1. These are the words that Moses spoke to all Israel across the Jordan—in the wilderness, in the Arabah opposite Suph, between Paran and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth and Di-Zahab.
2. It is eleven days’ journey from Horeb by way of Mount Seir to Kadesh-barnea.
3. Now Moses spoke to Bnei-Yisrael, according to all Adonai had commanded him for them—in the fortieth year, in the eleventh month, on the first day of the month,
4. after he had struck down Sihon king of the Amorites who lived in Heshbon, and Og king of the Bashan who lived in Ashtaroth and Edrei.
5. Across the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses began to explain this Torah saying,
6. “Adonai our God spoke to us at Horeb saying: ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain.
7. Turn, journey on, and enter the hill country of the Amorites and all their neighbors, in the Arabah, the hill country, the lowland, the Negev, and by the seashore—the land of the Canaanites and the Lebanon as far as the great river, the Euphrates.
8. See, I have set the land before you. Enter and possess the land that Adonai swore to your fathers—to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob—to give to them and to their descendants after them.’
9. “I spoke to you at that time saying: ‘I am not able to bear the burden of you by myself.
10. Adonai your God has multiplied you—and here you are today, like the stars of the heavens in number.
11. “‘May Adonai, God of your fathers, increase you a thousand times as many as you are, and may He bless you just as He has promised you!
12. How can I bear your load and burden and bickering by myself?
13. Choose for yourselves wise and discerning men, well known to your tribes, and I will appoint them as your heads.’
14. “You answered me and said: ‘The thing you have said to do is good.’
15. So I took the heads of your tribes, men who were wise and well known, and appointed them as heads over you—leaders of thousands, leaders of hundreds, leaders of fifties, leaders of tens, and officials for your tribes.
16. “I commanded your judges at that time saying: ‘Hear cases between your brothers, and judge fairly between a man and his brother or the outsider with him.
17. You must not show partiality in judgment —you must hear the small and the great alike. Fear no man, for the judgment is God’s. The case that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me and I will hear it.’
18. “I commanded you at that time everything you should do.
19. “Then we journeyed from Horeb and went through all that great and terrible wilderness that you saw on the way to the hill country of the Amorites, as Adonai our God commanded us. Then we came to Kadesh-barnea.