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Moses Commands Obedience

So now, Israel, give heed to the statutes and ordinances that I am teaching you to observe, so that you may live to enter and occupy the land that the L ord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you. ²You must neither add anything to what I command you nor take away anything from it, but keep the commandments of the L ord your God with which I am charging you. ³You have seen for yourselves what the L ord did with regard to the Baal of Peor—how the L ord your God destroyed from among you everyone who followed the Baal of Peor, ⁴while those of you who held fast to the L ord your God are all alive today.

⁵ See, just as the L ord my God has charged me, I now teach you statutes and ordinances for you to observe in the land that you are about to enter and occupy. ⁶You must observe them diligently, for this will show your wisdom and discernment to the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and discerning people!” ⁷For what other great nation has a god so near to it as the L ord our God is whenever we call to him? ⁸And what other great nation has statutes and ordinances as just as this entire law that I am setting before you today?

⁹ But take care and watch yourselves closely, so as neither to forget the things that your eyes have seen nor to let them slip from your mind all the days of your life; make them known to your children and your children’s children— ¹⁰how you once stood before the L ord your God at Horeb, when the L ord said to me, “Assemble the people for me, and I will let them hear my words, so that they may learn to fear me as long as they live on the earth, and may teach their children so”; ¹¹you approached and stood at the foot of the mountain while the mountain was blazing up to the very heavens, shrouded in dark clouds. ¹²Then the L ord spoke to you out of the fire. You heard the sound of words but saw no form; there was only a voice. ¹³He declared to you his covenant, which he charged you to observe, that is, the ten commandments; and he wrote them on two stone tablets. ¹⁴And the L ord charged me at that time to teach you statutes and ordinances for you to observe in the land that you are about to cross into and occupy.

¹⁵ Since you saw no form when the L ord spoke to you at Horeb out of the fire, take care and watch yourselves closely, ¹⁶so that you do not act corruptly by making an idol for yourselves, in the form of any figure—the likeness of male or female, ¹⁷the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the air, ¹⁸the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth. ¹⁹And when you look up to the heavens and see the sun, the moon, and the stars, all the host of heaven, do not be led astray and bow down to them and serve them, things that the L ord your God has allotted to all the peoples everywhere under heaven. ²⁰But the L ord has taken you and brought you out of the iron-smelter, out of Egypt, to become a people of his very own possession, as you are now.

²¹ The L ord was angry with me because of you, and he vowed that I should not cross the Jordan and that I should not enter the good land that the L ord your God is giving for your possession. ²²For I am going to die in this land without crossing over the Jordan, but you are going to cross over to take possession of that good land. ²³So be careful not to forget the covenant that the L ord your God made with you, and not to make for yourselves an idol in the form of anything that the L ord your God has forbidden you. ²⁴For the L ord your God is a devouring fire, a jealous God.

²⁵ When you have had children and children’s children, and become complacent in the land, if you act corruptly by making an idol in the form of anything, thus doing what is evil in the sight of the L ord your God, and provoking him to anger, ²⁶I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that you will soon utterly perish from the land that you are crossing the Jordan to occupy; you will not live long on it, but will be utterly destroyed. ²⁷The L ord will scatter you among the peoples; only a few of you will be left among the nations where the L ord will lead you. ²⁸There you will serve other gods made by human hands, objects of wood and stone that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. ²⁹From there you will seek the L ord your God, and you will find him if you search after him with all your heart and soul. ³⁰In your distress, when all these things have happened to you in time to come, you will return to the L ord your God and heed him. ³¹Because the L ord your God is a merciful God, he will neither abandon you nor destroy you; he will not forget the covenant with your ancestors that he swore to them.

³² For ask now about former ages, long before your own, ever since the day that God created human beings on the earth; ask from one end of heaven to the other: has anything so great as this ever happened or has its like ever been heard of? ³³Has any people ever heard the voice of a god speaking out of a fire, as you have heard, and lived? ³⁴Or has any god ever attempted to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs and wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by terrifying displays of power, as the L ord your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes? ³⁵To you it was shown so that you would acknowledge that the L ord is God; there is no other besides him. ³⁶From heaven he made you hear his voice to discipline you. On earth he showed you his great fire, while you heard his words coming out of the fire. ³⁷And because he loved your ancestors, he chose their descendants after them. He brought you out of Egypt with his own presence, by his great power, ³⁸driving out before you nations greater and mightier than yourselves, to bring you in, giving you their land for a possession, as it is still today. ³⁹So acknowledge today and take to heart that the L ord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other. ⁴⁰Keep his statutes and his commandments, which I am commanding you today for your own well-being and that of your descendants after you, so that you may long remain in the land that the L ord your God is giving you for all time.

Cities of Refuge East of the Jordan

⁴¹ Then Moses set apart on the east side of the Jordan three cities ⁴²to which a homicide could flee, someone who unintentionally kills another person, the two not having been at enmity before; the homicide could flee to one of these cities and live: ⁴³Bezer in the wilderness on the tableland belonging to the Reubenites, Ramoth in Gilead belonging to the Gadites, and Golan in Bashan belonging to the Manassites.

Transition to the Second Address

⁴⁴ This is the law that Moses set before the Israelites. ⁴⁵These are the decrees and the statutes and ordinances that Moses spoke to the Israelites when they had come out of Egypt, ⁴⁶beyond the Jordan in the valley opposite Beth-peor, in the land of King Sihon of the Amorites, who reigned at Heshbon, whom Moses and the Israelites defeated when they came out of Egypt. ⁴⁷They occupied his land and the land of King Og of Bashan, the two kings of the Amorites on the eastern side of the Jordan: ⁴⁸from Aroer, which is on the edge of the Wadi Arnon, as far as Mount Sirion (that is, Hermon), ⁴⁹together with all the Arabah on the east side of the Jordan as far as the Sea of the Arabah, under the slopes of Pisgah.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

25. When thou shalt beget children, and children’s children. Although at the outset he only adverts to idolatry, yet, inasmuch as he thence takes occasion to inveigh generally against the transgressors of the Law, and denounces punishment against them, I have thought it advisable to introduce this passage amongst the Sanctions (of the Law.) He had already strictly forbidden them to turn aside to idols; he now requires this instruction to be handed down to their grand-children and their whole race; as though he had said, that they must continue faithfully in the pure worship of God, not only lest they should deprive themselves of entering the land of Canaan, but also lest, after having long enjoyed quiet possession of it, they should be expelled from it. For long possession might have hardened their minds in security and arrogance, as if they had no change to fear. Lest, therefore, as time should pass away, they should trust that they were firmly established, and advance to greater license, he now reminds them that the punishment which he had already taught them to await themselves, would also be extended to their descendants; since it was no less easy for God to drive their ²⁵⁷²⁵⁷     “Abnepotes,” — Lat.; i.e., their grandchild’s grandchildren. distant posterity from their quiet nest, than it would have been for Him to prevent their taking possession of it. But although he is treating of idols, still he addresses them on the subject of the curse, which overhangs all despisers of God. And, in order that the threat may affect them more deeply, he calls on “heaven and earth to witness;” as though he had said, that even things inanimate and without reason were in a manner conscious of the vengeance of God. Their opinion ²⁵⁸²⁵⁸     “When he calls heaven and earth to witness, he calls all things which are in heaven and in earth, by metonomy; and especially angels and men, who are properly called witnesses. Thus Theodoret. So the Poet says:
   Vos aeterni ignes, and non violabile numen
Tester; (Virg.Aen., 2. 154;)
   for the Platonists thought that the heavenly fires, i.e., the stars, were animated by their intelligences, or guardian angels, whom they worshipped as inferior gods.” — Corn. a Lapide in loco.
   De Lyra’s note is, “i.e., every intellectual creature existing in heaven and earth, since none but an intellectual creature can properly bear witness.” is a poor one who think that angels and men are thus designated by a metonomy; for we shall see a little further on that the same form of expression is repeated. And when he says in his song, (Deuteronomy 32:1,) “Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth,” it is to signify by hyperbole that his address is worthy of being listened to by all creatures. Thus Isaiah, the more to shame the Jews, who had become stupified in their folly, addresses his words to the heavens and earth. (Isaiah 1:2.)

When he calls heaven and earth to witness God’s vengeance, it is as much as to say, that it will as clearly appear as the heaven and earth appear before our eyes; and after he has said that they shall perish, he also declares in what manner, viz., that God would scatter them hither and thither, and reduce them to a small number. What follows might seem absurd, inasmuch as it ought not to be reckoned among their punishments that they should serve idols among strangers, whereas they had already worshipped them of their own accord in their own land; but this difficulty is easily solved, and in two ways, either that banishment was a just reward to them in order that there they might indulge to their full these impure dispositions; and thus there will be an antithesis between the nations of the heathen and the Holy Land, as though God had said that He would not; suffer them to profane the latter by their superstitions; or else, that then, the veil being as it were removed, they should be ashamed when they should be compelled to serve dead idols. Nor can it be questioned but that then they were wounded in spirit by the same disgusting practices in which they had before taken pleasure; and I (See ante on Deuteronomy 28:36, p. 254.) have stated elsewhere that I prefer this latter sense. Meanwhile, he reproaches them for their stupidity in adoring ²⁵⁹²⁵⁹ “Des marmousets sans sens;” senseless puppets. — Fr. dead images, formed of corruptible things, and the work of men’s hands.

²⁵⁷ “Abnepotes,” — Lat.; i.e., their grandchild’s grandchildren.

²⁵⁸ “When he calls heaven and earth to witness, he calls all things which are in heaven and in earth, by metonomy; and especially angels and men, who are properly called witnesses. Thus Theodoret. So the Poet says: Vos aeterni ignes, and non violabile numen Tester; (Virg.Aen., 2. 154;) for the Platonists thought that the heavenly fires, i.e., the stars, were animated by their intelligences, or guardian angels, whom they worshipped as inferior gods.” — Corn. a Lapide in loco. De Lyra’s note is, “i.e., every intellectual creature existing in heaven and earth, since none but an intellectual creature can properly bear witness.”

²⁵⁹ “Des marmousets sans sens;” senseless puppets. — Fr.