Assumption of Moses 1:1-18

¹The book of the prophecy of Moses, which was declared to him during the forty years in the desert, after the children of Israel went out of Egypt.

²And Moses summoned Joshua the son of Nun, a man approved by the Lord, and said to him: Keep all the words and the commandments which I give you this day.

³For from my death, and my assumption until his coming, there shall be two hundred and fifty times.

⁴This is the course of the times which they shall pursue until they are completed.

⁵But I am about to sleep with my fathers. Therefore be strong, Joshua son of Nun; for God has chosen you to be minister to his people.

⁶Know, therefore, that it is not on account of any virtue or strength that you are chosen to this ministry, but on account of the mercy and patience of God.

⁷So he called to him and said: God of Abraham, and God of Isaac, and God of Jacob, and of all their seed, remember your covenant which you have made with them, and your oath which you have sworn to them by yourself.

⁸That their seed should never fail from the land which you have given them.

⁹Yet in their wickedness they shall go astray in a strange land; but you will not forget them, nor will you forsake them.

¹⁰For you are gracious and merciful. You did not forget them in Egypt when they were in bondage in the house of slavery, since you are patient in mercies and long-suffering.

¹¹And so must it be with me. For I am about to die. I go to sleep with my fathers, and there is no one among men who knows the place of my grave.

¹²For thus it is ordained concerning me: that no one shall know my tomb.

¹³Therefore write in a book all that I say to you, and hide it until the last times.

¹⁴For this purpose you shall place it in earthen vessels, that it may remain in that place which God has chosen from the beginning of the creation of the world.

¹⁵For his name's sake the book shall be preserved incorrupt to the end of times.

¹⁶For these words shall not perish and shall not be forgotten by the Lord of all things, but they shall be fulfilled exactly as he has ordained concerning the nations.

¹⁷Hear therefore, O Joshua, and mark my words. All that I say to you, keep carefully, so that the Lord God, who has kept the people, may hear these things.

¹⁸For he it was who first devised and created the world, and was the advocate for their cause from the beginning.