Deuteronomy 32

Listen, you heavens, and I will speak. Hear, earth, the words of my mouth.

1Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth.

NoteCalling on heaven and earth to listen was legal language. Ancient treaties and contracts named witnesses who could be called on later if the agreement was broken; the song opens by summoning the two largest witnesses available.

2Let my teaching fall like rain. Let my words settle like dew, like a light rain on new grass, like showers on young plants.

2My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass:

3For I will announce the name of the LORD. Say out loud how great our God is!

3Because I will publish the name of the LORD: ascribe ye greatness unto our God.

Note"LORD" in capitals stands for the personal name of Israel's God, written in Hebrew with four letters usually transcribed YHWH. Readers said "Lord" aloud in its place, and English translations follow that custom. To announce the name is to state publicly who he is and what he has done.

4He is the Rock. What he does is perfect, and all his ways are just. He is a God you can trust, who does nothing wrong. He is upright and fair.

4He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.

Note"Rock" is a fixed title for God in this song, used seven or eight times in it. The picture is a crag or cliff: high ground you retreat to when attacked, and stone that does not shift under you.

5They have ruined themselves. The stain on them is not the mark of his children. They are a twisted and crooked generation.

5They have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children: they are a perverse and crooked generation.

NoteThe Hebrew of this line is garbled and no translation of it is certain. "Spot" means a blemish or mark of the kind that would disqualify an animal from sacrifice; the sense seems to be that the flaw on these people shows they are not behaving as his children.

6Is this how you pay the LORD back, you foolish people with no sense? Is he not your father, the one who bought you? Did he not make you and set you firmly in place?

6Do ye thus requite the LORD, O foolish people and unwise? is not he thy father that hath bought thee? hath he not made thee, and established thee?

NoteThe Hebrew verb behind "bought" covers buying, acquiring, producing and fathering, and translators divide over which is meant here. It can describe purchasing a slave out of another owner's hands, or a parent bringing a child into being.

7Remember the days long ago. Think about the years of past generations. Ask your father, and he will show you. Ask your elders, and they will tell you.

7Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations: ask thy father, and he will shew thee; thy elders, and they will tell thee.

8When the Most High handed out land to the nations, when he separated the human race, he set the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel.

8When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.

NoteThe manuscripts disagree here. The traditional Hebrew text reads "the sons of Israel"; the Dead Sea Scrolls and the ancient Greek translation read "the sons of God," meaning heavenly beings, the nations being divided up to match their number, while the LORD kept Israel for himself (verse 9).

9For the LORD's share is his own people. Jacob is the portion handed to him.

9For the LORD’s portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.

NoteJacob is the ancestor who was renamed Israel; his name is used throughout as a name for the whole nation. "Share" and "portion" are the vocabulary of dividing land or plunder, where each party draws a lot and receives an allotted piece.

10He found him in a desert land, in an empty wasteland where the wind howls. He circled around him and taught him. He guarded him like the pupil of his own eye.

10He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.

Note"Apple of the eye" in the King James translates a Hebrew phrase meaning the pupil, the most delicate part of the body, which a person shields without having to think about it.

11Like an eagle that stirs up its nest and flutters over its young, he spread his wings wide, took them, and carried them on his wings.

11As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings:

NoteThe Hebrew bird is the largest raptor known in the region, either the eagle or the griffon vulture. Ancient writers described the parent breaking up the nest to force the fledglings into the air, then flying beneath them to catch them.

12In the same way the LORD alone led him, and no foreign god was with him.

12So the LORD alone did lead him, and there was no strange god with him.

13He made him ride over the high places of the land, so he could eat what the fields produced. He fed him honey out of the rock and oil out of the hard stone,

13He made him ride on the high places of the earth, that he might eat the increase of the fields; and he made him to suck honey out of the rock, and oil out of the flinty rock;

Note"High places" here means the heights and ridges of the country, not the hilltop shrines the phrase refers to elsewhere; riding over them means holding the land as its master. Wild bees nested in rock crevices and olive trees grew out of stony ground, so honey and oil did come out of rock.

14curds from the herd and milk from the flock, with the fat of lambs, with rams from Bashan, and goats, and the finest wheat. And you drank wine from the red juice of grapes.

14Butter of kine, and milk of sheep, with fat of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bashan, and goats, with the fat of kidneys of wheat; and thou didst drink the pure blood of the grape.

NoteBashan was the high pasture land east of the Sea of Galilee, proverbial for heavy cattle and rams. "Curds" is soured, thickened milk, an everyday food. The Hebrew for "the finest wheat" says literally "the kidney fat of wheat", kidney fat being the richest part of an animal, so the phrase means the choicest grain.

15But Jeshurun grew fat and kicked. You grew fat, thick, and stuffed. Then he abandoned the God who made him and treated the Rock who saved him as worth nothing.

15But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: thou art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou art covered with fatness; then he forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.

NoteJeshurun is a rare poetic nickname for Israel, built on a Hebrew root meaning straight or upright. Calling the nation "the upright one" in the same breath as describing it as an overfed animal kicking at its owner is deliberate.

16They made him jealous with foreign gods. They made him angry with things he hates.

16They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they him to anger.

17They sacrificed to demons, not to God. They sacrificed to gods they had never known, new gods that had just shown up, gods your fathers never feared.

17They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not.

NoteThe Hebrew word is shedim, borrowed from Mesopotamian usage where it named lesser spirit powers. The charge in the line is about address rather than about the nature of these beings: whatever they sacrificed to, it was not the LORD.

18You paid no attention to the Rock who fathered you. You forgot the God who gave you birth.

18Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee.

NoteThe two verbs are parental in different ways. The first is the ordinary word for a father begetting a child; the second is the word used of a mother in labor giving birth.

19When the LORD saw this, he turned from them in disgust, because his sons and daughters had provoked him.

19And when the LORD saw it, he abhorred them, because of the provoking of his sons, and of his daughters.

20He said: I will hide my face from them and see how they end up. They are a generation that keeps turning away, children with no faithfulness in them.

20And he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very froward generation, children in whom is no faith.

NoteTo "hide the face" is an idiom for deliberately withdrawing attention and protection. It is the exact reverse of the blessing in which God makes his face shine on someone.

21They made me jealous with something that is not God. They made me angry with their worthless idols. So I will make them jealous with people who are not a nation. I will make them angry with a nation that has no sense.

21They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities: and I will move them to jealousy with those which are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.

NoteThe two halves of the verse mirror each other term for term. They wounded him with a no-god, something that is not God at all; he will wound them with a no-people, a nation of no standing.

22For a fire has been lit by my anger, and it burns down to the lowest part of Sheol. It eats up the earth and its crops, and it sets the foundations of the mountains on fire.

22For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains.

NoteSheol was the underworld of Hebrew thought, the place below where all the dead go, not a place of punishment for the wicked. The King James "hell" carries later associations the Hebrew word does not. "The lowest Sheol" means as far down as anything goes.

23I will pile disasters on them. I will use up all my arrows on them.

23I will heap mischiefs upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them.

NoteArrows are a standard image for harm sent from a distance and arriving without warning, disease, famine, defeat. The disasters listed in the next verses are what the arrows are.

24They will waste away from hunger and be eaten up by burning fever and bitter plague. I will also send wild animals to tear at them, and snakes that crawl in the dust to poison them.

24They shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with burning heat, and with bitter destruction: I will also send the teeth of beasts upon them, with the poison of serpents of the dust.

NoteThe words translated "burning fever" and "bitter plague" name destructive forces; one of them, Resheph, was also the name of a Canaanite god associated with plague and arrows. The line stacks up the ordinary killers of the ancient world: starvation, epidemic, wild animals, snakebite.

25Outside, the sword will kill. Inside, terror will. Both will destroy the young man and the young woman, the nursing baby and the gray-haired man.

25The sword without, and terror within, shall destroy both the young man and the virgin, the suckling also with the man of gray hairs.

26I said I would scatter them into far corners and wipe out all memory of them from among people.

26I said, I would scatter them into corners, I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men:

NoteThe Hebrew verb here occurs nowhere else and its meaning is uncertain. Proposals range from "blow them away like chaff" to "cut them to pieces."

27But I dreaded what the enemy would say. I did not want Israel's opponents to misread it and say, "Our own strength won. The LORD did not do any of this."

27Were 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.

Note"Our own hand won" uses the raised or high hand as the standard image for power actually exerted. The concern in the verse is about how a defeat would be read by the people who inflicted it.

28For they are a nation with no wisdom in their plans, and there is no understanding in them.

28For they are a nation void of counsel, neither is there any understanding in them.

29If only they were wise and understood this, and thought hard about how they will end.

29O that they were wise, that they understood this, that they would consider their latter end!

30How could one man chase a thousand, and two make ten thousand run away, unless their Rock had sold them and the LORD had handed them over?

30How 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?

NoteOne soldier routing a thousand runs the other way elsewhere in these books, where Israel's few drive off the many; here the arithmetic is reversed. "Sold them" is the language of an owner handing a slave over to somebody else.

31For their rock is not like our Rock, and even our enemies admit it.

31For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges.

Note"Rock" is used here of the gods of other nations too, the same title, applied to whatever a people relies on for protection.

32Their vine comes from the vine of Sodom and from the fields of Gomorrah. Their grapes are full of poison. Their clusters are bitter.

32For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah: their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter:

NoteSodom and Gomorrah were the cities destroyed by fire in Genesis 19. By this period their names worked as shorthand for total corruption followed by total ruin, and the "fields" are the plain around them, remembered as burnt and barren ground.

33Their wine is snake venom, the deadly poison of cobras.

33Their wine is the poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps.

34Is this not stored up with me, sealed away among my treasures?

34Is not this laid up in store with me, and sealed up among my treasures?

NoteValuables and legal documents were kept in sealed storerooms, and a clay or wax seal proved nothing had been removed or altered. The picture is of a record kept intact until the day it is brought out.

35Payback belongs to me; I will repay. In due time their foot will slip. Their day of disaster is near, and what is coming to them is rushing toward them.

35To 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.

NoteIn the ancient world, avenging a death was the right and the obligation of the victim's family. The claim in this line is that this particular right belongs to God and not to anyone else.

36For the LORD will judge his people and change his heart toward his servants, when he sees that their strength is gone and no one is left, slave or free.

36For 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.

NoteThe Hebrew verb rendered "change his heart" means to relent or turn back from a course of action; it does not mean repenting of a sin. The last phrase, literally "none shut up or left," is an idiom whose sense is disputed; it is usually taken as a pair of opposites covering everybody, bond and free, or confined and at large.

37And he will say: Where are their gods, the rock they ran to for safety,

37And he shall say, Where are their gods, their rock in whom they trusted,

38the gods who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let those gods get up and help you. Let them be your shelter!

38Which 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.

NoteAt a sacrifice the fat was burned on the altar and wine was poured out on the ground as a drink offering. Both were understood as the god's own share of the meal. The taunt is that gods who have been taking the food should now do the work.

39See now that I, I alone, am he, and there is no god beside me. I put to death and I give life. I wound and I heal, and no one can rescue anyone from my hand.

39See 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.

40For I raise my hand toward heaven and say: I live forever.

40For I lift up my hand to heaven, and say, I live for ever.

NoteRaising a hand toward the sky was the physical gesture of swearing an oath, as raising a hand in a courtroom is now. "As I live" was the standard oath formula, in which the speaker stakes his own existence on what he is promising.

41When I sharpen my flashing sword and my hand takes hold of judgment, I will pay back my enemies and give what is due to those who hate me.

41If 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.

42I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword will devour flesh. It will drink the blood of the killed and the captured, from the heads of the enemy leaders.

42I 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.

NoteThe end of the verse is ambiguous in Hebrew. The word rosh means both "head" and "beginning" or "chief," so the line can be read either as "from the heads of the enemy leaders" or as "from the first act of vengeance on the enemy."

43Be glad, you nations, along with his people. For he will avenge the blood of his servants. He will pay back his enemies, and he will show mercy to his land and to his people.

43Rejoice, 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.

NoteThis verse survives in several different lengths. The Dead Sea Scrolls and the ancient Greek version contain extra lines calling on the heavens and on divine beings to bow down; the traditional Hebrew text has the shorter form used here.

44Moses came and spoke all the words of this song out loud so the people could hear them. Hoshea son of Nun, also called Joshua, was with him.

44And Moses came and spake all the words of this song in the ears of the people, he, and Hoshea the son of Nun.

NoteHoshea was Joshua's original name; Numbers 13:16 records Moses changing it. Using the older form at this point is unusual, and may be a deliberate archaism.

45When Moses finished speaking all these words to all Israel,

45And Moses made an end of speaking all these words to all Israel:

46he said to them: Take to heart all the words I am declaring to you today. You are to command your children to carefully obey all the words of this law.

46And 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.

Note"Declaring" translates courtroom language: Moses is putting the words on record as formal testimony that can be cited against the people later if they break the agreement.

47These are not empty words for you. They are your life. Through them you will live a long time in the land you are crossing the Jordan to take as your own.

47For 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.

48That same day the LORD spoke to Moses. He said:

48And the LORD spake unto Moses that selfsame day, saying,

49Go up into the Abarim mountains, to Mount Nebo, in the land of Moab, across from Jericho. Look at the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites to own.

49Get 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:

NoteThe Abarim are the range of highlands east of the Dead Sea; Nebo is a peak in that range, in Moab, the territory east of the Jordan. From its summit the Jordan valley and Jericho are visible roughly twenty miles to the west.

50Then die on the mountain you climb, and be gathered to your people, just as your brother Aaron died on Mount Hor and was gathered to his people.

50And 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:

Note"Gathered to your people" is a set phrase for dying, literally joining one's ancestors, which in practice meant being laid in the family burial place. Aaron was Moses' older brother and Israel's first high priest; his death on Mount Hor is recorded in Numbers 20.

51This is because both of you broke faith with me in front of the Israelites at the waters of Meribah-kadesh, in the desert of Zin. You did not treat me as holy among them.

51Because ye trespassed against me among the children of Israel at the waters of MeribahKadesh, in the wilderness of Zin; because ye sanctified me not in the midst of the children of Israel.

NoteMeribah-kadesh was a stopping place in the desert of Zin, south of Canaan, where the people quarreled over the lack of water and Moses produced it by striking a rock rather than speaking to it as he had been told (Numbers 20:1–13). The name Meribah means "quarrelling." To treat someone as holy is to publicly set them apart as different; the charge is that the failure happened in full view of the nation.

52You will see the land spread out in front of you, but you will not go into the land I am giving the Israelites.

52Yet thou shalt see the land before thee; but thou shalt not go thither unto the land which I give the children of Israel.