1. all lsrael] A designation of the people characteristic of D and deuteronomic writers. See on [ Deu 4:44].
beyond Jordan] As is clear from [ Deu 1:5] and elsewhere, the E. of Jordan is intended. The title was therefore written in W. Palestine. A.V. on this side Jordan, is an impossible rendering of the Hebrew.
in the wilderness] Heb. midbar, properly pasture ground as distinct from arable; [ Jer 2:1], land not sown. The word, hardly applicable to the scene of Moses’s discourse in Moab, is the usual term both for the wilderness E. of Moab and Edom ([ Deu 2:8]; [ Deu 2:26]), and for the region of Israel’s earlier wanderings before they crossed Edom ([ Deu 1:19]; [ Deu 1:40], [ Deu 2:1]; [ Deu 2:7]). In the latter lay some, if not all, of the following localities.
in the Arabah] Heb. ‘Arabah, dry or waste: (a) a synonym for midbar, both with the def. art. ([ Isa 40:3]), as here, and without ([ Isa 35:1]; [ Jer 2:6] etc.). But with the art. it is usually the name of (b) the great depression extending from the Gulf of ‘Aḳabah northwards to the Lebanons, of which the Dead Sea, the Sea of the ‘Arabah ([ Deu 4:49]), is the deepest portion; and again is more particularly applied both to (c) the stretch of the depression N. of that Sea, the Jordan valley ([ Deu 3:17]; [ 2Ki 25:4]), cp. the Plur. ‘Arboth Moab, P’s designation of Israel’s last station before crossing Jordan, [ Deu 34:1] (cp. Arbatta, [1Ma 5:23]); and (d) the stretch of the depression S. of the Dead Sea. Each of these four meanings is possible here. Those who take the names in 1b as of places in the scene of Moses’ discourse in the land of Moab point to (c) the application of the name ‘Arabah to the Jordan valley. As we shall see, however, those names indicate rather the region of Israel’s earlier wanderings, before they crossed the S. of Edom, and this makes it more probable that ‘Arabah here = the S. stretch of the depression; so the Sam. Biḳ‘a, trench or valley. But (a) the general signification, synonymous with midbar, is not improbable here, and even more suitable to the localities in 1b than the other meanings are. To-day the name el ‘Arabah is confined to the stretch of the depression S. of a line of cliffs a few miles below the Dead Sea; while all to the N. is known as el-Ghôr.
Suph] LXX ‘the Red Sea,’ but this in Heb. is always sea of Suph. Suph may have been a locality from which the Sea derived its name, the usual etymology which would render it sea of sedge being, though plausible, uncertain (see Enc. Bibl. ‘Red Sea’). Suph cannot be Suphah of [ Num 21:14] if as is probable this lay in S. Moab; while another modern place-name that has been proposed as identical, Naḳb eṣ-Ṣafa (on which see Musil Edom ii. 29), S.W. of the Dead Sea, corresponds with Suph neither phonetically nor from its situation.
between Paran … and Di-zahab] All these places are uncertain. ‘Paran cannot be the extensive desert of that name corresponding to the modern et-Tîh, but only the place after which this desert was named, cp. [ 1Ki 11:18]’ (Dillm.). For Tophel, LXX Τοφὸλ, no modern place-name has been found: eṭ-Ṭafîleh on cultivated soil in the N. of Mt Se‘îr corresponds to it in neither spelling nor situation. Though Laban (milkwhite) and Ḥaṣerôth (folds) are names of such general signification that each may have been attached to more than one site, it is natural to identify them with the Libnah and Ḥaṣerôth of [ Num 33:20]; [ Num 33:17], stations on Israel’s march between Ḥoreb and Ḳadesh. On the W. el Ḥadharah and the ‘Ain el Ḥadharah, see Burckhardt, Travels, 494 f.; Wilson, Lands of the Bible, i. 255–260; Robinson B. R. i. 223 f. Di-zahab has been taken to be the modern Minet edh-Dhahab on the Gulf of ‘Aḳabah, but this is not on the line of Israel’s march; the meaning, (place) of gold, LXX καταχρύσεα, is general enough for the name to have been applied to several places. Thus all that is certain in these names is that some, if not all, lay on the march towards Ḳadesh, and this is confirmed by the next verse. It is not possible to bring them, or that verse, into harmony with the repeated datum that the scene of Moses’discourse was in Moab, at the N.E. end of the Dead Sea.
2. It is eleven days’, etc.] The distance from the accepted position of Ḥoreb-Sinai to that of Ḳadesh, ‘Ain Ḳudeis, is ‘10 or 11 days of common camel-riding’ (C. Trumbull K. B. 71, 215): caravans with children and flocks, like Israel’s, would of course take longer.
Horeb] Always in E, and Deut., as in 1 Kings 19 and Malachi, the name of the Mt of the Lawgiving, for which J and P have Sinai. The attempt has been made to interpret the two names as of different sites; but the Biblical evidence for their identity is clear; as even so early a scholar as Jerome perceived (Onom. Sacr. ed. Lagarde, 146). This matter as well as the questions of the position of Sinai-Ḥoreb (as between Jebel Musa and Jebel Serbal and between the Sinaitic Peninsula as a whole and the E. coast of the Gulf of ‘Aḳabah or Mt Se‘îr or the neighbourhood of Ḳadesh) has already been exhaustively discussed in this series (Driver, Exod. pp. 18, 177–191). It is, therefore, unnecessary to say anything more here; except to recall that the question as between the Sinaitic Peninsula and some site farther N. appears to have been open in the time of the Crusades and of the Moslem geographers in the 14th century. Abu-l Fida c. 1321: ‘the position of Tur Sinâ is the subject of discussion. Some say it is the mountain near Ailah (at the head of the Gulf of ‘Aḳabah) and others that it is a mountain in Syria’ (quoted by G. le Strange, Palestine under the Moslems, 72 f.). The Chronicle d’Ernoui et Bernard le Trésorier says, ‘Cel Mons Synai est entre le Mer Rouge et leCrac (Kerak).’ See further ZDPV xxxvii. 190 ff.
by the way of mount Seir] Se‘îr, the territory of Edom, lay W. as well as E. of the ([ Deu 1:44]; cp. C. Trumbull K. B. 84 ff.; Buhl, Gesch. der Edomiter, 22 ff.); but Mt Se‘îr is in Dt ([ Deu 2:1]) and elsewhere (e.g. [ Gen 14:6]) the range E. of the ‘Arabah. Thus the way of Mt Se‘îr would be the most easterly of the roads from the Sinai Peninsula to Ḳadesh, which passes through the ‘Arabah. Further see Dillm.
Kadesh-barnea] This form is peculiar to D, deuteronomic passages and P; elsewhere Ḳadesh stands alone: and we have besides ‘En-Mishpaṭ, Well of Judgement ([ Gen 14:7]), and Meribath-ḳadesh (see on [ Deu 33:2]). The accepted site, visited first by Seetzen in 1807, then by Rowlands in 1842 (Williams, Holy City, i. 464 ff.), and described and argued for by Trumbull (Kad. Barn.), is the neighbourhood of the ‘Ain Ḳudeis (Seetzen’s and Rowlands’ spelling, confirmed by Musil) about 80 km. S.S.W. of Be’er-sheba‘, but the name must have covered the still more fertile ‘Ain Ḳadeyrât and the ‘A. Ḳaseymeh. Musil, who visited ‘Ain Ḳudeis thrice, doubts its identity with Ḳadesh (Edom i. 212), and suggests a site farther N.; yet he admits there the most fertile landscapes in all the region, describes the wâdies as either cultivated or full of relics of ancient cultivation, and even reports one more fertile than the plain about Gaza. See also PEFQ, 1914, 64 ff.; ZDPV, 1914, 7 ff. Barnea‘ has been explained as ‘son’ or ‘desert, of wandering.’ But it may belong to the number of non-Semitic names found in this region (e.g. Gharandel). To a hill S.E. of ‘Ain Ḳudeis, there is still attached the name Forni, which appears to be an echo of Barnea‘: the letter ‘ayin is sometimes dropped in mod. Arabic.
The whole fragment, 1b and 2, thus obviously out of place where it stands, may have been originally a note to [ Deu 1:19], which its details, so far as they are clear, suit.
3. And it came to pass in the fortieth year, etc.] P alone of the Hex. documents dates by months and days (I. P. 58, 71); and its division of the year is not that which, beginning with the autumn, prevailed in early Israel, but the Babyl. division which began with the spring. The Babyl. system was first adopted by the Jews, not during the exile (as usually supposed, Marti, Enc. Bibl. ‘Year’), but, as we gather from Baruch’s narratives in the Bk of Jeremiah, during Manasseh’s reign, when the Assyrians imposed on Judah many of their institutions (Jerusalem, ii. 189 f.). Another mark of P is the term for eleventh used in the Hex. by P alone and elsewhere only by late writers. Wellh. (Hist. 384 f.) takes the verse as from the editor who incorporated D with P, but Driver, as the introd. to a summary narrative in P, and as followed immediately by [ Deu 32:48-52]; the self-same day there being the day specified here. On the date the 40th year and the different dating of JE and D see below on [ Deu 2:1-8].
the children of Israel] Another designation characteristic of P; D all Israel. See on [ Deu 1:1], [ Deu 4:44].
4. Sihon … and Og] See below on [ Deu 2:26-37], and [ Deu 3:1] ff.
at Edrei] LXX Syr. and Vulg. have and in Edrei, as if ‘Ôg reigned there as well as at ‘Ashteroth Ḳarnaim, but the Heb. indicating, though awkwardly, the scene of ‘Ôg’s defeat, is confirmed by the Sam.
A. Duet [ Deu 1:5] to [ Deu 4:40]. First Discourse and Introduction to the Law-Book
5. Special Title to the First Discourse of Moses
Usually taken as the continuation of the general title to the Book, 1a and 4, this appears rather—note the repetition of the datum beyond Jordan—to have been originally a special title to the following first discourse of Moses. Obviously written in W. Palestine.
5. in the land of Moab] So always in D as the place of this legislation, which P gives more exactly as the ‘Arboth-Moab, the sections of the ‘Arabah in Moabite territory, just N. of the Dead Sea (I.P. 209). Except for some doubtful cases in later writers Moab is always the name of the people, not of their land. See Enc. Bibl. art. ‘Moab.’ In [ Deu 3:29], [ Deu 4:46] the scene of the lawgiving is more exactly defined as in the gai or hollow over against Beth-pe‘or.
began] Heb. hô‘îl is stronger: undertook, or set himself to ([ Gen 18:27]), or was pleased to ([ 2Ki 5:23]; [ Hos 5:11]).
to declare] In the original sense of declare (Wright, Bible Word-Bk), make clear or distinct. The Heb. bç’çr, properly to dig or hew, is used of writing on stone ([ Deu 27:8]), or tablets ([ Hab 2:2]). Only here metaphorically, to explain or expound, as in post-Bibl. Heb., or to engrave in the mind of the people.
this law] Heb. this Tôrah, on the various meanings of the term see I.P. App. vi.; Driver, Exodus, 162, 165. In which of these it is to be taken here is disputed. Dillm., after stating that in D Tôrah is distinguished from Law proper, described as statutes and judgements, takes it here to mean instruction concerning law and justice. So Steuern. and Berth. But in the other 18 instances of the phrase this Tôrah in D) it is used of the deuteronomic code and indeed in [ Deu 4:8] is parallel to statutes and judgements. We may take it in the same sense here (so Driver), equivalent indeed to no mere catalogue of laws, but to laws with notes, exhortations, precedents and reminiscences. If that be the meaning of Tôrah in this title, it proves that the discourse to which the title is attached, [ Deu 1:6] to [ Deu 4:40], was originally designed as an introduction to the code [ Deu 1:12-26]. But the terms of the title are more suitable to [ Deu 1:5] ff. in which discourse the actual exposition of the Law begins. See further on [ Deu 4:44-49].
6–8. The Command to start from Ḥoreb for the Land
Jehovah spake: In Ḥoreb ye have dwelt enough (6); break up and march to the Mt of the Amorites and the parts adjacent as far as the Euphrates (7); I have set the land before you, enter and possess as Jehovah sware to the fathers to give it to them and their seed (8).—JE, [ Exo 33:1] ff., narrates the order to depart to the land promised by oath to the fathers; the promise of an angel to drive out the six nations possessing it (probably a gloss, see Driver ib.): Jehovah’s refusal to go with them; and His consent after an argument by Moses (also held by some to be editorial); and adds, [ Num 10:29-32] (J), Moses’ appeal to Ḥobab to act as eyes1[109] to the host. The terms of the command differ from those in D. P, in harmony with its account of the procedure on the march ([ Num 9:15-22]), gives the signal of departure from Ḥoreb as the lifting of the cloud above the Tabernacle, and dates it the 20th day of the 2nd month of the 2nd year ([ Num 10:11]). The contrast between the spoken command in JE and D, and the physical signal in P, is characteristic; note also the characteristically exact date in P.
[109] The same term, ‘uyûn is given to the scouts of Arab expeditions who seek out the ways, water and camping-places: Musil, Araóia Petraea, Ethn. Ber. iii. 376.
[ Deu 1:6]. The Lord our God] Heb. Jehovah, our God: contrary to the usual syntax (cp. the parallel in JE, [ Exo 33:1]), this divine name is placed emphatically at the beginning of the sentence, as the proper start and motive of the whole discourse: for this form and its variants thy God and your God are characteristic of the style of D. J. our God, 23 times in D always from Moses to his fellow Israelites with the intimate accent of a common affection, and only 7 times in the rest of the Pent.; J. thy God, addressed to Israel 230 times in D, and only 9 times in JE (of which five are in additions to the Decalogue, [ Exo 20:2-12], and at least two in verses with other marks of the deuteronomic style), and only once in P ([ Lev 21:8]), though P has seven instances of somewhat variant forms; J. your God, 46 times in D, while in JE only in Pharaoh’s speeches to Israel, but in P over 30 times, attached to priestly institutions and laws. The enormous predominance of these titles in D is significant of the ardent, confident religion of the Book. We seem to touch in them the heart of the writers. Nor can we forget the echo of their wonderful repetition in the hearts of the Jewish and Christian Churches. Probably no phrases in the O.T. have been more helpful to piety in all generations. See further introd. to ch. 28
Horeb] Above, [ Deu 1:2].
Ye have dwelt long enough in this mountain] Heb. the stay in this Mt is much, i.e. enough, for you: the same idiom in [ Deu 2:3], [ Deu 3:26], also in P, [ Num 16:3]; [ Num 16:7].
7. turn you, and take your journey] Heb. turn you or face, and break up camp, or move on. The first of these two verbs employed with a verb of motion is used only in D (and the editorial [ Num 14:25]) of fresh starts of the whole people on their journey through the wilderness; as here, [ Deu 1:40], [ Deu 2:1], or with other verbs. In JE, where used with verbs of motion, it is of individuals only; while in P it has another meaning, to look towards. On the second verb see below, [ Deu 1:19].
hill country of the Amorites] Heb. Mount of the Amorite: as at the present day in Arabic, the singular mount is applied to a mountain-range. The range of Pal. W. of Jordan is meant, but especially its S. end (cp. [ Deu 1:20]). The name appears very early, for Kings of the 1st Dynasty in Babylon call themselves Kings of Amurru: a name which inscriptions found at Boghaz-Keui (Mitt. d. deutsch. Orient. Gesellschaft, Dec. 1907, 23 f.), prove to have extended to the Euphrates; but which the Tell-el-Amarna letters (about 1400 b.c.) confine to the hinterland of Phoenicia, in the N. of Palestine. Amorite, in D as in E, is the general name for all the tribes dispossessed by Israel; J has Canaanite. Winckler explains this from the origin of E in N. Israel where the Amorites had been in force; while J, writing in Judah where Israel had not fought the Amorites, knew nothing of them but assigned the whole land to the Canaanites, whose civilisation had been paramount on the coast at the time of Israel’s entry and who continued to form an antithesis to Israel (Gesch. Isr. i. 53). If this argument were sound, then D’s extension of the name Amorite to the S. of W. Palestine would be artificial. But Winckler himself recognises the ancient character of the tradition which calls Sîḥôn an Amorite (op. cit. p. 52), and if the Amorites had penetrated to Moab, they had also, it is probable, extended their sovereignty as far S. on the W. of the Jordan.
and unto all … nigh thereunto] Heb. unto all its neighbours: the Arabah, i.e. N. of the Dead Sea (see on [ Deu 1:1]); the hill-country, such of the W. range as was not included under the Mt of the Amorite; the lowland, Heb. the Shephelah, the low or foot-hills between the range and the maritime plain (HGHL. 201 ff.); the South, Heb. the Negeb, the region to the S. of the range, which descends into the Negeb about Be’er-Sheba‘; the sea-shore, the maritime plain between the Shephelah and the Mediterranean, further defined as the land of the Canaanites, the deuteronomic writers limiting the Canaanites to the level ‘Arabah and the maritime plain, just as the Tell-el-Amarna letters call the coast land Kinaḥi = Kena‘an (so rightly Driver, while Dillm. and Steuern. take the phrase as covering all the land already defined); and Lebanon added to complete the land, cp. [ Deu 11:24], [ Jos 1:4]; as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, the ideal but never the actual limit of Israel’s territory, cf. [ Deu 11:24]. Lists of the divisions of the Promised Land similar to this occur in (probably editorial) passages of the Book of Jos.:—[ Jos 9:1], [ Jos 10:40], [ Jos 11:2]; [ Jos 11:16], [ Jos 12:8].
8. Behold] Sg. but even if this reading be correct (Sam. and LXX read Pl.) it is meant as an interjection and is no proof of a change to the Sg. address, cp. [ Deu 4:5].
I have set … before you] Heb. given before you, given up to you; in this sense both of land and foe; eleven times in D, and not elsewhere in Heb.; in D nearly always with Sg.
which the Lord sware] As the Lord Himself is the speaker, we ought perhaps to read with LXX and Sam. which I sware. Yet their reading may be a correction of the original, which in that case would be a symptom of the carelessness of the writer in not sustaining the situation he assumed. The anthropomorphism, imputing an oath to the Deity, is found in JE ([ Gen 22:16]), especially in the phrases, sware unto Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ([ Gen 50:24]; [ Exo 32:13]; [ Exo 33:1]); to Abraham thy father ([ Gen 26:3]); to thy fathers or to them ([ Num 11:12]; [ Num 14:16]; [ Num 14:23]); thee and thy fathers ([ Exo 13:11]). Used in D of special oaths ([ Deu 1:34], [ Deu 2:14], [ Deu 4:21]); of the covenant ([ Deu 4:31]); or as here of the land which he sware unto thy, your, or our fathers, 22 or 23 times.
9. at that time] As the syntax implies this means when or after the command was given to depart from Ḥoreb; while in Ex. the institution of colleagues for Moses, E, [ Exo 18:12] ff., conies before Israel’s arrival there. This difference of date is either due to D’s move distant perspective (Introd. § 11); or as Dillm. suggests (also Bacon JBS xii. 24) the author of D found the passage in JE placed beside our [ Num 10:29-36]. See further Dri. Exod. p. 162. The discrepancy is of no importance. The other difference, the absence from D of Jethro’s initiative as related in JE, may be due to the summary nature of its review (Dillm.); yet the possibility of intentional omission cannot be excluded in view of the prevalent confinement of the interest in D to Israel alone. Berth. (p. 4) relevantly points to the omission from D of all reference to Balaam. The formula, at that time, is curiously enough found only in Pl. passages [ Deu 1:9]; [ Deu 1:16]; [ Deu 1:18]; [ Deu 2:34]; [ Deu 3:4]; [ Deu 3:8]; [ Deu 3:12]; [ Deu 3:18]; [ Deu 3:21]; [ Deu 3:23]; [ Deu 4:14]; [ Deu 5:5]; [ Deu 9:20]; [ Deu 10:1]; [ Deu 10:8].
I am not able to bear you myself alone] More fully in E, [ Num 11:14], I am not able, I myself alone, to bear all this people, for it is too heavy for me; similarly E, [ Exo 18:18] (Jethro to Moses), the thing is too heavy for thee, thou art not able to do it alone.
10. the Lord your God] See on [ Deu 1:6].
as the stars in heaven] So [ Deu 10:22]; [ Deu 28:62]; and [ Gen 22:17]; [ Gen 26:4]; [ Exo 32:13], in contexts that otherwise betray the editorial hand. It is one of the many hyperboles in D and is not found in the parallel E, Exodus 18.
11. This verse is even more characteristic of the deuteronomic style. The Lord, the God of your fathers occurs indeed twice in JE; but either thus or with variants seven times in D. As he promised, Heb. spake, to you occurs in D 14 or 15 times.
12. How] This emphatic Heb. form is found in the Pent. only here, [ Deu 7:17], [ Deu 12:30], [ Deu 18:21], ([ Deu 32:30]).
can I myself alone bear] See on [ Deu 1:9].
your cumbrance, and your burden, and your strife] Better the weight, the burden, and the strife of you. Weight cp. [ Isa 1:14], they are a weight upon me, I am weary of bearing. Is the use of the word here an echo of Isaiah? The Heb. ṭoraḥ is not found elsewhere in the O. T. Burden or carriage, cp. J, [ Num 11:11], the burden of all this people upon me, and 17. Strife; the Heb. rîb is used in JE of quarrels about wells and other physical struggles; but also of law-disputes, and of Israel’s contentiousness with Moses and God (E, [ Exo 17:2]; [ Exo 17:7]; J, [ Num 20:3]; P, [ Num 20:13]; and in the Song, [ Deu 33:8]). In D four times for law-pleas. Here it is either the people’s litigiousness among themselves or their frequent contentions with Moses and God.
13. Take you] Heb. Give yourselves: [ Jos 18:4]. The people themselves are to elect as in [ Deu 16:18], consistently with the emphasis, so frequent in D, on the judicial responsibilities of the whole people. In E, [ Exo 18:25] (cp. [ Num 11:16]), Moses chooses.
wise men, and understanding, and known] With the LXX some take the last term as synonymous with the others; either reading as in the Heb. the pass. part. experienced, or the act. Part. knowing. The pass. part. is perhaps the better, but as meaning known: men reputed for their judicial gifts, as among the Arabs to-day. While here the emphasis is laid on intellectual gifts, which, however, in D always include the moral; E, [ Exo 18:21], more definitely expresses the latter: men of power (Dri. capable, worthy), fearing God, men of troth, hating unjust gain.
according to your tribes] E, [ Exo 18:21]; [ Exo 18:25]: out of, all the people, all Israel. E and D use shebet for tribe, but P’s usual term is maṭṭah.
make them heads over you] Rather, set them as your chiefs.
15. the heads of your tribes] LXX, from you, either represents the original Heb. reading or is the Gk translator’s emendation of a difficult text. On the ground that the present Heb. reading conflicts with [ Deu 1:13] and is meaningless in relation to the rest of this verse (it being unlikely that Moses would say, that he took heads of tribes to make them heads over you), some would delete the words. But the verse, though awkward, may mean that Moses took those elected within the various tribes ([ Deu 1:13]) and made them chiefs with judicial functions in the new national organisation which he now instituted: so in E, [ Exo 18:25], he set them chiefs over the people, as a whole.
captains of thousands, hundreds, fifties, tens] Captains, Heb. sarîm. So E, [ Exo 18:21]; [ Exo 18:25]. But neither there nor here is the meaning clear. Under the monarchy there were military sarîm of thousands, hundreds, and fifties ([ 1Sa 8:12]; [ 1Sa 17:18]; [ 2Sa 18:1]; [ 2Ki 1:9] ff; [ 2Ki 11:4]; [ Isa 3:3]); that no sarîm of tens are mentioned does not imply that they did not exist, for the notices of the others are incidental. Did such military sarîm already exist in the time of Israel’s wanderings, and is it meant, here and in Exodus 18, that the popularly elected heads took such military titles on their appointment? Or were these military ranks first instituted under the monarchy, when an organised national army took the place of the old tribal levies, and have the writers of E and D (cp. P, [ Num 31:14]; [ Num 31:28]) merely reflected this institution of their own times back on the period of the wandering? Or are we to hold with Steuernagel that although [ Exo 18:13-26] deals throughout with the institution of judges this deuteronomic review, [ Deu 1:9-15], narrates the appointment not of judges but of military and administrative officers and that we reach the judges only in [ Deu 1:16], where their title first occurs and where a new paragraph is indicated by the recurrence of the formula, and at that time? In support of his view, Steuernagel alleges that only intellectual qualities are required for the officers dealt with in [ Deu 1:9-15], while in [ Exo 18:13] ff., where judges are intended throughout, the requirements are moral. But this point we have already answered above on [ Deu 1:13]. Further Steuernagel’s explanation neither solves the difficulty in [ Exo 18:13] ff. (E) where the equation of military titles with the judicial posts is certain; nor meets the fact that this deuteronomic review is based on [ Exo 18:13] ff., and if it had meant to differ from the latter on so substantial a point it would certainly have indicated the difference explicitly. None of the explanations is satisfactory. The evidence that even under Moses the tribal institutions were welded into a national organisation is frequent and probable; and that main fact may be held, even if we allow, as equally probable, that E and D reflected back upon it the military titles of their own day.
and officers] Heb. shôṭerîm, with the original meaning either of rangers, organisers (so Dri. after Nöldeke, citing Ar. saṭara ‘to rule’ a book, ‘write,’ and saṭr ‘line’ or ‘row,’ cp. Heb. mishṭar, [ Job 38:33]), or of writers (Ass. shatâru ‘write’). Both meanings are attached to the name in the O.T. In [ Deu 20:5]; [ Deu 20:8] f., as in E, [ Jos 1:10]; [ Jos 3:2], shôṭerîm are army officers who pass on the general orders through the ranks; cp. J, [ Exo 5:6], etc., native officers of Israel under Pharaoh’s taskmasters. But here, as in [ Deu 16:18], they are associated with judges, [ Deu 29:10], with elders exercising judicial functions: cp. deuteron., [ Jos 8:33]; [ Jos 23:2]; [ Jos 24:1]; and E, [ Num 11:16]; [ Pro 6:7]. Sam. has here scribes; LXX γραμματοεισαγωγεῖς. They were either the secretaries or professional assessors of the lay judges.
according to your tribes] So Heb. and Sam.; LXX τοῖς κριταῖς ὑμῶν, to your judges, which Berth. emends to judge you.
16. judges] Unless the previous emendation be accepted the term judges appears here for the first time in the passage.
Hear … and judge righteously] The two indispensables: patient, equal hearing, and impartial decision.
your brethren] Your fellow-Israelites.
the stranger that is with him] His Gêr or sojourner: any non-Israelite who leaving his own kin settles under the protection of an Israelite family or individual; in distinction from the ‘ezraḥ or born Israelite ([ Jos 8:33]). The Ar. equivalents are ǧar and ṣarîḥ. See W. R. Smith, OTJC2, 342n., and Rel. Sem. 75 ff. In E the Gêr is not to be wronged, [ Exo 22:21]; [ Exo 23:9], and to have rest on the Sabbath, [ Exo 23:12]; cp. [ Exo 20:8]. In D his equal rights at law are reiterated here, [ Deu 24:17], [ Deu 27:19]; not to be oppressed, [ Deu 24:14], but cherished, [ Deu 10:19]; to share with the Levite and the poor, [ Deu 14:29], [ Deu 16:11-14], [ Deu 24:19] ff., [ Deu 26:11] ff.; to rest on the Sabbath, [ Deu 5:14]; enter the covenant, [ Deu 29:11]; and keep the Law, [ Deu 31:12]; only he is to have freedom in meats forbidden to Israel, [ Deu 14:21]; if Israel persists in sin the Gêr shall rise over him, Deut 18:43. See on [ Deu 10:19] and [ Deu 14:21] where the different treatment of the Gêr in P is noted.
17. respect persons) Heb. recognise or regard, pay undue attention to, faces or presences, whence our idiom ‘respect of persons’ in a bad sense. In Pent. only here and [ Deu 16:19]. A Heb. synonym is to lift the face or person, [ Deu 10:17], LXX, θαυμάζει πρόσωπον, N.T. πρόσωπον λαμβάνειν, to accept the person of, [ Gal 2:6]; [ Luk 20:21]. The command not to respect persons is next explained as hearing alike, or equally, small and great, not fearing (a poetical term, in prose only here, [ Deu 18:22], [ Num 22:3], E, and [ 1Sa 18:15]), the face of any man. Cp. [ Deu 16:19], not to wrest judgement, nor respect persons, nor take bribes. ‘Justice is administered … immaculate, unspotted, and unsuspected. There is no human being whose smile or favour can start the pulse of an English judge upon the Bench, or move by one hair’s breadth the even equipoise of the scales of justice,’ Lord Bowen’s Life, 175 f. In [ Exo 23:3] (JE) the phrase is neither shall thou favour (lit. adorn).
for the judgement is God’s] In early Israel as among the nomad Arabs to-day, there was a final appeal from the tribal or local judge to some immediate representative of the Deity; with the Arabs the greater awe of this religious appeal brings out the truth distorted or veiled before the inferior tribunal. But Moses would have the lower judges feel that they also are God’s representatives: at every stage judgement is His. This emphasis is not given in E except in connection with the decrees of Moses himself, [ Exo 18:15] f. The expression of it here is an instance of the more thorough penetration of religion in D to every department of the national life.
the cause that is too hard for you] E, [ Exo 18:26]. In [ Deu 17:8] the same is expressed differently; and from [ Deu 19:16] ff. we see that the hardness of a case might arise from the character of the evidence, as well as from the principle involved in it.
18. And I commanded you] A summary reference to all the instructions given at Ḥoreb: cp. E, [ Exo 18:20]; [ Exo 24:3]; [ Exo 24:7] etc.
19. From Ḥoreb to Ḳadesh-Barnea‘
A very brief account, indicating only the beginning and the end of the march, with the character of the wilderness between, and the further goal, the Mt of the Amorite: but it is possible that [ Deu 1:1] b, 2 (q.v.) were originally an addition or note to this.—The account of this march in JE, [ Num 10:33] to [ Num 21:16], includes the start from the Mt of Jehovah, the formulas recited on the lifting and the resting of the Ark, the disaffection of the people on the lack of flesh, the institution of 70 elders, the grant of flesh and its fatality, the presumptuousness of Miriam and Aaron, the encampment in the wilderness of Paran. Three stages are named, Tab‘erah, [ Num 11:3], Ḳibroth Ḥaṭṭa’avah and Ḥaṣeroth, [ Num 11:35]: the first two also in [ Num 9:22]. P dates the start from Sinai on the 20th of the 2nd month of the 2nd year, states that the guiding cloud settled in the wilderness of Paran, and adds the order of the host, [ Num 10:11-28].
[ Deu 1:19]. And we journeyed] Rather broke up or set out, A.V. departed. Heb. nasa‘ was originally to pull up the tent-pegs, break camp, but came to cover the journey that ensued, to march by stages ([ Gen 12:19]; [ Gen 35:21]). That the earlier meaning is intended here is clear from the following verb.
that great and terrible wilderness] [ Deu 8:15]. This was much the most desolate tract of the wilderness crossed by Israel. See Palmer on the Desert of el-Tih (Desert of the Exodus), 284–288, and Musil, Edom.
Kadesh-barnea] See above on [ Deu 1:2].
20. Ye are come unto the hill-country of the Amorites] See on [ Deu 1:7]. If Ḳadesh be ‘Ain Ḳudeis, the Negeb still lay between Israel and the Mt of the Amorite as J, [ Num 13:17] b, 22, correctly notices. The omission here is due to the summary character of the review, and has no bearing on the position of Ḳadesh.
giveth] Heb. giving with the force of is about to give: followed by ground or land, it forms a phrase peculiar to D. See on [ Deu 1:8].
21. Behold, the Lord thy God, etc.] The first of the passages, scattered throughout this discourse, in the Sg. form of address. The LXX has indeed the Pl. but apparently in order to harmonise with the context; the Sg. is confirmed by the Sam. Moreover the expression fear thou not neither be dismayed (al-tîra’ We’al teḥath) is always found with the Sg. address, while the Pl. has for the same idea dread ye not neither fear ye (lo-ta‘arsûn welô-tîrûn), e.g. [ Deu 1:29], [ Deu 31:6]. Further the contents of the verse, though not otherwise exhibiting marks of separate-ness from the context, are not indispensable as a connection between [ Deu 1:20]; [ Deu 1:22]. It is probable, therefore, that the verse is a later insertion, to make that connection clearer and more exact.
22. And ye came near unto me … and said] The proposal to send spies is here attributed to the people, Moses consenting (see next verse). In P, [ Num 13:1] f., it is a divine command. There is no discrepancy of fact; but the difference of standpoint in describing the fact is instructive, and ought to be noticed along with other instances in D of the people’s initiative. JE has nothing on the origin of the mission of the spies; but the beginning of its narrative of the episode is broken (see above). This is one of four facts given in D of which no notice is found in JE; the other three are also given in P: (1) that the spies were twelve, [ Deu 1:23]; [ Num 13:2]; (2) that those who went down to Egypt with Jacob were seventy, [ Deu 10:22]; [ Gen 46:27]; [ Exo 1:5]; (3) that the ark was of acacia wood, [ Deu 10:3]; [ Exo 25:10]. See Introd. § 3.
that they may search] Heb. ḥaphar, lit. to dig; to explore, only here and [ Jos 2:2] f.; JE has see and P uses the verb tûr, to go about, travel either for spying or for trading.
the land] JE, [ Num 13:18] ff.; land and people; P, [ Num 13:2] land of Canaan.
the way … and the cities] J, [ Num 13:19], what cities they dwell in, whether in camps or strongholds.
23. and I took twelve men of you] So P, [ Num 13:2-16], adding their names. JE does not give their number but may originally have done so; see on [ Deu 1:22].
tribe] Heb. shebeṭ; see on [ Deu 1:13].
24. and they turned] See on [ Deu 1:7].
the mountain] The Mt of the Amorite: see on [ Deu 1:7]. So JE, [ Num 13:17], but it adds through the Negeb; see on [ Deu 1:20].
the valley of Eshcol] LXX φάραγξ βότρυος, ‘ravine of the cluster’; but Heb. naḥal is the Ar. wâdy, a valley with a winter-stream, Gk χειμάῤῥοος, Ital. fiumara. Heb. ’eshkôl is the Ar. ’ithkâl (weakened from ‘ithkâl with initial ‘ayin), a cluster of dates or palm-branch with clusters, and means a cluster of dates, [ Son 7:8], or of grapes as here (dates not ripening so high as Ḥebron). As a place-name Eshkôl occurs elsewhere only in P, [ Num 32:9]; but in [ Gen 14:13]; [ Gen 14:24] as the name of a person, the brother of Mamre the Ạmorite at Ḥebron. The neighbourhood of Ḥebron is fertile with numerous springs, and the vine flourishes there. Baedeker (5th ed. 134) reports to the N.W. a Wâdy Iskâhil. While JE and D take the spies no further than Ḥebron, P, [ Num 13:2]; [ Num 13:17]; [ Num 13:21]; [ Num 13:25], describes them as exploring the whole land, from the wilderness of Ṣin to Reḥob, the entry to Ḥamath, and as taking 40 days.
25. And they took of the fruit of the land in their hands] Summary of E, [ Num 13:23]; [ Num 13:26] b; a branch with one cluster (eshkol) of grapes … pomegranates and figs … and showed them the fruit of the land.
a good land] J, [ Num 13:27] f., surely it flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit; but the people are strong, the cities fenced and great, etc. P, [ Num 13:32]: they brought up an evil report of the land … a land that eateth up its inhabitants. Yet later, [ Num 14:7], P ascribes a good report to Joshua and Kaleb.
26–33. The Disaffection of the People
Israel defied the command to go up ([ Deu 1:26]), murmuring that in hate God had brought them from Egypt, to be destroyed by the Amorite ([ Deu 1:27]). quoting the spies that the people of the land were taller with fenced cities, and the ‘Anakim were there ([ Deu 1:28]). Moses exhorted them not to fear, Jehovah would fight for them ([ Deu 1:29] ff.). But they persisted in unbelief ([ Deu 1:32]), though God had never failed to guide them ([ Deu 1:33]).—In the parallel account which is compiled from JE and P the few J E fragments, [ Num 13:30] f., [ Num 13:33], [ Deu 14:1] b, [ Deu 14:3] f., [ Deu 14:8-9] b, imply the people’s disquietude at the spies’ report and state that Caleb quieted them, but the other spies contradicted, affirming that the giant ‘Anakim (J), the Nephîlim (E), were in the land. The people wept, Why doth Jehovah bring us to this land to fall by the sword? were it not better to return to Egypt under another captain? Someone (Caleb?) exhorted them not to fear, Jehovah is with us.—P, [ Num 13:32]; [ Num 14:1] a, [ Num 14:2]; [ Num 14:5]; [ Num 14:9] a, [ Num 14:10] a, states that on the evil report of the spies, that the land was hungry and the men of great stature, the congregation murmured (a different term from that in the deuteronomic review) against Moses and Aaron. Would God we had died in the wilderness! Moses and Aaron fell prostrate, while Joshua and Caleb rent their clothes and affirmed the land to be exceeding good. But the congregation bade stone them.
Thus all three accounts agree on the main facts: (1) that the spies were divided in reporting (any variations as to this are merely of emphasis), (2) that the people refused to go up from fear of the taller peoples of the land; (3) that they murmured against God (so even P, [ Num 14:27]), (4) that they were exhorted to faith, and still disbelieved. The differences are—JE mentions only Caleb as urgent to go on, P Caleb and Joshua, the deuteronomic review neither, though the writer had those in mind as appears from the next section; JE reports the proposal to return to Egypt, P only a wish to die in the desert; P alone mentions the proposal of stoning.—Each writer, as elsewhere, uses his own style, our passage being full of characteristic deuteronomic phrases. But its main distinction is its religious spirit. Summarising the JE narrative, with a few verbal coincidences, it finely indicates the moral character of the people’s disaffection—opposing to their fears founded on a few men’s reports their own long and indubitable experience of their God’s unfailing providence.
[ Deu 1:26]. ye would not] A phrase found seven times in D against three in the rest of the Pent.
rebelled, etc.] Web. defied the month of: another deuteronomic phrase.
27. and ye murmured] Heb. ragan, not elsewhere in Pent. P uses a different verb.
in your tents] Transposing two consonants Geiger reads against your God. This change is unnecessary. Discontent with a report, originally suggested by the people themselves, and discontent that shaped itself (according to JE) to the demand for another leader, would at first be uttered in private.
Because the Lord hated us] To this extreme of unbelief and ingratitude were the people driven by the report of a few among themselves, in spite of their long experience of God’s leading. The passage is eloquent of the fickleness with which a people will suffer the lessons of its past—facts of Providence it has proved and lived upon—to be overthrown by the opinion of a few ‘experts’ as to a still untried situation! To which the answer is memorable—Be the facts as the ‘experts’ assert, do ye try the situation and prove that God will be with you there as He has been with you before.
to deliver us into the hand of] A phrase frequent in D: 9 times, + 10 in deuteronomic passages in Jos., against 5 times in JE.
the Amorites] See on [ Deu 1:7].
to destroy us] Another phrase so characteristic of D that in its active and pass. forms it occurs 28 times in the Bk + 5 in deuteronomic passages in Jos. against 4 or 5 times in all the rest of the Hexateuch.
28. Whither are we going up?] That is, to what kind of a land or a fate? In the Hex. the Heb. prep is used only of place by JE and D, only of time by P.
made our heart to melt] In the Hex. the phrase either thus or with the intrans. form of the verb is found only here, [ Deu 20:8], and in the deuteronomic [ Jos 2:11]; [ Jos 5:1].
greater and taller] Sam. and LXX greater and more numerous, J, [ Num 13:28]; [ Num 13:31], strong … stronger than we; E id. 33, we were in our own sight as grasshoppers; P, id. 32, men of great stature.
cities] So Sam.; LXX and cities.
great and fenced up to heaven] So [ Deu 9:1]; J, [ Num 13:28], fenced, very great. The presumably pre-Israelite walls of two cities have been excavated: Lachish (Bliss, A Mound of Many Cities, 27 ff.) and Gezer (Macalister, Bible Side Lights from … Gezer, 141 ff.). Each is about 14 ft thick; the latter (a little later than 1450 b.c.) still in parts from 10 to 14 ft. high ‘can hardly be regarded as much more than the underground foundations.’ If, as is usually reckoned, the thickness was from ⅓ to ⅔ of the height this wall was from 21 to 42 ft, its impressive-ness increased by the scarps and slopes from which it rose and by the towers that crowned it. Sellin has laid bare in Jericho a ‘cyclopean’ outer stone wall 5 m. (16.4 ft), crowned by a brick wall 2 m. thick and 6 or 8 m. (19½ to 26¼ ft) high. So that up to heaven, the height at which birds fly, is hardly an exaggeration.
Emerging from the desert, Israel were startled by two facts which still startle the tent-dwelling nomads—the walls of cities and the stature of the settled inhabitants. No Arab enters without fear a walled city for the first time, nor willingly passes the night there. Egyptian bas-reliefs and paintings distinguish the ampler figures of settled Syrians from the lean and meagre desert Arabs. To-day, as the present writer has frequently noticed, the same difference of average stature is obvious between the two classes. Cp. Burton (Pilgrimage to Al-Medinah and Mecca, ii. 83, mem. ed.) on the short stature of the Arabs of the Hiǧaz. The cause of this is the difference in nutriment (Doughty, Ar. Des. passim, Musil, Ar. Petr. iii.). That early Israel felt these two impressions is one of many indications that they belonged to the nomad or Arab type of Semite. So far we are in the region of fact.
sons of the Anakim] Heb. without the art. as in [ Deu 9:2] a; but sons of the ‘A. [ Deu 2:11]; sons of ‘Anak, [ Deu 9:2] b; J, [ Num 13:28], children of (yelîdê, Scot. ‘bairns’) the ‘Anak; cp. 22, 33. Both forms in [ Jos 15:14]. The Ar. ‘anaḳa is ‘to overtop,’ ‘unḳ, ‘neck,’ and in plur. ‘outstanding men,’ a‘naḳ, ‘long-necked,’ ‘tall’ (‘anḳa, a mythical beast, Wellh. Reste, 158, 216). In [ Jos 15:13]; [ Jos 22:11] (P or edit.) ‘Anaḳ has become the name of the ancestor of the ‘Anaḳim (cp. LXX mother-city of the ‘A., which shows how the personification arose). The root still occurs in place names ‘Ain ‘Eneḳ, S. of Ma‘ân, and Jebel ‘Eneiḳ, S. of ‘Ain Ḳudeis, due perhaps to the shape of the ground. E, [ Num 13:33], has there we have seen the Nephilim (to which an edit. hand has added sons of ‘Anaḳ which come from the N.) who in [ Gen 6:4] are said to be sprung from the sons of God and daughters of men, mighty men (LXX giants) of old, men of renown. LXX also render N. Giants, and Nephîla was the Aram. name for Orion, Giant par excellence. A note, [ Deu 2:11] (below), connects the ‘Anaḳîm with another racial name, Repha’îm, of whom ‘Ôg, of the great sarcophagus, was one of the last, [ Deu 3:11]. R. is also the name in later Heb. literature for shades or ghosts of the dead, as if flaccid or powerless. Applied to an aboriginal race of giants (cp. the allied collective form The Raphah, [ 2Sa 21:16]) it may have meant either the exhausted and vanishing or the shadowy race, or perhaps limp and flaccid, in derision of the notorious flabbiness of monstrously tall men. LXX render R. by giants or Titans ([ Gen 14:5]; [ 2Sa 5:15], etc.).
Note on the Giants. The O.T. associates this vanishing race of giants with the neighbourhood of Hebron and the E. of Jordan, where structures of huge stones abound, and individual giants are said to have lived in the time of David. The latter notices are perfectly credible; single giants being then as possible as they have been at all other periods. The present writer saw in the asylum at Asfuriyeh a Syrian of unusual height, who was born with six fingers on each hand like the giant in [ 2Sa 21:20]. But the question of gigantic races in primitive ages vanishing before historic man must be judged in the light of the following. First, stories of such giant races are universal, e.g. among the Babylonians (Jeremias, Das A. T. im Lichte des alten Orients, 76, 120 f., 359), Phoenicians (Eusebius, Praep. Evang. i. 10 from Philo Bybl.), Greeks (the stories of Titans and Cyclopes), the nations of N. Europe, modern Arabs and Syrians (Thomson, Land and Book, 586 f.; Doughty, Ar. Des. i. 22). Second, many of these traditions are associated with remains of cyclopean masonry, and have obviously arisen in order to account for these, the giant races being nearly always described as builders; moreover the giants are generally derived by birth from the gods. Third, though stories have been current from time to time of the discovery of monstrous human skeletons and bones, e g. Plutarch, Pliny and even as late as Buffon, yet where it has been possible to test these the bones have been recognised as those of elephants, mastodons, etc.; while the discovered remains of pre-historic man show generally a stature under the average; this is also true of Mr Macalister’s finds of pre-Semitic remains in Gezer (the sole exception seems to be the average of the Cro-Magnon remains and this is only 5.839 feet). Fourth, the Hebrew tradition of a giant race exhibits the features already noted in such stories elsewhere: the race has disappeared, its memory is connected with cyclopean remains, it is said to have descended from the union of divine and human beings. These marks, along with the mythical names given to the race, Nephîlîm and Repha’îm, make it clear that, like its analogies among other peoples, Israel’s tradition of a primitive race of giants is borrowed from an imaginative folk-lore.
29. Dread not, neither be afraid] See on [ Deu 1:21]. [ Num 14:9] has only the second verb and in a less emphatic form. Neither be afraid (lo-ta‘arsûn) not elsewhere in prose. But see [ Deu 31:6].
30. who goeth before you] Heb. emphatically, the goer before you is He, found only in D as here or with slight differences, [ Deu 1:33], [ Deu 20:4], [ Deu 31:6]; [ Deu 31:8]; J, [ Exo 13:21], has the same part, without the def. art. adding the pillar of cloud and pillar of fire; E, [ Exo 14:19], the angel of God going before the camp. It is in such differences of style as well as of figure that the distinction of D consists. See Driver on [ Exo 13:21]; [ Exo 14:9].
he shall fight for you] Cp. JE, [ Exo 14:14], and these deuteronomic passages: [ Exo 14:25]: [ Deu 3:22]; [ Jos 10:14] b, [ Jos 10:42], [ Deu 23:3]; [ Deu 23:10].
before your eyes] LXX omit. Cp. [ Deu 4:6]; [ Deu 4:34], [ Deu 6:22], [ Deu 9:17], [ Deu 25:3]; [ Deu 25:9], [ Deu 28:31], [ Deu 29:1], [ Deu 31:7], [ Deu 34:12]; [ Jos 10:12]; [ Jos 24:17]. Here Moses insists that the people must prefer their experience of God to the reports of the spies about a situation not yet reached. See [ Deu 1:27].
31. the wilderness, where thou hast seen how that … thy God bare thee] The second of the Sg. passages in this discourse. If we omit it the rest of the verse in the Pl. address follows suitably on the initial conjunction: and in all the way ye went until ye came to this place. Possibly, therefore, the Sg. clause is a later insertion (so Stärk, Steuern., Berth.). Yet it may be argued that the author has himself naturally changed from Pl. to Sg. under the influence of the metaphor he uses; the nation being personified by the metaphor and therefore conceived in the Sg.
bare thee] Rather, hath borne thee. This figure for the Divine Providence is frequent in the O.T.; whether with the accompanying simile, as a man his son, [ Deu 1:44]; [ Deu 8:5]; cp. [ Hos 11:1] f.; or with another, on eagles’ wings, [ Deu 32:11]; [ Exo 19:4] (both JE); or with no addition, [ Hos 11:4]; [ Isa 46:4]; [ Isa 63:9]; or as implied in other words [ Deu 32:13], he made him to ride; [ Deu 33:27], underneath are the everlasting arms. Isaiah 46 contrasts the dead idols that need to be carried with the living God who carries His people. The same idea, that religion is not what we have to carry but what carries us, is enforced nowhere more finely than in D in which faith in God means buoyancy and progress, the experience of being lifted and forwarded.
unto this place] [ Deu 3:29], the valley over against Beth-Pe‘or. Cp. [ Deu 9:7], [ Deu 11:5], and with a different prepos. [ Deu 26:9], [ Deu 29:6].
32. Yet in this thing] Rather, in spite of this word, [ Deu 1:29-31].
ye did not believe] Heb. ye were not believing (participle), i.e. ye continued, or persisted, not to believe.
33. who went before you] See on [ Deu 1:30], and cp. [ Exo 13:21].
to seek you out a place] The same verb, tûr, which P uses for exploring; see on [ Deu 1:22]. This is the only instance of its use in D. Some, therefore, take the verse as a later gloss, which but repeats what is described in [ Deu 1:30] f. (yet repetition is a mark of D’s style), while the rest of the verse consists of variations of JE, [ Exo 13:21], [ Num 14:14]. For P’s additions to the close of this episode see above.
fire by night … cloud by day] See on [ Exo 13:21].
34. the voice of your words] So [ Deu 1:28] and not elsewhere.
34. and was wroth] Heb. wayyiḳṣoph, [ Deu 9:19] and twice in P, but not elsewhere of God in Pent. The causative form to provoke God only in [ Deu 9:7] f., Deu_9:32.
and sware] See on [ Deu 1:8].
35. of this evil generation] Omit of; the clause being in apposition to these men. It is not in the LXX and is generally taken as a later explanation that these men are not merely the spies but the whole adult generation (Dillm). Whether a gloss or not the explanation is correct.
the good land] JE, [ Num 14:23]; [ Exo 3:8], a good land; cp. [ Num 13:19], whether good or bad; P, [ Num 14:7], a very, very good land. Contrast the frequency of the phrase in D and deuteronomic passages, [ Deu 3:25], [ Deu 4:21] f., [ Deu 6:18], [ Deu 8:7]; [ Deu 8:10], [ Deu 9:6], [ Deu 11:17]; [ Jos 23:16]: a good soil, [ Jos 23:13]; [ Jos 23:15].
to give] Sam. and LXX omit.
36. save] Heb. zûlathî, in the Hex. only here, [ Deu 4:12] and [ Jos 11:13].
Caleb the son of Jephunneh] In the O. T. Kaleb—probably meaning dog (as from a tribal totem, W. R. Smith, Kinship, 200, 219), though other meanings have been suggested1[110]—is the name both of an individual and of a tribe, as among other Semites; Nabatean Kalba (Cooke, N. Sem. Inscr. 237); Arab. Kilâb (Wellh. Reste, 176 f., 217) and el-Kleib, a small tribe, (Musil, Ar. Petr. iii. 120 f.). In JE frequently Kaleb alone ([ Num 13:30]; [ Num 14:24]; [ Jos 15:14]; [ Jos 15:16] f.); those passages in JE in which he is called son of Yephunneh2[111] are usually regarded as editorial, but it would be rash to say that the name of his father was not already found in JE by the deuteronomists. In D and P Kaleb the son of Yephunneh ([ Num 13:6]; [ Num 14:6]; [ Num 32:12]; [ Num 34:19]). According to J, [ Jos 15:17] (= [ Jdg 1:13]) Kaleb was the brother of Ḳçnaz (the sons of Ḳçnaz were Edomite, [ Gen 36:11]; [ Gen 36:15]; [ Gen 36:42]) and is called the Kenizzite in secondary passages of JE, [ Jos 14:6]; [ Jos 14:13] f., which also explain along with [ Jos 15:13] how Joshua gave him Ḥebron in fulfilment of Moses’ promise to him. In David’s time the clan was still distinct from Judah or at least the memory of its original distinction was then preserved, [ 1Sa 30:14]. Yet according to P, [ Num 13:6]; [ Num 14:6]; [ Num 34:19], Kaleb the spy was already of the tribe of Judah, and so the tribe or its ancestor is reckoned by the genealogies, [ 1Ch 2:9], [ 1Ch 2:18] ff., [ 1Ch 2:42] ff., [ 1Ch 4:15]. This history of the name proves that the tradition held Kaleb the spy and Kaleb the ancestor of the tribe to have been the same. Yet it is possible that there was more than one possessor of so general a name; in connection with which, notice that neither in E, Numbers 13 f., nor in D is Kaleb described as a Kenizzite or indeed as anything but an Israelite.
[110] Sayce (Early Hist. of Hebr. 265) points out that in the Tell-el-Amarna letters awl later Assyr. despatches kalbu, ‘dog,’ is used of the king’s officers; but surely this is a term of humility; Hommel (Geogr. u. Gesch. d. alt. Orients) identifies Kaleb with Kalabu (Kalibu) ‘priests.’
[111] He (God?) is turned: cp. Palmyrene Ithpani, Cooke, p. 276.
to him will I give the land … and to his children] J E [ Num 14:24], his seed shall possess it.
that he hath trodden upon] JE, [ Num 14:24], whereinto he went. ‘D in harmony with its more elevated style uses the choicer and more expressive word, [ Deu 11:24] f.; [ Jos 1:3]; [ Jos 14:9]’ (Driver).
because] Heb. ya‘an asher, JE. in consequence of, ‘eḳeb.
hath wholly followed the Lord] Heb. hath fulfilled after Jehovah. Jehovah, being the speaker, we expect rather after me, as in [ Num 14:24]; and so doubtless it was originally here ’aḥarai, the last letter of which has been mistaken by a scribe for the initial of Jehovah. Sam. and LXX, after Jehovah.
Further Note to [ Deu 1:36-38]. Because Moses has just been described as seeking to turn the people from their sin, 29 ff., and it is therefore unreasonable to include him in their punishment; because [ Deu 1:37-38] needlessly anticipate [ Deu 3:26]; [ Deu 3:28] and [ Deu 4:21]; and because [ Deu 1:39] in whole or part follows suitably on [ Deu 1:36]; therefore [ Deu 1:37-38] are taken by many (Dillm., W. R. Smith, Steuern., Berth, etc.) as a later addition to the text. And indeed the beginning of [ Deu 1:39] shows that the original has been disturbed by an editorial hand (see below). Steuern. would also omit [ Deu 1:36] on the ground that Kaleb has not been previously mentioned in this survey. But Kaleb is mentioned in JE on which this survey otherwise depends. In whatever way these textual questions may be decided, the parallel passages [ Deu 3:26] ff. and [ Deu 4:21] confirm the fact of a D tradition or statement that Jehovah was angry with Moses for the people’s sake. This can only mean, their guilt was great enough to include the very leader who had done his best to dissuade them from their disaffection! Now neither JE nor P gives any hint of so remarkable a judgement. On the contrary, P accounts for the exclusion of Moses by his own sin in striking the rock at Ḳadesh 37 years after this disaffection of Israel, [ Num 21:10] ff; [ Num 27:13] f.; [ Deu 32:50] f. The most reasonable explanation of such discrepancies is that they are discrepancies not of fact but or opinion. The earliest tradition, JE, merely held the facts that Kaleb survived and that Moses died on the eve of the possession of the Promised Land. The problem, which arose from this contrast of fortune, the deuteronomic writers solved by the statement that Moses was included in the guilt of the people when, startled by the report of the spies, they refused to invade Canaan from the S. in the second year of the wandering; and this agrees with the deuteronomic principle of the ethical solidarity of Israel. But the later priestly writer or writers, under the influence of the idea, first emphasized in the time of Jeremiah and Ezekiel ([ Jer 31:29] f., Ezekiel 18), that every man died because of his own sin, found a solution for the problem in Moses’ own guilt in presumptuously striking the rock at Ḳadesh, 37 years later. In this double engagement, from two different standpoints, with so difficult a problem, note the strong evidence that the survival of Kaleb and the death of Moses before Israel’s entrance to the Land were regarded as irremoveable elements of the early tradition.
37. Also the Lord was angry with me for your sakes] The Heb. order is more emphatic, also with me was Jehovah angry—hith’annaph, peculiar in the Pent. to D, and to its passages in the Pl. address, here, [ Deu 4:21], [ Deu 9:8]; [ Deu 9:20]—for your sakes, bigelalekem. So in different terms [ Deu 3:26], was angry, yith‘abber, for your sakes, lema‘anekem; and [ Deu 4:21], hith’annaph and ’al dibrêkem.
Thou also shalt not go in thither] Heb. even thou or for thy part thou, etc.
Further Note to [ Deu 1:36-38]. Because Moses has just been described as seeking to turn the people from their sin, [ Deu 1:29] ff., and it is therefore unreasonable to include him in their punishment; because [ Deu 1:37-38] needlessly anticipate [ Deu 3:26]; [ Deu 3:28] and [ Deu 4:21]; and because [ Deu 1:39] in whole or part follows suitably on [ Deu 1:36]; therefore [ Deu 1:37-38] are taken by many (Dillm., W. R. Smith, Steuern., Berth, etc.) as a later addition to the text. And indeed the beginning of [ Deu 1:39] shows that the original has been disturbed by an editorial hand (see below). Steuern. would also omit [ Deu 1:36] on the ground that Kaleb has not been previously mentioned in this survey. But Kaleb is mentioned in JE on which this survey otherwise depends. In whatever way these textual questions may be decided, the parallel passages [ Deu 3:26] ff. and [ Deu 4:21] confirm the fact of a D tradition or statement that Jehovah was angry with Moses for the people’s sake. This can only mean, their guilt was great enough to include the very leader who had done his best to dissuade them from their disaffection! Now neither JE nor P gives any hint of so remarkable a judgement. On the contrary, P accounts for the exclusion of Moses by his own sin in striking the rock at Ḳadesh 37 years after this disaffection of Israel, [ Num 21:10] ff; [ Num 27:13] f.; [ Deu 32:50] f. The most reasonable explanation of such discrepancies is that they are discrepancies not of fact but or opinion. The earliest tradition, JE, merely held the facts that Kaleb survived and that Moses died on the eve of the possession of the Promised Land. The problem, which arose from this contrast of fortune, the deuteronomic writers solved by the statement that Moses was included in the guilt of the people when, startled by the report of the spies, they refused to invade Canaan from the S. in the second year of the wandering; and this agrees with the deuteronomic principle of the ethical solidarity of Israel. But the later priestly writer or writers, under the influence of the idea, first emphasized in the time of Jeremiah and Ezekiel ([ Jer 31:29] f., Ezekiel 18), that every man died because of his own sin, found a solution for the problem in Moses’ own guilt in presumptuously striking the rock at Ḳadesh, 37 years later. In this double engagement, from two different standpoints, with so difficult a problem, note the strong evidence that the survival of Kaleb and the death of Moses before Israel’s entrance to the Land were regarded as irremoveable elements of the early tradition.
38. Joshua the son of Nun] So [ Deu 3:28]; P, [ Num 27:18] ff.; not given in JE.
which standeth before thee] [ Deu 10:8]; so a servant stood before his lord, a courtier before his king, and the Levites before Jehovah. JE, [ Exo 24:13] f., the minister of Moses.
encourage thou him] lit. him make thou strong. The vb ḥizzeḳ, alone as here, or with the synonymous vb ’immeṣ [ Deu 3:28]; or in their intransitive forms [ Deu 31:6-7]; [ Deu 31:23]. Cp. [ Deu 11:8], [ Deu 12:23] (be firm).
cause … to inherit] characteristic of D: used of Joshua here, [ Deu 3:28], [ Deu 31:7]; [ Jos 1:6]; but of God 12 to, [ Deu 19:3]. Outside D only in [ Jer 3:18]; [ Jer 12:14]; [ Eze 46:18] and later writers. P uses another form of the vb, [ Num 34:29]; [ Jos 13:32]; [ Jos 14:1]; [ Jos 19:51].
Further Note to [ Deu 1:36-38]. Because Moses has just been described as seeking to turn the people from their sin, 29 ff., and it is therefore unreasonable to include him in their punishment; because [ Deu 1:37-38] needlessly anticipate [ Deu 3:26]; [ Deu 3:28] and [ Deu 4:21]; and because [ Deu 1:39] in whole or part follows suitably on [ Deu 1:36]; therefore [ Deu 1:37-38] are taken by many (Dillm., W. R. Smith, Steuern., Berth, etc.) as a later addition to the text. And indeed the beginning of [ Deu 1:39] shows that the original has been disturbed by an editorial hand (see below). Steuern. would also omit [ Deu 1:36] on the ground that Kaleb has not been previously mentioned in this survey. But Kaleb is mentioned in JE on which this survey otherwise depends. In whatever way these textual questions may be decided, the parallel passages [ Deu 3:26] ff. and [ Deu 4:21] confirm the fact of a D tradition or statement that Jehovah was angry with Moses for the people’s sake. This can only mean, their guilt was great enough to include the very leader who had done his best to dissuade them from their disaffection! Now neither JE nor P gives any hint of so remarkable a judgement. On the contrary, P accounts for the exclusion of Moses by his own sin in striking the rock at Ḳadesh 37 years after this disaffection of Israel, [ Num 21:10] ff; [ Num 27:13] f.; [ Deu 32:50] f. The most reasonable explanation of such discrepancies is that they are discrepancies not of fact but or opinion. The earliest tradition, JE, merely held the facts that Kaleb survived and that Moses died on the eve of the possession of the Promised Land. The problem, which arose from this contrast of fortune, the deuteronomic writers solved by the statement that Moses was included in the guilt of the people when, startled by the report of the spies, they refused to invade Canaan from the S. in the second year of the wandering; and this agrees with the deuteronomic principle of the ethical solidarity of Israel. But the later priestly writer or writers, under the influence of the idea, first emphasized in the time of Jeremiah and Ezekiel ([ Jer 31:29] f., Ezekiel 18), that every man died because of his own sin, found a solution for the problem in Moses’ own guilt in presumptuously striking the rock at Ḳadesh, 37 years later. In this double engagement, from two different standpoints, with so difficult a problem, note the strong evidence that the survival of Kaleb and the death of Moses before Israel’s entrance to the Land were regarded as irremoveable elements of the early tradition.
39. Moreover your little ones, which ye said should be a prey] Tautologous with the rest of the verse and wanting in the LXX; therefore probably an editorial addition from [ Num 14:31].
who this day have no knowledge of good or evil] Who are not of a responsible age, fixed by the more exact P at 20 years and over, [ Num 14:29]. Sam. omits.
40. turn … take your journey] See on [ Deu 1:7] and [ Deu 1:9].
by the way to the Red Sea] in the direction of; no definite road is meant. They are ordered back into the wilderness, when already on the verge of the good land.
41. We have sinned against the Lord] Sam. and LXX add our God: cp. JE, [ Num 14:40] b, we have sinned.
we will go up and fight] we, we Will go up, etc. We ourselves, the doomed generation, and not leave the advance to our children. JE, Behold us, we will go up.
and were forward to go up] deemed it a light thing to go up (R.V. marg.). The verb (tahînu) does not occur elsewhere in the O.T. and ancient translators gave it various meanings. In Ar. the same root is ‘to be slight’ or ‘light’ (see on [ Deu 1:43]); the causative Heb. form is best rendered made light of. This quick revulsion of popular feeling is true to life and admirably depicted. The change was too facile to be real. It is remarkable how alike Hosea and the authors of D are in their attitude to such ethical phenomena. As Hosea declares of his generation ([ Deu 1:15] ff.), so the generation of Moses does not appreciate how deep is its evil disposition; and, therefore, its repentance is futile. Mere enthusiasm is no atonement for guilt. Men cannot run away from their moral unworthiness on bursts of feeling. The next verse tells that God rejected the light-minded offer; and the truth underlies both verses that He did not do so arbitrarily. Lack of the sense of the seriousness of obedience, of the difficulty of doing God’s will, of the agony which Christ supremely felt, is as great a sin as the refusal to obey. Both are equally proof of unworthiness to work with God. He can do nothing with such shallow natures.
42. Say unto them, Go not up … for I am not among you] JE, [ Num 14:42]. See previous note.
lest ye be smitten, etc.] JE, [ Num 14:42].
43. rebelled] See on [ Deu 1:26].
and were presumptuous] Heb. boiled over, acted impulsively and with passion or rebelliously, [ Deu 17:2], [ Deu 18:20].
44. the Amorites] So D characteristically (see above on [ Deu 1:7]) names the peoples whom J, [ Num 14:45], calls Amalekites and Canaanites.
as bees do] Swarming in their multitudes; cp. [ Isa 7:18]; [ Psa 118:12]; Iliad, ii. 87 ff., ‘As when the tribes of thronging bees issue from some hollow rock.’
in Seir] Se‘îr, the frequent name of the territory of Edom, extended to the W. as well as to the E. of the ‘Arabah; and if that be here intended Israel’s defeat took place on Edomite soil; Sam. ‘in Gebala’ (Gebal being a late post-exilic name for the N. part of Edom’s territory on the E. of the ‘Arabah, [ Psa 83:8]: see ‘Land of Edom’ by the present writer in Expositor, seventh series, vol. vi. pp. 331, 515). LXX and other versions read from Se‘îr, which on such a reading would be a definite district in the N. whence Israel were driven southward to Ḥormah. And as Se‘îr, rough or shaggy, appears as the name of other localities than the land of Edom (cp. [ Jos 15:10]; [ Jdg 3:26]; Tell-el-Amarna Letters, Winckler’s ed. No. 181, line 26) it is possible that this is but another application of it to some place on the S. border of Palestine. But in that case one must not think of it as the plain of Seer, S.E. of Be’er-sheba‘, which Trumbull (K. B. 93) identifies with the Edomite Se‘îr (cf. Driver); for the spelling of that, first correctly given by J. Wilson (Lands of the Bible, i. 345) and. confirmed by Palmer (Des. of the Exod. ii. 404) and Musil (Edom, i. 9, etc.), as Sirr, is radically different from Se‘îr.
unto Hormah] Not now to be identified. Musil’s lists and maps discover no such place-name. The tradition of the origin of the name is double. According to JE, [ Num 21:3], it was so called because Israel devoted to the ḥerem or ban the Canaanites whom they defeated there; but in [ Jdg 1:17] because Judah and Simeon did the same upon their victory. The place lay in Judah in the Negeb on the border of Edom, [ Jos 12:14]; [ Jos 15:30]; cp. [ 1Sa 30:30]; but it was Simeon’s according to [ Jos 19:4], [ 1Ch 4:30]. In [ Jdg 1:17] the ancient name is given as Ṣephath; and es-Sbaita (Musil, Edom, ii. 37 ff.) has been suggested as its mod. equivalent, but the radicals of the name are not the same. The situation, however, is suitable; some 25 miles N.N.E. of ‘Ain-Ḳudeis.
45. nor gave ear] A poetic word used in the Hex. in prose only here and in the deuteronomic passage, [ Exo 15:26] (see Driver). The repentance of the people is not even yet satisfactory; see on 41.
46. So ye abode in Ḳadesh] So JE, [ Num 20:1] b, but apparently of a later residence than this.
many days, according unto the days that ye abode there] ‘An example of the “idem per idem” idiom often employed in the Semitic languages, when a writer is either unable or has no occasion to speak explicitly’ (Driver). Cp. [ Deu 9:25], [ Deu 29:16] [15]; [ 1Sa 23:13], etc.
If this verse be from the writer of the rest of this discourse the time implied cannot, in the light of his further statements in [ Deu 2:1]; [ Deu 2:14], amount to years; for the 2nd of the 40 years was already either wholly or nearly exhausted and these verses state that all the next 38 were spent between Ḳadesh and the Moabite frontier. But as we shall see in the introd. to the next section JE attributes to the people a very long residence in Ḳadesh, in fact the bulk of the 38 years. Probably, therefore, the indefinite statement of this verse is not from the writer of the rest of this discourse, but from an editor aware of the divergent traditions; in further evidence of which observe that he uses the simple Ḳadesh instead of the Ḳadesh-barnea‘ employed in the rest of the discourse.