Moses dissuades them from the opinion of their own righteousness by rehearsing their various rebellions, 1-29.
1 "Hear, O Israel. You are to pass over the Jordan this day to go in and dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourself, cities great and fortified up to heaven, 2 A people great and tall, the children of the Anakims, whom you know and of whom you have heard it said, 'Who can stand before the children of Anak?' 3 Understand therefore this day, that the LORD your God is he who goes over before you as a consuming fire. He shall destroy them and he shall bring them down before your face. So you shall drive them out and destroy them quickly, as the LORD has said to you.
4 "Do not speak in your heart after the LORD your God has cast them out from before you, saying, 'For my righteousness the LORD has brought me in to possess this land, but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD drives them out from before you.' 5 Not for your righteousness, or for the uprightness of your heart do you go to possess their land, but for the wickedness of these nations, the LORD your God drives them out from before you, so that he may perform the word which the LORD swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
6 "Understand therefore, that the LORD your God does not give you this good land to possess it for your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people. 7 Remember, and do not forget how you provoked the LORD your God to wrath in the wilderness. From the day that you departed from the land of Egypt until you came to this place, you have been rebellious against the LORD. 8 Also in Horeb you provoked the LORD to wrath, so that the LORD was angry with you to have destroyed you. 9 When I ascended the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, even the tablets of the covenant which the LORD made with you, I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread, nor drank water. 10 And the LORD delivered to me two tablets of stone written with the finger of God. And on them was written according to all the words which the LORD spoke with you on the mountain from the midst of the fire on the day of the assembly. 11 And it came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tablets of stone, even the tablets of the covenant. 12 And the LORD said to me, 'Arise, go down quickly from here, for your people which you have brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them. They have made themselves a molten image.' 13 Furthermore, the LORD spoke to me, saying, 'I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. 14 Leave me alone, so that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven. And I will make of you a nation mightier and greater than they are.'
15 "So I turned and came down from the mountain while the mountain burned with fire, and the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands. 16 And I looked, and behold, you had sinned against the LORD your God and had made yourselves a molten calf. You had turned aside quickly from the way which the LORD had commanded you. 17 And I took the two tablets, cast them out of my two hands, and broke them before your eyes. 18 And I fell down before the LORD, as at the first, forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread, nor drank water, because of all your sins which you sinned in doing wickedly in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger. 19 (For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure with which the LORD was angry against you to destroy you.) But the LORD listened to me at that time also. 20 And the LORD was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him. And I prayed for Aaron also at the same time. 21 And I took your sin, the calf which you had made, and burnt it with fire, stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust. And I cast the dust of it into the brook that descended from the mountain.
22 "And at Taberah, at Massah, and Kibroth-hattaavah, you provoked the LORD to wrath. 23 Likewise, when the LORD sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying, 'Go up and possess the land which I have given you,' you rebelled against the commandment of the LORD your God, and you did not believe him, nor listen to his voice. 24 You have been rebellious against the LORD from the day that I knew you.
25 "Thus I fell down before the LORD forty days and forty nights, as I fell down at the first, because the LORD had said he would destroy you. 26 I prayed therefore to the LORD, and said, 'O Lord GOD, do not destroy your people and your inheritance which you have redeemed through your greatness, which you have brought forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand. 27 Remember your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Do not look to the stubbornness of this people, nor to their wickedness, nor to their sin, 28 Lest the land from which you have brought us should say, "Because the LORD was not able to bring them into the land which he promised them, and because he hated them, he has brought them out to slay them in the wilderness." 29 Yet they are your people and your inheritance which you have brought out by your mighty power and by your out-stretched arm.'"
Matthew Henry Commentary - Deuteronomy, Chapter 9[➚]
[v.3] - "a consuming fire" - Reference, Hebrews 12:29.
[v.10a] - "written with the finger of God" - Reference, Exodus 31:18; Deuteronomy 10:4; 2nd Corinthians 3:3; Hebrews 8:10.
[v.10b] - "all the words which the LORD spoke with you in the mount" - Reference, Exodus 19:17-19, 20:1-18; Deuteronomy 4:10-15, 5:6-21.
[v.29] - "Yet they are your people and your inheritance" - Reference, verse 26; Deuteronomy 4:20; Psalm 95:7, 100:3.