made to us or to our descendants in the future, we will answer, ‘Look at the model of the Lord’s altar our ancestors made. They didn’t make it for burnt offerings or sacrifices but to stand as a witness between us.’
29. It would be unthinkable for us to rebel against the Lord or to turn back today from following the Lord by building an altar for burnt offerings, grain offerings, or sacrifices in addition to the altar of the Lord our God that is in front of his tent.”
30. When the priest Phinehas, the leaders of the congregation, and the heads of the divisions of Israel heard what the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh said, they were satisfied.
31. Then Phinehas, son of the priest Eleazar, said to the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh, “Today we know the Lord is among us, because you did not commit an unfaithful act against the Lord. Now you have rescued the people of Israel from the Lord’s punishment.”
32. Then Phinehas (son of the priest Eleazar) and the leaders returned from Reuben and Gad in Gilead to Israel in Canaan and gave them the report.