Moses argues that, if God does not keep his promise to take the people into the Promised Land, then the Egyptians will say that God hated the Israelites and led them out of Egypt in order to kill them in the wilderness.

Lest the land from which thou didst bring us: here bring is correct, from the point of view of Moses in the land of Moab. Lest may be expressed as “Otherwise” (Good News Translation), or even expanded to “If you destroy your people” (Contemporary English Version), pointing back to verse 25.

The land … say: preferably “the people of the land say” (as in the Septuagint, “the inhabitants of the land say”); the Hebrew text has “the land say” (using a plural form of the verb). But it will be helpful to identify the people as “Egyptians”; for example, “If you destroy your people, the Egyptians will say….”

Bring them into the land … brought them out: since these are the Egyptians speaking, it is better to say “take them” and “took them out.”

An alternative translation model for the final part of this verse is:

• Yahweh was unable [or, wasn’t powerful enough] to take them into the land that he had promised to give to them. In fact, he hated them so much that he took them into the wilderness in order to kill them.

Translators in some languages may prefer to use indirect speech; in this case the model of Good News Translation will be helpful.

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Deuteronomy. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2000. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .