1. A long time later, after the Lord had given Israel rest from all their enemies around them, Joshua was old and advanced in years.
2. Joshua called for all Israel, their elders, clan heads, judges, and officials, and said to them, “I am old and advanced in years.
3. You have seen all that the Lord your God did to all these peoples before you, for it is the Lord your God who has waged war for you.
4. See, I have allotted to you as an inheritance the land of these peoples who remain, along with the land of the peoples whom I defeated, from the Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea in the west.
5. The Lord your God will drive them out and dispossess them from before you, and you will inherit their land, as the Lord your God told you.
6. “Now be very strong to observe and enact all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, so that you do not deviate from it to the right or the left.
7. Do not assimilate with these peoples remaining among you. Do not invoke the names of their gods, nor swear by, serve, or worship them.
8. Instead, cling to the Lord your God, as you have done until today.