Deuteronomy 29 – Commentary

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.

Commentary Verse 1

The opening verse of chapter 29 starts by letting the reader know that this is a separate covenant “beside” or in addition to the covenant made at Horeb. This covenant is often overlooked by many Bible teachers because it speaks of future blessings and curses for Israel, which does not fit with Replacement Theology / Suppressionism; the doctrine that the Church has replaced Israel.

Continue reading…

² And 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;

³ The great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and those great miracles:

⁴ Yet the Lord hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.

Commentary Verses 2 – 4

Moses gathered the assembly to remind them of what The Most High had done for them since bringing them out of Egypt. In verse 4, Moses references the Israelites not having a heart to perceive, eyes to see, or ears to hear. This reference is used in multiple places throughout the Bible.

Cross References

Ezek. 12:2 | Matt. 11:15 | Matt. 13:9 | Mark 4:9 | Mark 4:23 | Mark 7:16 | Luke 8:8 | Luke 14:35 | Rev. 2:11, 17, and 29 | Rev. 3:6, 13, and 22

Continue reading…

⁵ And 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.

⁶ Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drunk wine or strong drink: that ye might know that I am the Lord your God.

Commentary Verses 5 – 6

In these verses we learn that Moses has been leading the Israelites for 40 years and they didn’t experience any of the normal effects of wear and tear on their clothes and belongings.

Continue reading…

⁷ And 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:

⁸ And we took their land, and gave it for an inheritance unto the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and to the half tribe of Manasseh.

Commentary Verses 7 – 8

Some people believe that Sihon and Og were both Nephilim kings residing in the Promised Land. The Nephilim were believed to be the giant hybrid offspring of angels and human women. Parallels have been drawn between the Nephilim and the heroes of Greek, Roman, and other pagan cultures. Belief in the Nephilim is not considered a mainstream belief, even though many Bible believers do believe they existed.

Continue reading…

⁹ Keep therefore the words of this covenant, and do them, that ye may prosper in all that ye do.

¹⁰ Ye 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,

¹¹ Your little ones, your wives, and thy stranger that is in thy camp, from the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water:

¹² That thou shouldest enter into covenant with the Lord thy God, and into his oath, which the Lord thy God maketh with thee this day:

¹³ That he may establish thee today 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.

¹⁴ Neither with you only do I make this covenant and this oath;

¹⁵ But 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;

¹⁷ And ye have seen their abominations, and their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which were among them:)

Commentary Verses 9 – 17

Verses 9 – 17 describe all parties that were present during the giving of the terms and conditions of the covenant. This is the only covenant in the Bible that includes strangers or foreigners along with Israel. It also includes people that are present, not present, and future generations of Israelites. These terms and conditions make this covenant different than every other covenant in the Bible.

Continue reading…

¹⁸ Lest 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;

¹⁹ And 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:

²⁰ The 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.

²¹ And 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:

Commentary Verses 18 – 21

These verses address the individual that believes they can break the covenant, disobey The Most High, and walk away without punishment. Verses 20 and 21 make it plain that The Most High will go as far as blotting out a person’s name from “under heaven” if they intentionally break this covenant.

Continue reading…

²² So 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;

²³ And 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:

²⁴ Even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger?

Commentary Verses 22 – 24

The punishments laid out in Chapter 28 are so severe that when they are finally carried out in the future, other nations will wonder why all of the plagues and curses are happening to Israel and their land. The question of “why” these things are happening seems to be the central focus, because even the other nations recognize that something bigger than bad luck or random chance is at work on Israel.

Continue reading…

²⁵ Then 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:

²⁶ For they went and served other gods, and worshipped them, gods whom they knew not, and whom he had not given unto them:

²⁷ And the anger of the Lord was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book:

²⁸ And 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.

²⁹ The 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.

Commentary Verses 25 – 29

The explanation that will be given as to why bad things are happening to Israel, seems to focus in on their serving of other gods in place of The Most High. Throughout the rest of scripture we will see consistency in Israel’s disobedience vs The Most High’s punishment. Whenever Israel falls into idolatry, The Most High punishes them with slavery to other nations. The irony being that if they want to show their hatred for The Most High by serving false gods, The Most High will also turn them into servants of men that hate them.