NOTES for Deu 32:26-52
26 I said, I would scatter them into corners, I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men: |
27 Were it not that I feared the wrath of the enemy, lest their adversaries should behave themselves strangely, and lest they should say, Our hand is high, and the LORD hath not done all this. |
28 For they are a nation void of counsel, neither is there any understanding in them. |
29 O that they were wise, that they understood this, that they would consider their latter end! |
30 How should one chase a thousand, and two put ten thousand to flight, except their Rock had sold them, and the LORD had shut them up? |
31 For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges. |
32 For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah: their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter: |
33 Their wine is the poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps. |
34 Is not this laid up in store with me, and sealed up among my treasures? |
35 To me belongeth vengeance, and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste. |
36 For the LORD shall judge his people, and repent himself for his servants, when he seeth that their power is gone, and there is none shut up, or left. |
37 And he shall say, Where are their gods, their rock in whom they trusted, |
38 Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? let them rise up and help you, and be your protection. |
39 See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand. |
40 For I lift up my hand to heaven, and say, I live for ever. |
41 If I whet my glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to mine enemies, and will reward them that hate me. |
42 I will make mine arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh; and that with the blood of the slain and of the captives, from the beginning of revenges upon the enemy. |
43 Rejoice, O ye nations, with his people: for he will avenge the blood of his servants, and will render vengeance to his adversaries, and will be merciful unto his land, and to his people. |
44 And Moses came and spake all the words of this song in the ears of the people, he, and Hoshea the son of Nun. |
45 And Moses made an end of speaking all these words to all Israel: |
46 And he said unto them, Set your hearts unto all the words which I testify among you this day, which ye shall command your children to observe to do, all the words of this law. |
47 For it is not a vain thing for you; because it is your life: and through this thing ye shall prolong your days in the land, whither ye go over Jordan to possess it. |
48 And the LORD spake unto Moses that selfsame day, saying, |
49 Get thee up into this mountain Abarim, unto mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, that is over against Jericho; and behold the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel for a possession: |
50 And die in the mount whither thou goest up, and be gathered unto thy people; as Aaron thy brother died in mount Hor, and was gathered unto his people: |
51 Because ye trespassed against me among the children of Israel at the waters of Meribah-Kadesh, in the wilderness of Zin; because ye sanctified me not in the midst of the children of Israel. |
52 Yet thou shalt see the land before thee; but thou shalt not go thither unto the land which I give the children of Israel. |
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The fate of the people on the land promised to them by God depends on their spiritual condition. That is the main message of the hymn we find in the closing part of the Book of Deuteronomy. If the external events of Jewish history always reflected the spiritual condition of the people, they would have lost their land very quickly, which is exactly what the hymn says.
Here we hear a truth well known to us from the New Testament books, and known to the Jews even before the coming of Christ: fallen man, by definition, deserves nothing good. This is not because he must necessarily be punished for sins, but because he is not capable of earning anything. To earn something, one must serve, serve God, and serve Him as He should be served. In other words, one must do what no one in the fallen state can do or knows how to do, and often, deep in the heart, does not especially want to do, although few believers are ready to admit this to themselves.
The people of God are no exception. They are God's people not by virtue of any national characteristics, not because the laws of the fallen world do not apply to them, but because God has a special plan for them, which God carries out despite all obstacles. If the people can remain on their land for any length of time, it is only because God is working with them on that land, trying to make them into the communal people He intended. Without this work, the catastrophe known as the Babylonian captivity could have happened much earlier.
God does not punish the people for their sins; the people punish themselves by coming face to face with the consequences of their choices and their actions. God, on the contrary, slows the arrival of those consequences as much as possible, but only to the extent that such slowing fits into His own plans. In the end the moment will come when the formation of the people as a community will require the people to meet the consequences of their spiritual choice face to face, and then catastrophe will break out.
For now, at the time the hymn mentioned above was written, alternatives are still possible. The catastrophe could perhaps still be avoided altogether, but of course only on the condition of focused and consistent spiritual work, which is what the Book of Deuteronomy, and the whole Torah with it, speaks about.
Readings for 9 February 2026
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