PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
The Expositor's Bible: The Book of Deuteronomy
Harper, Andrew · 161,366 words · 197 reading sections
_The Speakers For God--I. The King_
But the king of Israel was not only to be a law-abiding and a law-enforcing king. He was to learn from this new law even a deeper lesson. He was to read daily in the law, "that his heart might not be lifted up above his brethren." Oriental despots either openly claim that they are of higher and purer blood than their s…
739 wordsSECTION 122_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
DEUT. xviii. 1-8 The priesthood naturally follows the kingship in the regulations regarding the position of the governing classes. But it was an older and much more radical constituent in the polity of Israel than we have seen the kingship to be. Originally, the priests were the normal and regular exponents of Yahweh'…
811 wordsSECTION 123_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
The chief passage for our purpose is, however, xviii. 1-8, where we have the agents of the cultus defined, and directions for the dues to be given them. In ver. 1 these agents are clearly said to be the whole tribe of Levi; for the phrase "The priests, the Levites, the whole tribe of Levi," cannot mean the priests and …
655 wordsSECTION 124_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
Moreover the other functions assigned to the priests confirm the argument, and prove that in the time of Deuteronomy distinctions of rank among the Levites must have been firmly established. They had a place in the public justiciary, even in the supreme court, "in the place which Yahweh their God" had chosen (Deut. xvi…
745 wordsSECTION 125_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
But there were to be distinctions. In vv. 3-5 we have a special statement of what was to be paid by the people to the priests, _i.e._ the sacrificing priests. Of every animal offered in sacrifice, except those offered as whole burnt-offerings, they were to receive "the shoulder, the two cheeks, and the maw," all choice…
660 wordsSECTION 126_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
Some schools of critics offer the hypothesis that there was no special priesthood till late in the time of the kings. From the beginning, they say, the head of each household was the family priest, and secular men, such as the kings, and men of other tribes than the Levites, could be and were priests, and offered sacri…
1,011 wordsSECTION 127_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
The God whom the family worshipped became the God of the confederacy, and they would be the natural guardians of His sanctuary. This would not in the least involve special sanctity and meekness on the part of the tribe, as some insist. They would remain a tribe, like the others; but their leading men would discharge th…
653 wordsSECTION 128_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
[90] Exod. xxiv. 5. [91] Exod. xxxiii. 11. For the discharge of their sacred functions certain dues were doubtless assigned to the priests, and the Levites sharing in the subordinate duties of the sanctuary would share also in the emoluments. In other respects Levi in the wilderness would differ in nothing from other…
749 wordsSECTION 129_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
It is, therefore, not surprising that the priestly tribe was kept to the nomadic life by the ordinance that they should not have a portion in the distribution of the Canaanite territory. But according to the narrative of the attack upon Shechem by Levi and Simeon, and the verses in the blessing of Jacob (Gen. xlix.) de…
806 wordsSECTION 130_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
In the Divinely sanctioned arrangements of the Old Testament Church, therefore, the existence of a body of ecclesiastical persons, having little share in the ordinary pursuits of their neighbours, and dependent upon their clerical duties for a large part of their maintenance, was deemed necessary to secure the continui…
807 wordsSECTION 131_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
In modern times the necessity for such a body of special churchmen is challenged from two opposite sides. There is, on the one hand, the body of over-spiritualised believers who abhor organisation, and the machinery of organisation, as if it were an intolerable evil. Conscious very often of quick spiritual impulse and …
1,114 wordsSECTION 132_Speakers For God.--Ii. The Priest_
One other thing remains to be said. Though we have taken these significant words of ver. 2--"And they shall have no inheritance among their brethren: Yahweh is their inheritance, as He hath spoken unto them"--in their first and most obvious reference, it is not to be supposed that that meaning has exhausted all that th…
665 wordsSECTION 133_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
DEUT. xviii. 9-22 The third of the Divine voices to this nation was the prophet. Just as in the other Semitic nations round about Israel there were kings and priests and soothsayers, there were to be in Israel kings and priests and prophets; and the first two orders having been discussed, there remains for considerati…
725 wordsSECTION 134_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
The justice of the punishment of death decreed against wizards and witches in Scripture was, therefore, quite independent of the reality of the powers such persons claimed. They professed and were believed to have them, and thus they acquired an influence which was fatal to any real belief in a moral and spiritual gove…
893 wordsSECTION 135_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
Still, the interpretation thus reached does not exclude--it distinctly includes--the Messianic reference. If the passage promises that at all moments of difficulty and crisis in Israel's history, the will of God would be made known by a Divinely sent prophet, that would be specially true of the last and greatest crisis…
747 wordsSECTION 136_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
Viewed thus, the prophetic order in Israel has a quite unique character. It is a provision for religious progress such as had no parallel elsewhere in the world; and this public acknowledgment of its Divine right is almost more remarkable. Wherever elsewhere in the world religion has been supposed to be Divinely given …
880 wordsSECTION 137_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
[95] _Lehrbuch der Alt-Testamentlichen Religion's Geschichte_, pp. 169 ff. This did not escape the quick eye of John Stuart Mill. He says the religion of Israel "gave existence to an inestimably precious unorganised institution--the order (if it may be so termed) of prophets.... Religion, consequently, was not there,…
796 wordsSECTION 138_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
Even those who most profess to do so in no case take their stand simply and solely upon the truths believed and held by the first Christians. All of them have adopted later developments as part of their indefeasible treasure. Some go back to the theology of the great Evangelical Revival only; some to the Reformation; s…
684 wordsSECTION 139_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
On both sides, therefore, there is danger for us, as there was for the Old Testament Church; and we turn with quickened interest to the test, the criterion, by which Deuteronomy would have the prophets tried. It puts the very question which the line of thought we have been pursuing could not fail to suggest: "How shall…
705 wordsSECTION 140_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
[96] _Prophecy and History in Relation to the Messiah_, p. 150. The whole narrative is of extreme importance, for it shows us how the prophets themselves regarded their own supernatural powers, and how they used the tests supplied in Deuteronomy. In the first place, they asked how the new word of Yahweh stood in regar…
694 wordsSECTION 141_Speakers For God--Iii. The Prophet_
These then were the connecting links between Yahweh and His people, and the organs by which the life of the Israelite nation was guided: the Kingship, the Priesthood, and the Prophetic Order. The first gave visibility to the Divine rule, and stability to national and social life; the second secured the stability of rel…
831 wordsSECTION 142_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
It has often and justly been said that the life of Israel is so entirely founded on the grace and favour of God that no distinction is made between the secular and the religious laws. Whatever their origin may have been, whether they had been part of the tribal constitution before Moses' day or not, they were all regar…
1,055 wordsSECTION 143_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
[97] Cf. Numb. xxvi. 53-55 from P and Josh. xvii. 14 ff. from JE. Further, besides the prohibition of absolute sale which flowed from the recognition of Yahweh's ownership, and the limitations which tribal and family claims involved, there were distinct provisions in which the national ownership under Yahweh was plain…
776 wordsSECTION 144_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
The hypothesis that this was the case is strengthened to a certainty by the manner in which commerce, one of the other main sources of wealth, is dealt with in the Israelite law. There is but little sympathy expressed with it, and some of the regulations issued are such as to render trade on any very large scale within…
733 wordsSECTION 145_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
According to the Old Testament, then, the ideal state of things for a people like Israel was that every household should be settled upon the land, that permanent eviction from or even alienation of the holdings should be impossible, and that the whole population should have a common interest in agriculture, that most h…
755 wordsSECTION 146_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
There was only one power that could secure that this admirable machinery would move, and keep it moving. That was the love and fear of God. The conduct prescribed was the conduct befitting the _true_ Israelite, the man who was faithful in all his ways. The laws marked out the paths wherein he should walk if he willed t…
1,158 wordsSECTION 147_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
When we turn to modern times and modern circumstances, it is not easy to see how this ancient law can be applicable to them. In the first place, much of it was made binding upon Israel only because of its peculiar character as the people to whom the true religion was revealed. As custodians of that, they were justified…
1,106 wordsSECTION 148_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
"Far-off Divine event, To which the whole creation moves." But if we cannot make the Old Testament our law in regard to commerce, we must ask whether the legislation in regard to land has for us any binding force? Viewing it with this question in our minds, I think we must be struck by one fact, this namely, that the…
903 wordsSECTION 149_The Economic Aspects Of Israelite Life_
[105] _Essays on Political Economy_, p. 201. [106] Wallace, _Land Nationalisation_, p. 16. But this is not by any means the end of the matter. Even if the social reformers of our day could restore society to the conditions set forth so emphatically and so long ago in Israel, history proves that nothing more than a te…
730 wordsSECTION 150_Justice In Israel_
Among the nations of the modern world one of the most vital distinctions is the degree in which just judgment is estimated and provided for. Indeed, according to modern ideas, life is tolerable only where all men are equal before the law; where all are judged by statutes which are known, or at least may be known, by al…
718 wordsSECTION 151_Justice In Israel_
Now there does seem to have been that. As has been well pointed out by Dr. Oort,[108] in the tribes which became Israel justice must have been administered by the heads of the various bodies which went to make these up. The household was ruled even in matters of life and death solely by the father; the family, in the w…
1,035 wordsSECTION 152_Justice In Israel_
[110] Cf. Nowack, _Die sozialen Probleme in Israel_, p. 5. As new men, new times, and new difficulties arose, the priest became the special organ of Divine direction. It may be that the priestly Torah was largely the result of the sacred lot; but the questions that were put, and the manner in which they were put, woul…
993 wordsSECTION 153_Justice In Israel_
Nowhere in the world, therefore, has the demand for justice been made more central than here, and nowhere has injustice been more passionately fought against. Nor have the sanctions binding to a pursuit of justice been at any period more nobly or more vividly conceived. In this main point, therefore, Israel's law stand…
817 wordsSECTION 154_Justice In Israel_
But it is only in the days of Jehoshaphat (873-849 B.C.) that an arrangement like that in Deuteronomy is mentioned. From 2 Chron. xix. 5 ff. we learn that "he set judges in the land throughout all the fenced cities of Judah, city by city. Moreover in Jerusalem did Jehoshaphat set of the Levites and of the priests, and …
683 wordsSECTION 155_Justice In Israel_
The justice aimed at in Israel was, therefore, _impartial_ and _accessible_. We have still to inquire whether it was _merciful_ or cruel in its infliction of punishment. Dr. Oort says it was a hard law in this respect, but one is at a loss to see how that view can be sustained. There is no mention of torture in connect…
942 wordsSECTION 156_Justice In Israel_
In this way this seemingly harsh law helped to lay the foundation for our modern conception of humanity, which regards all men as brethren. For the teaching of our Lord, which fulfilled all that the polity and religion of ancient Israel had foreshadowed of good, broke down the walls of partition between Jew and Gentile…
652 wordsSECTION 157_Justice In Israel_
Taking it as a whole, therefore, the ancient world will be searched in vain for any legislation equal to this in the "promise and the potency" of its fundamental ideas as to justice. Here, as nowhere else, we can see the radical principles which should dominate in the administration of justice laying hold upon mankind,…
457 wordsSECTION 158_Laws Of Purity (Chastity And Marriage)_
In dealing with the ten commandments it has been already shown that, though these great statements of religious and moral truth were to some extent inadequate as expressions of the highest life, they yet contained the living germs of all that has followed. But we cannot suppose that the reality of Israelite life from t…
973 wordsSECTION 159_Laws Of Purity (Chastity And Marriage)_
[116] Cf. 1 Sam. xxv. 18 ff; 2 Sam. xiv. 1 ff. [117] Cf. Exod. xv. and 1 Sam. xviii. 6 f. Bearing these preliminary considerations in mind, we now go on to consider the actual legislation in regard to the relations of the sexes. But here we must once more recall the fact that, in regard to all matters vitally affecti…
875 wordsSECTION 160_Laws Of Purity (Chastity And Marriage)_
Moreover the personality of the woman was acknowledged in the entire acquittal of the betrothed woman who had been exposed to outrage in the country, where her cries could bring no help. In the earliest times most probably the punishment of death would have been inflicted equally in that case, since the husband's prope…
966 wordsSECTION 161_Laws Of Purity (Chastity And Marriage)_
It is thus clearly seen how our Lord's statement (Matt. xix. 8)--"Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives, but from the beginning it hath not been so"--is true. And when we leave the law and come to history and prophecy, we find this view to have been a prevalent one from early…
1,222 wordsSECTION 162_Laws Of Purity (Chastity And Marriage)_
[120] _The Primitive Family_, Starcke, p. 141. [121] Indeed in India it was not only the widow of the childless man who might bear him a son whose real father was a near relation, but his childless wife also.--Maine, _Early Law_, p. 102. [122] That the latter course may in some cases have been unpopular with the s…
725 wordsSECTION 163_Laws Of Kindness_
With Him all that the past generations "had willed, or hoped, or dreamed of good" came actually to exist. He made what had been aspiration only the basis of an actual Kingdom of God. As one of its primary moral foundations He laid down the radical indissolubility of marriage, and made visible to all men the breadth of …
960 wordsSECTION 164_Laws Of Kindness_
As these laws or precepts of kindness are not systematically arranged, it will be necessary to group them, and we shall take first those in which it is prescribed that injury to others should be avoided. Of course criminal wrongs are not dealt with here. They have already been forbidden in the strictly legal portions o…
937 wordsSECTION 165_Laws Of Kindness_
But the crown of all this kindness is found in the beautiful tenth verse: "When thou dost lend thy neighbour any manner of loan, thou shalt not go into his house to fetch his pledge thou shalt stand without, and the man to whom thou dost lend shall bring forth the pledge without unto thee." Not only does Yahweh care fo…
1,012 wordsSECTION 166_Laws Of Kindness_
Now, we have called these precepts and provisions the flower and blossom of the Deuteronomic legislation, because they reveal in their greatest perfection that sympathy with the commonest and the innermost cares of men which is the moving impulse of it all. But they reveal more than that. They show that already in thos…
653 wordsSECTION 167_Laws Of Kindness_
But though these are excuses for the attitude we have been describing, there can be no question that the fine and delicate courtesy which Deuteronomy prescribes is indispensable in order to avert class hostility. Courtesy cannot, of course, change our social state, and where it works badly evils that produce friction w…
676 wordsSECTION 168_Laws Of Kindness_
It is not, however, to be supposed that only the rich can sin in this respect. The labour organisations are becoming in many places, the stronger,[123] and so far they have learned the law of courtesy no better than their opponents. Opprobrious epithets and injurious suspicions and accusations are the stock-in-trade of…
682 wordsSECTION 169_Laws Of Kindness_
The fundamental position with regard to him was, however, the common one: he was the property of his master. He could be sold, pledged, given away as a present, and inherited, and could even be sold to foreigners. But a female slave, if taken as a subordinate wife, could not be sold, but only freed if she ceased to occ…
994 wordsSECTION 170_Laws Of Kindness_
[125] Sir W. Muir, _Caliphate_, pp. 26 and 33. But the highest points of privilege come to the non-Israelite slave in a way which disturbs the modern conscience, for they came by means of compulsion in religion. In contrast to the day labourer and the "Toshab" or sojourner, the slave _must_ be of his master's religion…
1,225 wordsSECTION 171_Laws Of Kindness_
The only other precepts under this head are that a fallen animal is always to be lifted (Deut. xxii. 4), and the ox is not to be muzzled when it is treading out the corn (Deut. xxv. 4). These were ordinary prescriptions of humanity, but they too rest upon the sympathetic identification of the sufferings and wants of al…
505 wordsSECTION 172_Moses' Farewell Speeches_
DEUT. iv. 1-40, xxvii.-xxx. With the twenty-sixth chapter the entirely homogeneous central portion of the Book of Deuteronomy ends, and it concludes it most worthily. It prescribes two ceremonies which are meant to give solemn expression to the feeling of thankfulness which the love of God, manifested in so many laws …
1,011 wordsSECTION 173_Moses' Farewell Speeches_
But other entanglements follow. Chapters xxix. and xxx. manifestly contained an adieu on the part of Moses, who turns finally to the people with an affecting and solemn speech of farewell. That appears in chapters xxix. and xxx. But for many reasons it is impossible to believe that these chapters as they stand are the …
730 wordsSECTION 174_Moses' Farewell Speeches_
[127] Le _Deuteronome_ (Toulouse, 1891), pp. 62-75. The order in which he disposes of the verses is as follows: Deut. xxxi. 24-29, xxix. 1-15, iv. 1, 2, xxix. 16-21, iv. 3-30, xxix. 22-28, iv. 30, 31, xxx. 1-10, iv. 32-40, xxx. 11-20, xxxii. 45-47. If before this we place xxxi. 1-13, we shall probably have the orig…
743 wordsSECTION 175_Moses' Farewell Speeches_
But after all we have seen of the spirituality of the Deuteronomic teaching, and its insistence upon love as the true bond between men and God and the true motive to all right action, it is perhaps disappointing to some to find how entirely these promises and threats have their centre in the material world. Probably no…
1,177 wordsSECTION 176_Moses' Farewell Speeches_
[128] Cf. Recent fiction, _e.g. The African Farm_, _Tess of the D'Urbevilles_, _The Heavenly Twins_. We, on the other hand, have been so diligent in tracing out the immediately preceding links of natural causation that, for the most part, we have been fatigued before we reached God. We consequently have lost view of …
977 wordsSECTION 177_Moses' Farewell Speeches_
Certainly Christians now know that prosperity in material things is by no means God's best gift. That great principle must be held to firmly, as well as the legitimacy of the vivid hopes and fears of Old Testament times regarding the material rewards of right-doing. In many ways the new principle must overrule and modi…
707 wordsSECTION 178_Moses' Farewell Speeches_
Of this then the author of Deuteronomy says: "It is not too hard for thee, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, and make us to hear it, that we may do it? Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the …
897 wordsSECTION 179(A). The Song Of Moses
DEUT. xxxii. Critics have debated the date, authorship, and history of this song. For the present purpose it is sufficient, perhaps, to refer to the statement on these points in the note below.[130] [130] The song is described, in the narrative framework, as delivered through Moses to the children of Israel. On the …
687 wordsSECTION 180(A). The Song Of Moses
The view that a mistake as to the Mosaic authorship, for which the writers of JE were not responsible, was handed on in perfect good faith, is compatible with the doctrine of inspiration as held by representatives of the orthodox Evangelical school in Germany, and by the newer Evangelicals in England. Cf. Oettli, _…
697 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
Project Gutenberg source record →
Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.