Deuteronomy 29
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“Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.” — John 5:39
1These are the words of the covenant, which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, beside the covenant which he made with them in Horeb.
CHAPTER 29
De 29:1-29. An Exhortation to Obedience.
1. These are the words of the covenant--The discourse of Moses is continued, and the subject of that discourse was Israel's covenant with God, the privileges it conferred, and the obligations it imposed.
beside the covenant which he made with them in Horeb--It was substantially the same; but it was renewed now, in different circumstances. They had violated its conditions. Moses rehearses these, that they might have a better knowledge of its conditions and be more disposed to comply with them.
Beside the covenant which he made with them in Horeb. This was not a new covenant in addition to that made at Sinai, but simply a renewal and reaffirmation of that covenant. At Sinai the covenant was, properly speaking, made; sacrifices were then offered, and the people were sprinkled with the sacrificial blood, whereby the covenant was ratified (Exo_24:1-18.; cf. Psa_50:5); but on the occasion here referred to, no sacrifices were offered, for this was merely the recognition of the covenant formerly made as still subsisting.
2And Moses called unto all Israel, and said unto them, Ye have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt unto Pharaoh, and unto all his servants, and unto all his land;
2. Moses called unto all Israel, ... Ye have seen all that the Lord did, &c.--This appeal to the experience of the people, though made generally, was applicable only to that portion of them who had been very young at the period of the Exodus, and who remembered the marvellous transactions that preceded and followed that era. Yet, alas! those wonderful events made no good impression upon them (De 29:4). They were strangers to that grace of wisdom which is liberally given to all who ask it; and their insensibility was all the more inexcusable that so many miracles had been performed which might have led to a certain conviction of the presence and the power of God with them. The preservation of their clothes and shoes, the supply of daily food and fresh water--these continued without interruption or diminution during so many years' sojourn in the desert. They were miracles which unmistakably proclaimed the immediate hand of God and were performed for the express purpose of training them to a practical knowledge of, and habitual confidence in, Him. Their experience of this extraordinary goodness and care, together with their remembrance of the brilliant successes by which, with little exertion or loss on their part, God enabled them to acquire the valuable territory on which they stood, is mentioned again to enforce a faithful adherence to the covenant, as the direct and sure means of obtaining its promised blessings.
Moses addresses the nation as such, and reminds them of their dullness to apprehend the manifestations of God's grace which had been so abundantly afforded in their past history, in order that he may arouse them to a better state of mind, and stimulate them to hearken to the voice of God in the future.
3The great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and those great miracles:
4Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.
The Lord hath not given you an heart to perceive, etc. Moses says this "not to excuse their wickedness, but partly to direct them what course to take, and to whom they must have recourse for the amending of their former errors, and for a good understanding and improvement of God's works; and partly to aggravate their sin, and to intimate that, although the hearing ear and the seeing eye and the understanding heart are the workmanship of God (Pro_20:12), and the effects of his special grace (Deu_30:6; Jer_31:33; Jer_32:39, etc.), yet their want of this grace was their own fault and the just punishment of their former sins" (Poole). As they would not attend to God's word, as they had shut their eyes and their ears, that they might not see, or hear, or learn what God was teaching them by his conduct towards them, they had been left to themselves; and, as a necessary consequence, they had become as persons who had no eyes to see, or ears to hear, or heart to perceive what was set before them for their learning.
5And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot.
Having referred to the gracious dealing of God with them in the wilderness, Moses introduces Jehovah himself as speaking to them (cf. Deu_11:14). (On Deu_29:5 and Deu_29:6, see Deu_8:3, Deu_8:4; and on Deu_8:7 and Deu_8:8, see Deu_2:26, etc.; Deu_3:1, etc.)
6Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drunk wine or strong drink: that ye might know that I am the LORD your God.
7And when ye came unto this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, came out against us unto battle, and we smote them:
8And we took their land, and gave it for an inheritance unto the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and to the half tribe of Manasseh.
9Keep therefore the words of this covenant, and do them, that ye may prosper in all that ye do.
That ye may prosper in all that ye do. The verb here used (הִשְׂכִּיל) means primarily to look at, to consider or attend to, hence to become intelligent, to be prudent, to act wisely, and so to have success, to prosper. It is the prosperity which comes from wise and prudent action that God commends to his people (cf. Jos_1:7, Jos_1:8).
10Ye stand this day all of you before the LORD your God; your captains of your tribes, your elders, and your officers, with all the men of Israel,
10-29. Ye stand this day all of you before the Lord your God--The whole congregation of Israel, of all ages and conditions, all--young as well as old; menials as well as masters; native Israelites as well as naturalized strangers--all were assembled before the tabernacle to renew the Sinaitic covenant. None of them were allowed to consider themselves as exempt from the terms of that national compact, lest any lapsing into idolatry might prove a root of bitterness, spreading its noxious seed and corrupt influence all around (compare He 12:15). It was of the greatest consequence thus to reach the heart and conscience of everyone, for some might delude themselves with the vain idea that by taking the oath (De 29:12) by which they engaged themselves in covenant with God, they would surely secure its blessings. Then, even though they would not rigidly adhere to His worship and commands, but would follow the devices and inclinations of their own hearts, yet they would think that He would wink at such liberties and not punish them. It was of the greatest consequence to impress all with the strong and abiding conviction, that while the covenant of grace had special blessings belonging to it, it at the same time had curses in reserve for transgressors, the infliction of which would be as certain, as lasting and severe. This was the advantage contemplated in the law being rehearsed a second time. The picture of a once rich and flourishing region, blasted and doomed in consequence of the sins of its inhabitants, is very striking, and calculated to awaken awe in every reflecting mind. Such is, and long has been, the desolate state of Palestine; and, in looking at its ruined cities, its blasted coast, its naked mountains, its sterile and parched soil--all the sad and unmistakable evidences of a land lying under a curse--numbers of travellers from Europe, America, and the Indies ("strangers from a far country," De 29:22) in the present day see that the Lord has executed His threatening. Who can resist the conclusion that it has been inflicted "because the inhabitants had forsaken the covenant of the Lord God of their fathers. ... and the anger of the Lord was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book"?
Summons to enter into the covenant of the Lord with fresh ardor and cordiality.
Translate: Ye stand this day all of you before Jehovah your God, your chiefs, your tribes, your elders, and your officers, every man of Israel. The two members are parallel: the heads or chiefs are the elders and officers, the tribes are all Israel The Authorized Version follows the LXX; but against the idiom of the Hebrew. Ibn Ezra says ראשֵׁיכֵם is instead of ראֹשֵׁי, but this can hardly be.
11Your little ones, your wives, and thy stranger that is in thy camp, from the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water:
12That thou shouldest enter into covenant with the LORD thy God, and into his oath, which the LORD thy God maketh with thee this day:
13That he may establish thee to day for a people unto himself, and that he may be unto thee a God, as he hath said unto thee, and as he hath sworn unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
14Neither with you only do I make this covenant and this oath;
15But with him that standeth here with us this day before the LORD our God, and also with him that is not here with us this day:
16(For ye know how we have dwelt in the land of Egypt; and how we came through the nations which ye passed by;
17And ye have seen their abominations, and their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which were among them:)
18Lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the LORD our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations; lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood;
The covenant was a national engagement, and as such included not only the adults anti existing generation, but the little ones, the strangers resident in Israel, the lowest menial servants, that is, all the elements of which the nation was composed, as well as their posterity in coming, generations. That thou shouldest enter into covenant. The expression in the Hebrew is a strong one, indicating not a mere formal engagement, but a going thoroughly into the covenant; the phrase is used of the sword going through the land (Le Deu_26:6), and of one going into the pit (Job_33:28). Into his oath. Covenants were confirmed by oath (Gen_26:28; Heb_6:17); hence in Scripture the covenant of God is sometimes called his oath (Deu_29:14; 1Ch_16:16; Heb_7:28). (On Deu_29:13, cf. Deu_28:9; Deu_27:9; Exo_19:5, Exo_19:6.)
The summons to renew the covenant is enforced by a fresh exposition of the evil and danger of apostasy from the Lord. This is introduced by a reference to the experience which the people already had of idolatry in Egypt, and among the nations with whom they had come in contact during their march through the wilderness, from which they must have learned the utter worthlessness of all idols, that they were no gods, but only wood and stone,
Deu_29:16, Deu_29:17
These verses are not a parenthesis, as in the Authorized Version. Deu_29:18 is connected, not with Deu_29:15, but with Deu_29:17; there should be a full stop at the end of Deu_29:15. Their idols; literally, their blocks or logs (גִלוּלִים, from גָלַל, to roll something too heavy to be carried), a term of contempt used frequently in Scripture of idols.
Lest there should be among you; rather, See that there be not among you, etc. The part. פֵן, lest, at the beginning of a sentence, sometimes implies a prohibition or dissuasion, as Job_32:13, "say not;" Isa_36:18," beware of saying" (Gesenius, Noldius in voc.). Gall. The Hebrew word so rendered (ראֹשׁ) is supposed by Gesenius to be the poppy plant, by Celsius to be the hemlock (it is so rendered, Hos_10:4; Amo_6:12, and by AEdman to be colocynth. It is probably a general name for what is poisonous and bitter; for it is used of poison generally (Deu_32:32) and of the venom of asps (Deu_32:33; Job_20:16), as well as of poisonous roots and bitter fruits (see Kitto, 'Bibl. Cycl.,' 3.701). Coupled here with wormwood, it must be a plant that is referred to; and the union of the two affords "a striking image of the destructive fruit borne by idolatry" (Keil).
19And it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst:
That he bless himself in his heart;—congratulate himself—saying, I shall have peace—i.e; all shall be well with me—though—rather, for—I walk in the imagination of mine heart; literally, in the firmness or hardness of my heart, (שְׁרִירוּת, from שָׁרַר, to twist together, to be tough or firm); the word is always used in a bad sense in Hebrew, though not in Aramaic (cf. Psa_81:13 [12]; Jer_3:17; Jer_7:24; Jer_9:13 [14]; Jer_11:8). To add drunkenness to thirst; a proverbial expression, of which very different explanations have been given. It is now generally admitted that the verb (סְפוֹת) cannot be taken here in the sense of "add," but has its proper sense of pouring out, pouring away, destroying. The word rendered "drunkenness" (רָוֶת, from רָוָה, to be sated with moisture, to be drenched) means rather "sated, drenched, well-watered;" and the word rendered "thirst" (צְמֵאָה, from צָמֵא, to thirst) is properly thirsty, and is used of dry land (Isa_44:3); both are adjectives, and a substantive is to be supplied. Some supply נֶפֶשׁ, soul or person; others, אֶרֶץ, land. The former render, "The full [soul] with the thirsty" (Gesenius); or, "Them that are sated with them that are thirsty," i.e. as well those who have imbibed the poison as those who thirst for it (Knobel); or "That the sated [soul] may destroy the thirsty," i.e. that the impious one, restrained by no law and, as it were, drunk with crime, may corrupt others, also prone to evil, and bring on them destruction (Maurer). Those who supply "land," render "To destroy the well-watered [land] with the dry." This last seems the preferable rendering; but the general meaning is the same in either case, viz. that the effect of such hardness of heart would be to destroy one and all. "The Orientals are fond of such bipartite forms of expressing the whole" (Knobel; cf. Deu_32:36).
Deu_29:20, Deu_29:21
Though the sinner fancies all is well with him, and is hardened in his iniquity, and is leading others astray by his example, the Lord will not suffer him to rest in impunity, but will send on him terrible punishments. The anger of the Lord and his jealousy shall smoke, i.e. shall break forth in destructive fire (cf. Psa_74:1 : Isa_65:5; Psa_18:8). The Lord shall blot out his name from under heaven (cf. Deu_25:19; Exo_17:14). The Lord shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel,—so that, excluded from the covenant nation, and placed beyond the sphere over which rests the salvation of the Lord, they will be exposed to destruction—according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this book of the law; rather, as in the margin, is written; the participle agrees with "covenant."
20The LORD will not spare him, but then the anger of the LORD and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, and the LORD shall blot out his name from under heaven.
21And the LORD shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this book of the law:
22So that the generation to come of your children that shall rise up after you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which the LORD hath laid upon it;
23And that the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, that it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth therein, like the overthrow of Sodom, and Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger, and in his wrath:
Future generations and foreign visitants, seeing the calamities with which the rebels had been visited, nay, all nations, should ask, in astonishment and horror, Wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger? It is evident from this that Moses contemplates, and in fact here predicts, a defection, not of individuals or families merely, but of the nation as a whole from the Lord, and the punishment which came in consequence upon the nation. The words from "when they see" (Deu_29:22) to "wrath" (Deu_29:23) are a parenthesis, in which a reason for the main thought is given in a circumstantial clause; and the "say" of Deu_29:22 is resumed by the "say" of Deu_29:24.
And that the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, etc.; rather, sulfur and salt, a burning the whole land thereof, it shall not be sown, etc. The words "sulfur," etc; are in apposition to the "plagues and sicknesses" of Deu_29:22, and thus so far depend on the "see." The description here is taken from the country around the Dead Sea, to which there is an express allusion in the close of the verse (cf. Gen_19:23, etc.). As this country, which before had been as the garden of the Lord, became, when the wrath of God was poured upon it, utterly desolate and waste; so should it be with the land of Israel when the plagues and sicknesses threatened were laid on it by the Lord.
24Even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the LORD done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger?
What meaneth the heat of this great anger? The reply to this question comes in what follows (Deu_29:25-28).
Gods … whom he had not given unto them (cf. Deu_4:19).
25Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them forth out of the land of Egypt:
26For they went and served other gods, and worshipped them, gods whom they knew not, and whom he had not given unto them:
27And the anger of the LORD was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book:
All the curses; literally, every curse, or the whole curse (cf. Dan_9:11, etc.).
28And the LORD rooted them out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation, and cast them into another land, as it is this day.
And cast them. In the Hebrew the word cast them (יַשְׁלִכֵם) has one of its letters, the ל, larger than the rest, and another letter, י which should be after the ל, is omitted; on which "Baal Hatturim noteth. There is a great lamed and a want of yod, to teach that there is no casting away like that of the ten tribes" (Ainsworth). According to Baxtorf, the large lamed represents the first letter of l'olam, forever, and the yod, the numeral 10, represents the ten tribes, whose perpetual omission from the nation of Israel is thus indicated.
29The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.
By secret things, here, some understand "hidden sins," which are known only to God, and which he will punish (Targum Jon.); but the meaning rather is, things in God's purpose known only to himself: these things, it is affirmed, belong to him, are his affair, and may be left with him. On the other hand, the things revealed are the things made known by God to man in his Word, viz. his injunctions, threatenings, and promises; and with these men have to do. This verse is by some regarded as part of the answer given to the question of Deu_29:24; but others regard it as a general reflection added by Moses by way of admonition to his previous discourse. This latter view is the more probable, and the scribes may have had this in their mind when they distinguished the words, unto us and to our children, by placing over them extraordinary points (עֹ נֹוֹ וֹעֹ בָנֵיֹנֹוֹ עַֹד), in order to emphasize them, though by many this is regarded as a mere critical notation, indicating a various reading.
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