among the different tribes, preserved them from the disadvantages of standing alone, and defended them from the danger of moral and spiritual declension. Lastly, in the number forty-eight, the quadrupling of the number of the tribes (twelve) is unmistakeable. Now, as the number four is the seal of the kingdom of God in the world, the idea of the kingdom of God is also represented in the four times twelve towns (of. Bdhr, Symbolik, ii. pp. 50, 51).
Vers. 9-34. Selection and Appointment of Cities of Refuge for unpremeditated Manslayers. — Vers. 10, 11. When the Israelites had come into the land of Canaan, they were to choose towns conveniently situated as cities of refuge, to which the manslayer, who had slain a person (nephesh) by accident ("^JJ^*?: see at Lev. iv. 2), might flee, •^"^p'?, from nnj^^ to hit, occurritj as well as accidity signifies here to give or make, i.e. to choose something suitable (Dietrich), but not " to build or complete" (Knohel), in the sense of nnip^ as the only meaning which this word has is contignare, to join with beams or rafters; and this is obviously unsuitable here. Through these directions, which are repeated and still further expanded in Deut. xix. 1—13, God fulfilled the promise w^hich He gave in Ex. xxi. 13: that He would appoint a place for the man who should unintentionally slay his neighbour, to which he might flee from the avenger of blood. — ^Vers. 12-15. These towns were to serve for a refuge from the avenger of blood, that the manslayer might not die before he had taken his trial in the presence of the congregation. The number of cities was fixed at six, three on the other side of the Jordan, and three on this side in the land of Canaan, to which both the children of Israel, and also the foreigners and settlers who were dwelling among them, might flee. In Deut. xix. 3 sqq., Moses advises the congregation to prepare (r?n) tl^e way to these cities, and to divide the territory of the land which Jehovah would give them into three parts (t^'?i^*), i.e. to set apart a free city in every third of the land, that every manslayer might flee thither, i.e. might be able to reach the free city without being detained by length of distance or badness of road, lest, as is added in ver. 6, the avenger of blood pursue the slayer while his heart is hot {^^\f imjierf. Kal of C?'^), and overtake him because the way is long, and slay him (C'Dp ^"^^^ as in Gen. xxxvii. 21), whereas he was not worthy of death {i.e. there was no just ground for putting him to death), " because he had not done it out of hatred." The three cities of refuge on the other side were selected.
by Moses himself (Deut. iv. 41-43); the three in Canaan were not appointed till the lan3 was distributed among the nine tribes and a half (Josh. XX. 7). Levitical or priests' towns were selected for all six, not only because it was to the priests and Levites that they would first of all look for an administration of justice (^Schultz on Deut. xix. 3), but also on the ground that these cities were the property of Jehovah, in a higher sense than the rest of the land, and for this reason answered the idea of cities of refuge, where the manslayer, when once received, was placed under the protection of divine grace, better than any other places possibly could.
The establishment of cities of refuge presupposed the custom and right of revenge. The custom itself goes back to the very earliest times of the human race (Gen. iv. 15, 24, xxvii. 45); it prevailed among the Israelites, as well as the other nations of antiquity, and still continues among the Arabs in unlimited force (cf. Niebuhr, Arab. pp. 32 sqq.; Burckhardtj Beduinen, 119, 251 sqq.). " Revenge of blood prevailed almost everywhere, so long as there was no national life generated, or it was still in the first stages of its development; and consequently the expiation of any personal violation of justice was left to private revenge, and more especially to family zeal" (Oehler in Herzog's B. Cycl., where the proofs may be seen). The warrant for this was the principle of retribution, the jus talionis] which lay at the foundation of the divine order of the world in general, and the Mosaic law in particular, and which was sanctioned by God, so far as murder was concerned, even in the time of Noah, by the command, " Whoso sheddeth man's- blood," etc. (Gen. ix. 5, 6). This warrant, however, or rather obligation to avenge murder, was subordinated to the essential principle of the theocracy, under the Mosaic law. Whilst God Himself would avenge the blood that was shed, not only upon men, but upon animals also (Gen. ix. 5), and commanded blood-revenge, He withdrew the execution of it from subjective caprice, and restricted it to cases of premeditated slaying or murder, by appointing cities of refuge, which were to protect the manslayer from the avenger, until he took his trial before the congregation, /^i, redeemer, is " that particular relative whose special duty it was to restore the violated family integrity, who had to redeem not only landed property that had been alienated from the family (Lev. xxv. 25 sqq.), or a member of the family that had fallen into slavery (Lev. xxv. 47 sqq.), but also the blood that had been taken away from the family by murder" (Oehler). In the latter respect he was called D'nn ''5<i,
(vers. 19, 21, 24 sqq.; Deut. xix. 6, 12). From 2 Sam. xiv. 7, we may see that it was the duty of the wliole family to take care that blood-revenge was carried out. The performance of the duty itself, however, was probably regulated by the closeness of the relationship, and corresponded to the duty of redeeming from bondage (Lev. XXV. 49), and to the right of inheritance (chap, xxvii. 8 sqq.). What standing before the congregation was to consist of, is defined more fully in what follows (vers. 24, 25). If we compare with +his Josh. xx. 4 sqq., the manslayer, who fled from the avenger of blood into a free city, w^as to stand before the gates of the city, and state his cause before the elders. They were then to receive him into the city, and give him a place that he might dwell among them, and were not to deliver him up to the avenger of blood till he had stood before the congregation for judgment. Consequently, if the slayer of a man presented himself with the request to be received, the elders of the free city had to make a provisional inquiry into his case, to decide whether they should grant him protection in the city; and then if the avenger of blood appeared, they were not to deliver up the person whom they had received, but to hand him over, on the charge of the avenger of blood, to the congregation to whom he belonged, or among whom the act had taken place, that they might investigate the case, and judge whether the deed itself was wilful or accidental.
Special instructions are given in vers. 16-28, with reference to the judicial procedure. First of all (vers. 16-21), with regard to qualified slaying or murder. If any person has struck another with an iron instrument (an axe, hatchet, hammer, etc.), or " ivitli a stone of the hand, from which one dies,^ i.e. with a stone which filled the hand, — a large stone, therefore, with which it was possible to kill, — or " with a wooden instrument of the hand, from which one dies" i.e. with a thick club, or a large, strong wooden instrument, and he then died (so that he died in consequence), he was a murderer, who was to be put to death. " For the suspicion would rest upon any one who had used an instrument, that endangered life and therefore was not generally used in striking, that he had intended to take life away" (Knobel). — Ver. 19. The avenger of blood could put him to death, when he hit upon him, i.e. whenever and wherever he met with him. — Vcr. 20. And so also the man who hit another in hatred, or threw at him by lying in wait, or struck him with the hand in enmity, so that he died. And if a murderer of this kind fled into a free city, the elders of his city were to have him fetched out and delivered up to the avenger of blood (Deut. xix. 11, 12). Then follow, in vers. 22-28, the proceedings to be taken with an unintentional manslayer, viz. if any one hit another " in the moment," i.e. suddenly, unawares (chap. vi. 9), without enmity, or by throwing anything upon him, without lying in wait, or by letting a stone, by which a man might be killed, fall upon him without seeing him, so that he died in consequence, but without being his enemy, or watching to ao him harm. In using the expression lli{<'733j the writer had probably "^y^^ still in his mind; but he dropped this word, and wrote /S)"'! in the form of a fresh sentence. The thing intended is explained still more clearly in Deut. xix. 4, 5. Instead of yriS3, we find there riyi "'713, without knowing, unintentionally. The words, " without being his enemy," are paraphrased there by, " without hating him from yesterday and the day before yesterday " (i.e. previously), and are explained by an example taken from the life; " When a man goeth into the wood with his neighbour to hew wood, and his hand fetcheth a stroke with the axe to cut down the tree, and the iron slippeth (^^\ Niphal of ^7^) from the wood (handle), and lighteth upon his neighbour. ^^ — Vers. 24, 25. In such a case as this, the congregation was to judge between the slayer and the avenger of blood, according to the judgments before them. They were to rescue the innocent man from the avenger of blood, to bring him back to his (i.e. the nearest) city of refuge to which he had fled, that he might dwell there till the death of the high priest, who had been anointed with the holy oil. — Vers. 26-28. If he left the city of refuge before this, and the avenger of blood got hold of him, and slew him outside the borders (precincts) of the city, it was not to be reckoned to him as blood (D'n i^ \% like D''^^^ ii^ psi, Ex. xxii. 1). Bat after the death of the high priest he might return " into the land of his possession," i.e, his hereditary possession (cf. Lev. xxvii. 22), so. without the avenger of blood being allowed to pursue him any longer.
In these regulations " all the rigour of the divine justice is manifested in the most beautiful concord with His compassionate mercy. Through the destruction of life, even when not wilful, humar blood had been shed, and demanded expiation. Yet this expiation did not consist in the death of the offender himself, because he had not sinned wilfully." Hence an asylum was provided for him in the free city, to which he might escape, and where he would lie concealed. This sojourn in the free city was not to be regarded as banishment, although separation from house, home, and family was certainly a punishment; but it was a concealment under " the pro- teQtion of the mercy of God, which opened places of escape in the cities of refuge from the carnal ardour of the avenger of blood, where the slayer remained concealed until his sin was expiated by the death of the high priest." For the fact, that the death of the high priest was hereby regarded as expiatory, as many of the Rabbins, fathers, and earlier commentators maintain (see my Comm. on Joshua, p. 448), is unmistakeably evident from the addition of the clause, " who has been anointed with the holy oil," which would appear unmeaning and superfluous on any other view. This clause points to the inward connection between the return of the slayer and the death of the high priest. " The anointing with the holy oil was a symbol of the communication of the Holy Ghost, by which the high priest was empowered to act as mediator and representative of the nation before God, so that he alone could carry out the yearly and general expiation for the whole nation, on the great day of atonement. But as his life and work acquired a representative signification through this anointing with the Holy Ghost, his death might also be regarded as a death for the sins of the people, by virtue of the Holy Ghost imparted to him, through which the unintentional manslayer received the benefits of the propitiation for his sin before God, so that he could return cleansed to his native town, without further exposure to the vengeance of the avenger of blood" (Comm. on Joshua, p. 448). But inasmuch as, according to tliis view, the death of the high priest had the same result in a certain sense, in relation to his time of office, as his function on the day of atonement had had every year, " the death of the earthly high priest became thereby a type of that of the heavenly One, who, through the eternal (holy) Spirit, offered Himself without spot to God, that we might be redeemed from our transgressions, and receive the promised eternal inheritance (Heb. ix. 14, 15). Just as the blood of Christ wrought out eternal redemption, only because through the eternal Spirit He offered Himself without spot to God, so the death of the high priest of the Old Testament secured the complete deliverance of the manslayer from his sin, only because he had been anointed with the holy oil, the symbol of the PToly Ghost " (p. 449).
If, therefore, the confinement of the unintentional manslayer in the city of refuge was neither an ordinary exile nor merely a means of rescuing him from the revenge of the enraged goely but an appointment of the just and merciful God for the expiation of human blood even though not wilfully shed, that, whilst there was no vio- latlon of judicial righteousness, a barrier might be set to the unrighteousness of family revenge; it was necessary to guard against any such abuse of this gracious provision of the righteous God, as that into which the heathen right of asylum had degenerated.^ The instructions which follow in vers. 29-34 were intended to secure this object. In ver. 29, there is first of all the general law, that these instructions (those given in vers. 11-28) were to be for a statute of judgment (see chap, xxvii. 11) for all future ages (" throughout your generations," see Ex. xii. 14, 20). Then, in ver. 30, a just judgment is enforced in the treatment of murder. " Whoso killeth any person (these words are construed absolutely), at the mo2ith (the testimony) of tvitnesses shall the murderer he put to death; and one tvitness shall not answer (give evidence) against a person to die; " i.e. if the taking of life were in question, capital punishment was not to be inflicted upon the testimony of one person only, but upon that of a plurality of witnesses. One witness could not only be more easily mistaken than several, but would be more likely to be partial than several persons who were unanimous in bearing witness to one and the same thing. The number of witnesses was afterwards fixed at two witnesses, at least, in the case of capital crimes (Deut. xvii. 6), and two or three in the case of every crime (Deut. xix. 15; cf. John viii. 17, 2 Cor. xiii. 1, Heb. x. 28). — Lastly (vers. 31 sqq.), the command is given not to take redemption money, either for the life of the murderer, who was a wicked man to die, i.e. deserving of death (such a man was to be put to death); nor '^ for fleeing into the city of refuge, to return to divell in the land till the death of the high priest: " that is to say, they were neither to allow the wilful murderer to come to terms with the relative of the man who had been put to death, by the payment of a redemption fee, and so to save his life, as is not unfrequently the case in the East at the present day (cf. Robinson, Pal. i. p. 209, and Loners Manners and Customs)'; nor even to allow the unintentional murderer to purchase permission to return home from the city of refuge
1 On the asyla^ in general, sec Winer''s Ileal- Wurtcrhuch, art. Frclstatt; Pauhj^ Rcal-encykl. dcr class. Altcrthums-wissenschaft, Bd. i. s. v. Asylum; but more especially K. Danji, " iihcr den Urspriing den AsT/lrccJits tnid dcsscn Schickmle und Ueberreste in Europa," in his Ztschr.fiir deutsches Reclity Lpz. 1840. " The asyla of the Greeks^ Romans^ and Germans differed altogether from those of tlie Hebrews; for whilst the latter were never intended to save tlie wilful criminal from the punishment he deserved, but were simply established for the purpose of securing a just sentence, the former actually answered the purpose of rescuing the criminal from the punishment which he legally deserved."
before the death of the high priest, by the payment of a money compensation. — Ver. 33. The Israehtes were not to desecrate their land by sparing the murderer; as blood, i.e. bloodshed or murder, desecrated the land, and there was no expiation p^?0 ^o the land for the blood that was shed in it, except through the blood of the man who had shed it, i.e. through the execution of the murderer, by which justice would be satisfied. — Yer. 34. And they were not to desecrate the land in which they dwelt by tolerating murderers, because Jehovah, the Holy One, dwelt in it, among the children of Israel (cf. Lev. xviii. 25 sqq.).
Vers. 1-4. The occasion for this law was a representation made to Moses and the princes of the congregation by the heads of the fathers' houses e^i^?"^ for rinxn"n''3j as in Ex. vi. 25, etc.) of the family of Gilead the!Manassite, to which ZelopheJiad (chap. xxvi. 33) belonged, to the effect that, by allotting an hereditary possession to the daughters of Zelophehad, the tribe-territory assigned to the Manassites would be diminished if they should marry into another tribe. They founded their appeal upon the command of Jehovah, that the land was to be distributed by lot among the Israelites for an inheritance (ver. 2 compared with chap. xxvi. 55, 56, and xxxiii. 54); and although it is not expressly stated, yet on the ground of the promise of the everlasting possession of Canaan (Gen. xvii. 8), and the provision made by the law, that an inheritance was not to be alienated (Lev. xxv. 10, 13, 23 sqq.), they understood it as signifying tliat the portion assigned to each tribe was to continue unchanged to all generations. (The singular pronoun, mi/ Lord, in ver. 2, refers to the speaker, as in chap, xxxii. 27.) Now, as the inheritance of their brother, i.e. their tribe-mate Zelophehad, had been given to his daughters (chap, xxvii. 1), if they should be chosen as wives by any of the children of the (other) tribes of Israel, i.e. should marry into another tribe, their inheritance would be taken away from the tribe-territory of Manasseh, and would be added to that of the tribe into which they were received. The suffix on? (ver. 3) refers ad sensum to f^^^, the tribe regarded according to its members. — Ver. 4. And when the year of jubilee came round (see Lev. xxv. 10), their inheritance would be entirely withdrawn from the tribe of Manasseh. Strictly speaking, the hereditary property would pass at once, when the marriage took place, to the tribe into which an heiress married, and not merely at the year of jubilee. But up to the year of jubilee it was always possible that the hereditary property might revert to the tribe of Manasseh, either through the marriage being childless, or through the purchase of the inheritance. But in the year of jubilee all landed property that had been alienated was to return to Its original proprietor or his heir (Lev. xxv. 33 sqq.). In this way the transfer of an inheritance from one tribe to another, which took place in consequence of a marriage, would be established in perpetuity. And it was in this sense that the elders of the tribe of Manasseh meant that a portion of the inheritance which had fallen to them by lot would be taken away from their tribe at the year of jubilee.— Vers. 5-9. Moses declared that what they had affirmed was right (13), and then, by command of Jehovah, he told the daughters of Zelophehad that they might marry whoever pleased them (the suffix nn, attached to "p."!!?, for jn, as in Ex. I. 21, Gen. xxxl. 9, etc.), but that he must belong to the family of their father's tribe, that is to say, must^be a Manassite. For (ver. 7) the inheritance was not to turn away the Israelites from one tribe to another (not to be transferred from one to another), but every Israelite was to keep to the inheritance of his father's tribe, and no one was to.enter upon the possession of another tribe by marrying an heiress belonging to that tribe. This Is afterwards extended, in vers. 8 and 9, into a general law for every heiress in Israel.
In vers. 10-12 it is related that, in accordance with these instructions, the five daughters of Zelophehad, whose name^^ are repeated from chap. xxvi. 33 and xxvll. 1 (see also Josh. xvil. 3), married husbands from the families of the Manassites, namely, sons of their cousins (? uncles), and thus their inheritance remained in their father's tribe {^V r]]^^ to be and remain upon anything).— Ver. 13. The conclusion refers not merely to the laws and rights contained in chap, xxxili. 50-xxxvi. 13, but includes the rest of the laws £^Iven in the steppes of Moab (chap, xxv.-xxx.), and forms the conclusion to the whole book, which places the lawgiving in the steppes of Moab by the side of the lawgiving at Mount Sinai (Lev. xxvi. d6, xlvli. 34) and brings it to a close, though without in any way implying that the explanation ("l^??, Deut. i. 5), further development, and hortatory enforcement of the law and its testimonies, statutes, and judgments (Deut. i. 5, iv. 44 sqq., xii. 1 sqq.), which follow in Deuteronomy, are not of Mosaic origin.
HE fifth book of Moses, which is headed Dnnnn n^K, or briefly D^"ill, in the Hebrew Bibles, from the opening words of the* book, is called T]y\r\n Ti^^^ip {repetitio legis), or merely "^.^^p by the Hellenistic Jews and some of the Rabbins, with special reference to^ its contents as described in chap. xvii. 18. The rabbinical explanation of the latter given in Miinster and Fagius is D''J1{i't5'^'7 |^13t? " memoria rerum jpriorum^ qucB in aliis scrihuntur libris" By some of the Rabbins the book is also called flinjin iDpj Uher redargutionum. The first of these titles has become current in the Christian Church through the rendering given by the LXX. and Vulgate, AevrepovofiLov, Deuteronomium; and although it has arisen from an incorrect rendering of chap. xvii. 18 (see the exposition of the passage), it is so far a suitable one, that it describes quite correctly the leading contents of the book itself. The book of Deuteronomy contains not so much " a recapitulation of the things commanded and done, as related in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers" (Theod.), as "a compendium and summary of the whole law and wisdom of the people of Israel, wherein those things which related to the priests and Levites are omitted, and only such things included as the people generally required to know" (Luther), Consequently it is not merely a repetition and summary of the most important laws and events contained in the previous books, still less a mere " summons to the law and testimony," or a " fresh and independent lawgiving standing side by side with the earlier one," a " transformation of the old law to suit the altered circumstances," or "merely a second book of the law, intended for the people that knew not the law" (Ewald, Biehm, etc.); but a hortatory description, explanation, and enforcement of the most essential contents of the covenant revelation and covenant laws, with emphatic prominence given to the spiritual principle of the law and its fulfilment, and with a further development df the ecclesiastical, judicial, political, and civil organization, which was intended as a permanent foundation for Hie life and wellbeing of the people in the land of Canaan, There is not the slightest trace, throughout the whole book, of any intention whatever to give a new or second law. Whilst the laws as well as the divme promises and threatenings in the three middle books of the Pentateuch are all introduced as words of Jehovah to Moses, which he was to make known to the people, and even where the announcement passes over into the form of an address,— as, for example, m Ex. xxiii. 20 sqq., Lev. xxvi.,-are not spoken by Moses in his own name, but spoken by Jehovah to Israel through Moses; the book of Deuteronomy, with the exception of chap, xxxi.-xxxiv., contains nothing but words addressed by Moses to the people, with the intention, as he expressly affirms in chap. i. 5, of expkmmg 0^ the law to the people. Accordingly he does not quote those laws, which were given before and are merely repeated here, nor the further precepts and arrangements that were added to them, such as those concerning the one site for the worship of God, the prophetic and regal qualifications, the administration of justice and carrying on of war, in the categorical language of law; but clothes them, as well as the other commandments, in the hortatory form of a paternal address, full of solemn and affectionate admonition with the addition of such reminiscences and motives as seemed best adapted to impress their observance upon the hearts of the people. As the repetition not only of the decalogue, which God addressed to the people directly from Sinai, but also of many other laws, which He gave through Moses at Sinai and during the journey through the desert, had no other object than this, to make the contents of the covenant legislation intelligible to all the people, and to impress them upon their hearts; so those laws which are peculiar to our book are not additions made to this legislation for the purpose of completing it, but simply furnish such explanations and illustrations of its meaning as were rendered necessary by the peculiar relations and forms of the religious, social, and political life of the nation in the promised land of Canaan. Throughout the whole book, the law, with its commandments, statutes, and judgments, which Moses laid "this day" before the people, is never described as either new or altered; on the contrary, it is only the law of the covenant, which Jehovah had concluded with His people at Horeb (chap. v. 1 sqq.); and the commandments, statutes, and judgments of this law Moses had received from the Lord upon the Mount (Sinai), that he might teach Israel to keep them (chap. V. 31 sqq.; comp. chap. vi. 20-25). The details of the book also bear this out.
The first part of the book, which embraces by far the greater portion of it, viz. chap, i.-xxx., consists of three long addresses, which Moses delivered to all Israel, according to the heading of chap. i. 1-4, in the land of Moab, on the first of the eleventh month, in the fortieth year after the exodus from Egypt. The first of these addresses (chap. i. 6-iv. 40) is intended to prepare the way for the exposition and enforcement of the law, which follow afterwards. Moses calls to their recollection the most important facts connected with the history of their forty years' wandering in the desert, under the protection and merciful guidance of the Lord (chap. i. 6-iii. 29); and to this he attaches the exhortation not to forget the revelation of the Lord, which they had seen at Horeb, or the words of the covenant which they had heard, but to bear in mind at all times, that Jehovah alone was God in heaven and on earth, and to keep His comm^andments and rights, that they mio-ht enjoy long life and prosperity in the land of Canaan (chap. iv. 1-40). This is followed by the statement in chap. iv. 41-43, that Moses set apart three cities of refuge in the land to the east of the Jordan for unintentional manslayers. The second address (chap, v.-xxvi.) is described in the heading in chap. iv. 44-49 as the law, which Moses set before the children of Israel, and consists of two parts, the one general and the other particular. In the general part (chap, v.-xi.), Moses repeats the ten words of the covenant, which Jehovah spoke to Israel from Sinai out of the midst of the fire, together with the circumstances which attended their promulgation (chap, v.), and then expounds the contents of the first two commandments of the decalogue, that Jehovah alone is the true and absolute God, and requires love from His people with all their heart and all their soul, and therefore will not tolerate the worship of any other god beside Himself (chap. vi.). For this reason the Israelites were not only to form no alliance with the Canaanites after conquering them, and taking possession of the promised land, but to exterminate them without quarter, and destroy their altars and idols, because the Lord had chosen them to be His holy nation from love to their forefathers, and would keep the covenant of His grace, and bestow the richest blessings upon them, if they observed His commandments (chap, vii.); but when in possession and enjoyment of the riches of this blessed land, they were to remain for ever mindful of the temptation, humiliation, and fatherly chastisement which they had experienced at the hand of their God in the wilderness, that they might not forget the Lord and His manifestations of mercy in their selfexaltation (chap, viii.), but might constantly remember that they owed their conquest and possession of Canaan not to their own righteousness, but solely to the compassion and covenant faithfulness of the Lord, whom they had repeatedly provoked to anger in the wilderness, (chap. ix. 1-x. 11), and might earnestly strive to serve the Lord in true fear and love, and to keep His commandments, that they might inherit the promised blessing, and not be exposed to the curse which would fall upon transgressors and the worshippers of idols (chap. x. 12-xi. 32). To this there is added in the more special part (chap, xii.-xxvi.), an account of the most important laws which all Israel was to observe in the land of its inheritance, viz.: (1.) Directions for the behaviour of Israel towards the Lord God, e.g. as to the presentation of sacrificial offerings and celebration of sacrificial meals at no other place than the one chosen by God for the revelation of His name (chap, xii.); as to the destruction of all seducers to idolatry, whether prophets who rose up with signs and wonders, or the closest blood-relations, and such towns in the land as should fall away to idolatry (chap, xiii.); as to abstinence from the mourning ceremonies of the heathen, and from unclean food, and the setting apart of tithes for sacrificial meals and for the poor (chap, xiv.); as to the observance of the year of remission, the emancipation of Hebrew slaves in the seventh year, and the dedication of the first-born of oxen and sheep (chap, xv.), and as to the celebration of the feast of Passover, of Weeks, and of Tabernacles, by sacrificial meals at the sanctuary (chap. xvi. 1-17). (2.) Laws concerning the organization of the theocratic state, and especially as to the appointment of judges and official persons in every town, and the trial of idolaters and evil-doers in both the lower and higher forms (chap. xvi. 18-xvii. 13); concerning the choice of a king in the future, and his duties (chap. xvii. 14-20); concerning the rights of priests and Levites (chap, xviii. 1-8); and concerning false and true prophets (vers. 9-22). (3.) Regulations bearing upon the sanctification of human life: viz. legal instructions as to the establishment of cities of refuge for unintentional manslayers (chap. xix. 1-13); as to the maintenance of the sanctity of the boundaries of landed property, and abstinence from false charges against a neighbour (vers. 14-21); as to the conduct of war, with special reference to the duty of sparing their own fighting men, and also defenceless enemies and their towns (chap, xx.); as to the expiation of inexplicable murders (chap. xxi. 1-9); as to the mild treatment of women taken in war (vers. 10-14); the just use of paternal authority (vers. 15-21); and the burial of criminals that had been executed (vers. 22, 23). (4.) The duty of paying affectionate regard to the property of a neighbour, and cherishing a sacred dread of violating the moral and natural order of the world (chap. xxii. 1-12), with various precepts for the sanctification of the marriage bond (chap. xxii. 13-xxiii. 1), of the theocratic union as a congregation (chap, xxiii. 2-26), and also of domestic and social life, in all its manifold relations (chaps, xxiv. and xxv.); and lastly, the appointment of prayers of thanksgiving on the presentation of the first-fruits and tenths of the fruits of the field (chap, xxvi. 1-15); together with a closing admonition (vers. 16-19) to observe all these laws and rights with all the heart. The third address (chap, xxvii.-xxx.) has reference to the renewal of the covenant. This solemn act is introduced with a command to write the law upon large stones when Canaan should be conquered, and to set up these stones upon Mount Ebal, to build an altar there; and after presenting burnt-offerings and slain-offerings, to proclaim in the most solemn manner both the blessing and curse of the law, the former upon Gerizim, and the latter upon Ebal (chap, xxvii.). Moses takes occasion from this command to declare most fully what blessings and curses would come upon the people, according as they should or should not hearken to the voice of the Lord (chap, xxviii.). Then follows the renewal of the covenant, which consisted in the fact that Moses recited once more, in a solemn address to the whole of the national assembly, all that the Lord had done for them and to them; and after pointing again to the blessings and curses of the law, called upon them and adjured them to enter into the covenant of Jehovah their God, which lie had that day concluded with them, and having before them blessing and cursing, life and death, to make the choice of life. — The second and much shorter portion of the book (chap, xxxi.-xxxiv.) contains the close of Moses' life and labours: (a) the appointment of Joshua to be the leader of Israel into Canaan, and the handing over of the book of the law, when completed, to the priests, for them to keep and read to the people at the feast of Tabernacles in the year of jubilee (chap, xxxi.); (b) the song of Moses (chap, xxxii. 1-47), and the announcement of his death (vers. 48-52); (c) the blessing of Moses (chap, xxxiii.); and (d) the account of his death (chap, xxxi v.).
From this general survey of the contents, it is sufficiently evident that the exposition of the commandments, statutes, and rights of the law had no other object than this, to pledge the nation in the most solemn manner to an inviolable observance, in the land of Canaan, of the covenant which Jehovah had made with Israel at Horeb (chap, xxviii. 69). To this end Moses not only repeats the fundamental law of this covenant, the decalogue, but many of the separate commandments, statutes, and rights of the more expanded Sinaitic law. These are rarely given in extenso (e.g. the laws of food m chap, xiv.), but for the most part simply in brief hints, bringing out by way of example a few of the more important rules, for the purpose of linking on some further explanations of the law in its application to the peculiar circumstances of the land of Canaan. And throughout, as F. W. Scliultz correctly observes, the intention of the book is, " by means of certain supplementary and auxiliary rules, to ensure the realization of the laws or institutions of the earlier books, the full validity of which it presupposes; and that not merely in some fashion or other, but in its true essence, and according to its higher object and idea, notwithstanding all the difficulties that might present themselves in Canaan or elsewhere." Not only arc the instructions relating to the building of the sanctuary, the service of the priests and Levites, and the laws of sacrifice and purification, passed over without mention as being already known; but of the festivals and festive celebrations, only the three annual feasts of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles are referred to, and that but briefly, for the purpose of commanding the observance of the sacrificial meals which were to be held at the sanctuary in connection with these feasts (chap. xvi.). The tithes and first-fruits are noticed several times, but only so far as they were to be applied to common sacrificial meals before the Lord. The appointment of judges is commanded in all the towns of the land, and rules are mven bv which the judicial form of procedure is determined more minutely; but no rule is laid down as to the election of the judges, simply because this had been done before. On the other hand, instructions are given concerning the king whom the peoj)le would one day desire to set over themselves; concerning the prophets wliom the Lord would raise up; and also concerning any wars that might be waged with other nations than the Canaanites, the extermination of the latter being enforced once more; and several things besides. — And if this Selection of materials indicates an intention, not so much to complete the legislation of the earlier books by the addition of new laws, as to promote its observance and introduction into the national life, and secure its permanent force; this intention becomes still more apparent when we consider how Moses, after repeating the decalogue, not only sums up the essential contents of all the commandments, statutes, and rights which Jehovah has commanded, in the one command to love God with all the heart, etc., and sets forth this commandment as the sum of the whole law, but in all his expositions of the law, all his exhortations to obedience, and all threats and promises, aims ever at this one object, to awaken in the hearts of the people a proper state of mind for the observance of the commandments of God, viz. a feeling of humility and love and willing obedience, and to destroy that love for merely outward legality and phaiisaic self-righteousness which is inherent in the natural man, that the people may circumcise the foreskin of their heart, and enter heartily into the covenant of their God, and maintain that covenant with true fidelity.
It is in this peculiar characteristic and design of the legislative addresses which the book contains, and not in the purpose attributed to it, of appending a general law for the nation to the legislation of the previous books, which had reference chiefly to the priests and Levites,^ that we are to seek for that completion of the law which the book of Deuteronomy supplies. And in this we may find the strongest proof of the Mosaic origin of this concluding part of the Thorah. What the heading distinctly states (chap. i. 1-4), — viz.
^ In opposition to this view of Ed. Rieha^ Schultz justly argues that the book of Deuteronomy is very far from containing everything that concerned the people and was of great importance to them. It does not even repeat those laws of the first book of the covenant in Ex. xx.-xxiii., which affected most closely the social every-day life of the people. It contains nothing about circumcision, which certainly could not have been omitted from the national law-book; no further details as to the Passover, Pentecost, and tlie feast of Tabernacles; it does not even mention the great day of atonement, on which every Israelite had to fast on pain of death, nor the feast of trumpets and year of jubilee; and the Sabbath command is simply introduced quite briefly in and with the decalogue. Of all the defilements and washings, which were of the greatest moment, according to the Old Testament view, to every individual, there is not a single word.
that Moses delivered this address to all Israel a short time before his death in the land of Moab, on the other side of the Jordan, and therefore on the threshold of the promised land,— is confirmed by both the form and contents of the book. As Hengstenherg has well observed {Ev. K, Z, 1862, No. 5, pp.49 sqq.), "the address of
Moses is in perfect harmony with his situation. He speaks like a dying father to his children. The words are earnest, inspired, impressive. He looks back over the whole of the forty years of their wandering in the desert, reminds the people of all the blessings they have received, of the ingratitude with which they have so often repaid them, and of the judgments of God, and the love that continually broke forth behind them; he explains the laws again and again, and adds what is necessary to complete them, and is never weary of urging obedience to them in the warmest and most emphatic words, because the very life of the nation was bound up with this; he surveys all the storms and conflicts which they have passed through, and, beholding the future in the past, takes a survey also of the future history of the nation, and sees, with mingled sorrow and joy, how the three great features of the past — viz. apostasy, punishment, and pardon — continue to repeat themselves in the future also.— The situation throughout is the time when Israel was standing on the border of the promised land, and preparing to cross the Jordan; and there is never any allusion to what formed the centre of the national life in future times— to Jerusalem and its temple, or to the Davidic monarchy. The approaching conquest of the land is merely taken for granted as a whole; the land is dressed throughout in all the charms of a desired good, and no reference is ever made to the special circumstances of Israel in the land about
to be conquered." To this there is to be added what makes its appearance on every hand — the most lively remembrance of Egypt, and the condition of the people when living there (cf. chap. v. 15, vii. 15, xi. 10, XV. 15, xvi. 12, xxiv. 18, xxviii. 27, 35, 60), and an accurate acquaintance witli the very earliest circumstances of the different nations with which the Israelites came into either friendly or hostile contact in the Mosaic age (chap, ii.); together with many other things that were entirely changed a short time after the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites.
And just as these addresses, which complete the giving of the law and bring it to a close, form an integral part of the Thorah, so the historical account of the finishing of the book of the law, and its being handed over to the priests, together with the song and blessing of Moses (chap, xxxi.-xxxiii.), form a fitting conclusion to the work of Moses, the lawgiver and mediator of the old covenant; and to this the account of his death, with which the Pentateuch closes (chap, xxxiv.), is very appropriately appended.
Vers. 1-4 contain the heading to the whole book; and to this the introduction to the first address is appended in ver. 5. By the expression, " These he the words" etc., Deuteronomy is attached- to the previous books; the word " these^'' which refers to the addresses that follow, connects what follows with what goes before, just as in Gen. ii. 4, vi. 9, etc. The geographical data in ver. 1 present no little difficulty; for whilst the general statement as to the place where Moses delivered the addresses in this book, viz. beyond Jordan^ is particularized in the introduction to the second address (chap. iv. 46), as '' in the valley over against Beth-Peor^" here it is described as " in the wilderness^ in the Arahah," etc. This contrast between the verse before us and chap. iv. 45, 46, and still more the introduction of the very general and loose expression, " in the desert^'' which is so little adapted for a geographical definition of the locality, that it has to be defined itself by the additional words "m the Arahah^"* suggest the conclusion that the particular names introduced are not intended to furnish as exact a geographical account as possible of the spot where Moses explained the law to all Israel, but to call up to view the scene of the addresses which follow, and point out the situation of all Israel at that time. Israel was " in the desert,^ not yet in Canaan the promised inheritance, and in fact "m the Arahah." This is the name given to the deep lowlying plain on both sides of the Jordan, which runs from the Lake of Gennesaret to the Dead Sea, and stretches southwards from the Dead Sea to Aila, at the northern extremity of the Ked Sea, as we may see very clearly from chap. ii. 8, where the Avay which the Israelites took past Edom to Aila is called the " way of the Arabah,'* and also from 4lie fact that the Dead Sea is called " the sea of the
Arahali'* in cliap. ili. 17 and iv. 49. At present the name Arahali is simply attached to the southern half of this valley, between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea; whilst the northern part, between the Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee, is called el Ghor; though Abulfeda, Ibn Haukal^ and other Arabic geographers, extend the name Ghor from the Lake of Gennesaret to Aila (cf. Ges, thes. p. 1166; Hengstenbergj Balaam, p. 520; Robinson^ Pal. ii. p. 596). — ^i^D PID, " over against Supli^ (PiD for ^^D, chap. ii. 19, iii. 29, etc., for the sake of euphony, to avoid the close connection of the two?«-sounds). Suph is probably a contraction of ^^D"D^j "the Red Sea" (see at Ex. x. 19). This name is given not only to the Gulf of Suez (Ex. xiii. 18, xv. 4, 22, etc.), but to that of Akabah also (Num. xiv. 25, xxi. 4, etc.). There is no other Suph that would be at all suitable here. The LXX. have rendered it TrXrjaLov rrj<; ipvOpa^ OaXdaarj^;; and Onkelos and others adopt the same rendering. This description cannot serve as a more precise definition of the Arabahj in which case "i^^5 (which) would have to be supplied before i^iD, since " the Arabah actually touches the Red Sea." Nor does it point out the particular spot in the Arabah where the addresses were delivered, as Knobel supposes; or indicate the connection between the Arboth Moab and the continuation of the Arabah on the other side of the Dead Sea, and point out the Arabah in all this extent as the heart of the country over which the Israelites had moved during the whole of their forty years' wandering {Hengstenberg). For although the Israelites passed twice through the Arabah (see p. 246), it formed by no means the heart of the country in which they continued for forty years. The words "opposite to Suph" when taken in connection with the following names, cannot have any other object than to define with greater exactness the desert in wdiich the Israelites had moved during the forty years. Moses spoke to all Israel on the other side of the Jordan, when it was still in the desert, in the Arabah, still opposite to the Red Sea, after crossing which it had entered the wilderness (Ex. xv. 22), " between Paraiij and Tophely and Laban, and liazeroth, and Di-Sahab" Paran is at all events not the desert of this name in all its extent (see vol. ii. pp. 58, 59), but the place of encampment in the " desert of Paran" (Num. x. 12, xii. 16), i.e. the district of Kadesh in the desert of Zln (Num. xiii. 21, 26); and Ilazeroth is most probably the place of encampment of that name mentioned in Num. xi. 35, xii. 16, from which Israel entered the desert of Paran. Both places had been very eventful to the Israelites. At Ilazeroth, Miriam the proplietess and Aaron the high priest had stumbled through rebelHon against Moses (Num. xii.). In the desert of Paran by Kadesh the older generation had been rejected, and sentenced to die in the wilderness on account of its repeated rebellion against the Lord (Num. xiv.); and when the younger generation that had grown up in the wilderness assembled once more in Kadesh to set out for Canaan, even Moses and Aaron, the two heads of the nation, sinned there at the water of strife, so that they two were not permitted to enter Canaan, whilst Miriam died there at that time (Num. xx:). But if Paran and Hazeroth are mentioned on account of the tragical events connected with these places, it is natural to conclude that there w^ere similar reasons for mentioning the other three names as well. Tophel is supposed by Hengstenherg {Balaam^ p. 517) and Robinson (Pal. ii. p. 570) and all the more modern w^riters, to be the large village of Tafyleh^ with six hundred inhabitants, the chief place in Jehal, on the western side of the Edomitish mountains, in a well-watered valley of the wady of the same name, with large plantations of fruittrees {Burckliardt^ Syr, pp. 677, 678). The Israelites may have come upon this place in the neighbourhood of Oboth (Num.xxi. 10, 11); and as its inha'bitants, according to Burckhardtj p. 680, supply the Syrian caravans with a considerable quantity of provisions, which they sell to them in the castle of el Ahsa, Schultz conjectures that it may have been here that the people of Israel purchased food and drink of the Edomites for money (chap. ii. 29), and that Tafyleh is mentioned as a place of refreshment, where the Israelites partook for the first time of different food from the desert supply. There is a great deal to be said in favour of this conjecture: for even if the Israelites did not obtain different food for the first time at this place, the situation of Tophel does w^arrant the supposition that it was here that they passed for the first time from the wilderness to an inhabited land; on which account the place w^as so memorable for them, that it might very well be mentioned as being the extreme east of their wanderings in the desert, as the opposite point to the encampment at Paran, where they first arrived on the western side of their wandering, at the southern border of Canaan. Laban is generally identified with Libnah, the second place of encampment on the return journey from Kadesh (Num. xxxiii. 22), and may perhaps have been the place referred to in Num. xvi., but not more precisely defined, where the rebellion of the company of Korah occurred. Lastly, Di-Sahab has been identified by modern commentators with Mersa Dahab or Mina Dahab, i.e. gold-harbour,