[Just as Miriam broke out in song during the exodus, here Moshe does the same. This song, says the commentator, is a ‘didactic ode’.
Man oh man, what a cultured and educated leader was Moshe and why should he not be? After all he grew up in the Pharaoh’s palace, was a prince of Egypt before his fortune changed to being a refugee from justice; then became a shepherd, then was called to be the leader of Israel and spokesman for God. He could read, he could write not only laws and instructions dictated by the Revelator; in time he could orate and by the end of his life he’s writing a ‘didactic ode’, a ‘song of praise and triumph’!
Could the Revelator, the God of Israel, have chosen a better mouthpiece-mediator-prophet? From babyhood, it seems Moshe was prepared for this very role for 80 years (40 in palace, 40 as shepherd) prior to his call.
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Sinaites had a discussion about ‘destiny’ or ‘fate’ and self-determination. Was Moses destined for this very role? It appears so, after all he was saved from death by the choice of 2 Hebrew midwives. After all he did not choose to be adopted by an Egyptian princess that was the princess’ choice; and being placed on water for the princess to discover him was his mother’s choice. Later he did choose to get himself out of his privileged position by killing an Egyptian which made him flee into the wilderness and live the life of a shepherd. Then he saw the burning bush, met YHWH, was commissioned to liberate and lead the children of Israel.
Destiny or self-determination?
In our individual lives we see a confluence of both . . . God’s hand as well as our hand at different points of our journey. We figure, anyone who is God-conscious seeks God actively and will eventually be used for His purposes.
We Sinites have ventured into one religion to another and ventured out of religion altogether to return to the God who spoke on Sinai. To this day, we are still listening to the Words of YHWH, through His mouthpiece Moshe. Are we in the same position as Moshe, be mouthpieces for our God? Of course, given any opportunity to explain or defend our faith to whoever is genuinely interested, though there are few takers in our circles of influence; hence this website.
While this chapter as well as the whole Torah is all about Israel, as gentiles looking in and learning from Israel’s ups and downs, victories and failures, interrelationship with their God and the leader appointed till this point of their nation’s history, there is so much to learn.
More than knowing about Israel, the biggest blessing is getting to know Israel’s God, the best knowledge anyone could possibly gain. There is no need to speculate about the nature, attributes, names, character of this God — He is talkative ! He is not secretive! What He wants man to know, He says so, not once, not twice, but repeatedly through His mouthpieces all over the Hebrew Scriptures. There is no shortage of revelation about Him, except for that He chooses not to reveal in His Wisdom. But for guidance for all humanity? He’s spoken loud and clear. Hear, HEAR, HEAR!
Commentary here is from the best of Jewish minds as collected in one resource book by Dr. J.H. Hertz, Pentateuch and Haftorahs; our translation of choice is EF/Everett Fox, The Five Books of Moses.–Admin1.]
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Dabariym 32
THE SONG OF MOSES
1-44. Moses began his ministry at the Red Sea with a song of praise and triumph, and he ends his life of service to God and Israel with another hymn of joy on the banks of Jordan, and in view of the Promised possession. Both songs are an anticipation of the glorious future beyond the wilderness-life. The majestic Farewell Song, distinguished by fire, force, and the sweep of its rhetoric, is a didactic ode. Moses takes his stand in the spirit at a point of time long subsequent to his own death: he makes a retrospective survey of Israel’s history, and develops the lessons deducible from it. The result is a vindication of the ways of God in His relations to Israel. The Divine lovingkindness and unchanging faithfulness are contrasted with Israel’s faithlessness and ingratitude. God is the loving father, whereas Israel is the wayward, disobedient child. The successive disasters which would befall Israel are a just retribution for his senseless and ungrateful conduct. But let not the heathen exult and say that Israel lies helpless and crushed. God would in the end intervene for Israel, and the Lawgiver calls upon the nations to rejoice in the salvation of the People of God.
1-3. APPEAL TO UNIVERSE FOR ATTENTION
Give ear, O heavens, that I may speak, hear, O earth, the utterance of my mouth.give ear ye heavens, and I will speak. He appeals to heaven and earth as eternal witnesses of the Divine truths he is about to declare; see XXX,19; Isa. I,2.
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doctrine. Better, teaching, message or instruction; Prov. IV,2. The message conveyed by the Song shall, like rain and dew falling on plants, penetrate to the hearts of the Israelites; refresh, stimulate, and give birth to a new spiritual life. The Song, therefore, is not only one of warning, but of comfort also, to awaken new hope in a suffering Israel.
distil as the dew. God’s word is as the dew which, though it falls gently and unheard, yet has a wonderful reviving power; Micah V,6.
small rain. The tender grass needs the small drops for its revival. Even so is the Divine teaching tempered to meet the wants of the weak and the young.
showers upon the herb. The grown-up grass need the strong forceful showers.
3 For the name of YHVH I proclaim, give greatness to our God!the name of the LORD. This v. states the reason of the invoking of heaven and earth in v. 1, and the wish expressed in v. 2. He will proclaim the Name of the LORD; i.e. His character as revealed in His dealings with Israel.
4-6. GOD’S FAITHFULNESS AND ISRAEL’S FOLLY
A contrast between the unchangeable rectitude of God and the fickle behavior of His people.
4 The Rock, whole-and-perfect are his deeds, for all his ways are just. A God steadfast, (with) no corruption, equitable and upright is he.‘This v. gives a concise and forcible declaration of the ethical perfection of God, maintained by Him uniformly in His moral government of the world’ (Driver).
the Rock. ‘Nine times in the course of this single hymn is repeated this most expressive figure, taken from the granite crags of Sinai, and carried thence through psalms and hymns of all nations, like one of the huge fragments which it represents, to regions as remote in aspect as in distance from its original birthplace’ (Stanley). It denotes the Divine unchangeableness and its refuge for men. Ages pass away, but the rock remains a place of safety in time of storm and flood.
perfect. Irreproachable.
a God of faithfulness. ‘Faithful to give the righteous his due reward in the life after death. Even though to our seeming this reward be unduly delayed in its coming, God will certainly keep faith in bringing it to pass’ (Rashi).
iniquity. Better, injustice. Maimonides makes the recognition of the justice of God one of the fundamental principles of the Jewish Faith, even as the Rabbis make it one of the fundamental duties of the Jew.
5 His children have wrought-ruin toward him-a defect in them, a generation crooked and twisted!His children’s is the blemish. The Heb. Text is very difficult, and the Ancient Versions render little help. M. Friedlander took a parallel form with the meaning of ‘fault-laden’: ‘Is corruption His? No, O ye His fault-laden children, ye perverse and crooked generation.’
The sinning of Israel is not a blemish upon the goodness of God. He gave them a Law which would render them happy, but they chose sin and its subsequent sorrows (Leeser).
6 (Is it) YHVH whom you (thus) pay back, O people foolish and not wise? I s he not your father, your creator, he (who) made you and established you?requite. Will ye thus treat your Father and Benefactor?
gotten thee. lit. ‘acquired thee,’ by delivering them out of Egypt.
hath He not made thee? Constituted thee a nation (Rashi).
and established thee. Set thee upon a firm basis, so as to play a great and lasting part in world-history.
7-14. THE LESSON OF HISTORY
7 Regard the days of ages-past, understand the years of generation and generation (ago); ask your father, he will tell you, your elders, they will declare it to you:the days of old. The story of Israel’s birth as a nation.
many generations. Or, ‘each generation.’
father . . . elders. The depositaries of religious tradition.
[S6K note: See post THE HALLOWING OF HISTORY]
8-14. THE ANSWER OF THE FATHERS AND ELDERS
When God first allotted the nations a place and a heritage, as described in Gen. X and XI, He had respect to the special necessities of the Israelites.
8 When the Most-high gave nations (their) inheritances, at his dividing the human-race, he stationed boundaries for peoples by the number of the gods.9 Indeed, the portion of YHVH became his people, Yaakov, the lot of his inheritance.
for the portion of the LORD is His people. Israel belonged to God in a more intimate sense than any other ethnic group.
10 He found him in a wilderness land, in a waste, a howling desert. He surrounded him, he paid-him-regard, he guarded him like the pupil of his eye;He found him in a desert land. This v. and those immediately following depict God’s fatherly care of Israel. Israel is represented as an abandoned, starving child left to die in the wilderness (Ezekiel XVI,3-6). God finds and rescues him. Israel’s history begins with the forty years’ march through the desert—where he must have perished, had not God supplied the food and the necessary protection.
howling wilderness. Where wild beasts howl.
compassed him about. By a pillar of cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night.
cared for him. Or, ‘gave him understanding’ (Onkelos, Rashi); Israel’s spiritual wants were cared for, inasmuch as he received the Law in that desert.
the apple of His eye. The pupil of his eye; the Heb. phrase is equivalent to the English ‘as his very life.’
11 like an eagle protecting its nest, over its young-birds hovering, he spread out his wings, he took him, bearing him on his pinions.as an eagle. God’s loving care for Israel is likened to the tender affection that is shown by the eagle towards its young when it teaches them to fly.
stirreth up her nest. When the time comes for the young to leave the nest, the mother-bird does not rouse them suddenly, but strikes her wings against the surrounding branches. Having thus gently awakened them, she ‘stirs up’ the nest, and allures them to imitate her fluttering in flight.
hovereth over her young. She hovers over them in loving solicitude, and has her wings in readiness to catch them, should they become exhausted.
spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them. If the young are too weak or too timid to fly, the eagle takes them upon her outspread wings and carries them—a picture of the fostering care, the discipline and training to independence, that Israel received at the Divine hands.
12 YHVH alone did lead them, not with him any foreign god!13-14. Israel would enjoy all the luxuries of a pastoral people in abundance.
13 He had them mount on the high-places of the land, he fed them the crops of the field; he suckled them with honey from a boulder, with oil from a flinty rock;ride on the high places. A figure of speech denoting the triumphant and undisputed possession of the land, even of its high mountain fastnesses, which the Prophet-poet foresees as an accomplished fact.
of the earth. Better, of the land.
honey . . . rock. Even from the rocks He had given them honey, and the flinty soil produced the olive tree. Palestine is by its flora (it has 3,000 species of flowers), and by its innumerable caves and fissures of the dry limestone rocks, well suited to honey-culture.
suck. Enjoy with relish.
14 on curds of cattle and milk of sheep, along with the milk of lambs and rams, of the young of Bashan and he-goats, along with the kidney fat of wheat, and blood of grapes, you drank fermented (wine).curd of kine . . . wine. The very products for which the Trans-Jordanic lands they had just conquered were famous.
Bashan. Famous for its cattle.
the kidney-fat of wheat. The best and the most nutritious wheat, even as the fat of the kidneys is the choicest of fat.
15-18. ISRAEL’S INGRATITUDE
15 But Yeshurun grew fat and kicked, you were fat, you were gross, you were gorged, he forsook the God that made him, and treated-like-a-fool the Rock of his deliverance.Jeshurun. This title of honour for Israel is formed from the root ‘to be righteous,’ and designates Israel under its ideal character as’ the Upright One’. It is used here ironically as a rebuke to Israel’s ingratitude and perfidy.
waxed fat, and kicked. Like an ox grown intractable through good feeding, and refusing to bear the yoke of the master.
become gross. Or, ‘wast gorged with food’ (Driver).
contemned. lit. ‘and treated as ‘a senseless person who only deserves contempt. ‘How often in their superstition do men act as if God could be tricked; and in their immorality, as if He were senseless’ (G.A. Smith).
16 They made-him-jealous with alien (gods), with abominations they vexed him.roused Him to jealousy. See IV, 24.
strange gods. False gods, served with ‘abominations’, i.e. wicked and idolatrous practices.
17 They slaughtered (offerings) to demons, no-gods, gods they had not known; n ew-ones from nearby came, of whom your fathers had no idea.demons. In Assyrian, shidu are the demi-gods usually represented by the bull-colossi in front of palaces.
new gods. Upstart deities recently invented or imported.
dreaded not. The Heb. verb is from the root ‘hair’; gods in whose presence your fathers ‘shuddered’ not, and the hair of their head did not stand on end (Sifri, Rashi).
18 The Rock that birthed you, you neglected, you forgot the God that produced-you-in-labor.of the Rock that begot thee. . . bore thee. A figure as bold as it is beautiful. God is represented as a Father, to whom Israel owed its existence as a people; and, at the same time, as a Mother, travailing with her infant, and forever watching over it with tender affection.
19-25. THE MERITED PUNISHMENT
19 When YHVH saw, he spurned (you), from the vexation of his sons and daughters.provoking. Vexation, disappointment at the unmerited dishonour.
20 He said: I will conceal my face from them, I will see what is their future. Indeed, a generation of overturning are they, children in whom one cannot trust.hide My face. Leave them to themselves.
a froward generation. lit. ‘a generation given to perverseness,’ i.e. evasions of truth and right; a falsehood-loving race (Driver).
no faithfulness. No loyalty to a tender Parent.
21 They made-me-jealous with a no-god, vexed me with their nothingnesses; so I will make-them-jealous with a no-people, with a nation of fools I will vex them!vanities. lit. ‘breaths’—something insubstantial, vaporous, unreal; hence false gods.
no people. Measure for measure. Just as they had angered God by adopting a no-god, so would God anger them by bringing against them a no-people; i.e. a horde of barbarians.
a vile nation. Or, ‘foolish nation’ (RV). Ignorant, and hence, barbarous and inhuman in its habits and methods (Ibn Ezra). And this people will win successes over Israel!
22 For fire is kindled in my nostrils, it burns (down) to Sheol, below, devouring the earth and its yield, setting-ablaze the hills’ foundations.setteth ablaze. . . mountains. Possibly a reference to volcanic activity, conceived as an expression of Divine anger.
23 I will sweep them away with evils, my arrows I will spend against them.spend Mine arrows. Exhaust the whole quiverful of evils upon them. ‘The evils, like arrows, fall suddenly upon their unprotected victims’ (Ibn. Ezra).
24 Drained by Famine, deprived-of-food by Fiery-plague and Bitter Pestilence; the teeth of beasts I will send out against them, along with the hot-venom of crawlers in the dust.fiery bolt. Of fever. Others understand as fiery darts that produce pestilence; Hab. III,5.
bitter destruction. Deadlly pestilence and malignant plague.
25 Outside, the sword bereaves, in rooms-within, Terror! (Destroying) young-men and virgins alike, nurselings along with men of gray-hair.without . . . terror. War, the climax to these natural horrors. Death will stalk through the streets and invade the homes. Neither age nor sex is spared.
26-33. THE STAY OF GOD’S VENGEANCE
God’s resolve on Israel’s annihilation was stayed by the consideration of the adversaries’ taunts. Nothing could save Israel, but God’s respect for His own Name.
26 I would have said: I will cleave-them-in-pieces, I will make their memory cease from mortals,I thought. Better, I would have said.
make an end. Or, ‘cleave them in pieces.’
27 -except that I feared the vexation from the enemy, lest their foes misconstrue, lest they say: Our hand is raised-high, not YHVH wrought all this!enemy’s provocation. The taunts of Israel’s foes. They would fail to see God’s retributive justice in it all.
misdeem. Misapprehend.
28 For a nation straying from counsel are they, in them there is no understanding. 29 If (only) they were wise, they would contemplate this, hey would understand their future!If they were wise. If those enemies were wise, they would look at things in the right light, past their temporary triumph over Israel. They would see their own inevitable undoing, as soon as Israel returned to God.
30 How can one pursue a thousand, two put a myriad to flight, unless their Rock had sold them out, YHVH had handed them over?how should one chase a thousand. Their victory over Israel is not their work. How should Israel be so completely crushed unless it were that God had abandoned His people?
31 For not like their rock is our Rock, though our enemies so-assess-it; indeed, from the vine of Sedom is their vine,for their rock is not as our Rock. ‘All this the heathens have understood; viz. that God had delivered Israel into their hands and that, therefore, the victory belonged neither to them nor to their gods’ (Rashi).
themselves being judges. They must admit that such deeds as were performed by Israel’s God stand unrivaled; Exod. XIV,25.
32 from the fields of Amora, their grapes are grapes of poison, clusters bitter for them,the vine of Sodom. Neither is the victory over Israel due to God’s approval of the deeds and spirit of the heathens. They are corrupt in root and fruit. The nations are compared to a vine whose stock is derived from Sodom and Gomorrah; hence, tainted by the corruption of which these cities are a type. Ancient writers (Strabo, Pliny, and TAcitus) speak of apples of Sodom that ‘have a colour as if they were fit to be eaten, but, if you pluck them with your hands, they dissolve into smoke and ashes’ (Josephus).
gall. Poison; XXIX,17. The grapes on a vine of Sodom, are a mockery—fair outside, but ashes within.
33 the hot-venom of serpents their wine, the cruel poison of vipers.asps. Cobras, poisonous snakes.
34-43. THE LOT OF ISRAEL’S ENEMIES
34 Is this not laid up in store with me, sealed up in my treasuries:is not this laid up in store with Me. Such corruption and moral poison as is the life and example of the heathens could not remain forever unpunished. God would, therefore, interpose on His people’s behalf. The punishment to be meted out to Israel’s enemies has been duly written down and sealed in the Divine archives.
35 mine are vengeance and payback, at the time when their foot slips, for near is the day of their calamity, making haste, the things impending for them.vengeance. Is here used in the general sense of punishment. God’s long-suffering towards the heathen doers of evil must not be taken for forgetfulness on His part. Retribution would assuredly come.
against the time when. As soon as.
the day of their calamity. The occasion of their sudden and irreparable disaster.
36-42. Hitherto Moses spoke to the Israelites words of warning, so that the Song might testify against them in the day of their calamity. In the remainder of this Song, he utters words of consolation—what would befall them, if they turned from their evil ways in consequence of the calamities that befell them (Rashi).
36 But YHVH will judge (in favor of) his people, regarding his servants he will relent, when he sees that strength-of-hand is gone, naught (left) of (both) fettered and free.for the LORD will judge His people. The very extremity of Israel’s need will move Him to vindicate Israel against foes and detractors.
and repent Himself for His servants. Or, have compassion on his servants,’ in their desolate and downtrodden state.
none remaining . . . large. ‘Nothing is left, except the things imprisoned or abandoned’ (Luzatto).
shut up or left at large. Or, ‘bond or free’ (Gesenius).
37-39. God would speak to them through the extremity of their need, bring them to own, by the logic of facts, that the gods in whom they trusted were unworthy of their regard, and so make it possible for Himself to interpose on their behalf (Driver). Moses endeavours to strengthen ‘their faith in a moral government of the world . . . . In spite of the conditions which might well make men despair, the world was one in a Divine purpose. And Israel, to whom this Divine purpose had been revealed, could endure through this dark night of the world. It alone had hope, and men who can hope can endure’ (Welch).
37 He will say: Where are its gods, the rock in whom it sought-refuge,38 that devoured the fat of their slaughtered-offerings, drank the wine of their poured-offerings? Let them rise up and help you, let them be over you a shelter!
39 See now that I, I am he, there is no god beside me; I myself bring-death, bestow-life, I wound and I myself heal, and there is from my hand no rescuing!
see now that I, even I, am He. Let Israel now see from the calamities it has suffered and from what it has learnt of the utter helplessness of the idols and their worshippers, that the God of Israel is the only true God; and that with Him alone is the power of life and death.
40-42. DIVINE RETRIBUTION ON ISRAEL’S FOES
40 For I lift up my hand to the heavens, and say: As I live, for the ages-I lift up My hand to heaven. Equivalent to ‘I swear.’
as I live for ever. An emphatic variation of the usual phrasing of an oath, As I live.
41 when I sharpen my lightning sword, my hand seizes judgment, I will return vengeance on my foes, and those who hate me, I will pay back.if. When.
take hold on judgment. The figure is that of God marching forth as a warrior with justice (‘judgment’) as his invincible weapon. the ‘judgment’ over the foes would be remorseless and complete.
that hate Me. Israel’s enemies are God’s enemies.
42 I will make my arrows drunk with blood, my sword devour flesh, with the blood of the slain and the captives, from the head thick-with-locks of the enemy.43. CONCLUSION OF THE SONG
43 Shout-for-joy, O nations, (over) his people, for the blood of his servants he will avenge. Vengeance he will return upon his foes, effecting-atonement for the soil of his people!sing aloud, O ye nations, of His people. The Poet calls upon the nations to join Israel in its song of deliverance. That deliverance has been so great that even the heathen, seeing it, must rejoice at it and celebrate it in song. ‘They will see His justice and His faithfulness and will gain new confidence in the stability and moral character of the forces which rule the world’ (Harper).
His adversaries. They alone who had brought Israel to the brink of destruction are threatened with vengeance, and not the heathen in general, who are invited to rejoice with Israel.
and doth make expiation for the land of His people. The expiation is for the massacred innocent Israelites whose blood was in the land of Israel, and for other defilements wrought either by enemies or earlier by backsliding Israelites on the soil of the Promised Land.
44 Moshe came and spoke all the words of this song in the ears of the people, he and Hoshe’a son of Nun.Hoshea the son of Nun. Hoshea, the original name of Joshua, before he came into prominence as Moses’ lieutenant and future successor (Num. XIII,16), was still the name by which he was popularly known. ‘Why is Joshua here called Hoshea? It is to show us his modesty. Although he was now about to become the Divinely-appointed Leader of Israel, he still felt himself the same humble youth that he was in the days of his obscurity’ (Sifri).
45-47. THE LAW IS ISRAEL’S LIFE
45 When Moshe had finished speaking all these words to all Israel,46 he said to them: Set your hearts toward all these words which I call-as-witness among you today, that you may command your children to carefully observe all the words of this Instruction.
that ye may charge. One more reference to the duty of impressing the coming generation with the necessity of observing the Torah.
47 Indeed, no empty word is it for you, indeed, it is your (very) life; through this word you shall prolong (your) days upon the soil that you are crossing over the Jordan to possess.no vain thing. Or, ‘no empty thing’; the Torah is no mere book of empty words, without meaning or message.
ye shall prolong your days. Obedience to the Torah tends to length of life, in that it restrains from sin, which shortens it. A life led in harmony with the demands of the Torah is a life of health and cheerfulness and holiness. ‘The fear of the LORD prolongeth days; but the years of the wicked shall be shortened’ (Prov. X,27).
48-52. MOSES ORDERED TO ASCEND MOUNT NEBO
48 Now YHVH spoke to Moshe on that same day, saying:that selfsame day. The day on which Moses rehearsed the Song in the hearing of the people.
49 Go up these heights of Avarim/The-region-across, Mount Nevo that is in the land of Moav, that faces Jericho, and see the land of Canaan that I am giving to the Children of Israel for a holding.into this mountain of Abarim. The mountain range in the northwest of Moab, overlooking the north end of the Dead Sea.
unto mount Nebo. The summit of the aforementioned range of mountains.
50 You are to die on the mountain that you are going up, and are to be gathered to your kinspeople, as Aharon your brother died on Hill’s Hill and was gathered to his kinspeopleand be gathered unto thy people. Be joined in soul to the souls of thy people who have preceded thee. A similar expression is used of the death of Abraham (Gen. XXV,8) and of Jacob (Gen. XLIX,33).
as Aaron thy brother died. Moses had witnessed the passing of Aaron on Mount Hor.
51 -because you (both) broke-faith with me in the midst of the Children of Israel at the waters of Merivat Kadesh, in the Wilderness of Tzyn, because you did not treat-me-as-holy in the midst of the Children of Israel.ye trespassed against Me. lit. ‘ye brake faith with Me’ ; see Numbers XX,12.
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in the midst of the children of Israel. It seems that these words are intended to be emphatic. Moses had made Pharaoh acknowledge the greatness of God; the chiefs of Edom and mighty men of Moab trembled at this achievement (Exod. XV,15)–but all this was among those outside Israel. In Israel itself, both princes and masses remained unimpressed. Moses’ work, therefore, was in this sense not a success—‘ye sanctified me not in the midst of the children of Israel’; see Lev. XXII,32.