05 March

Bible in 365 Days

Deuteronomy 17-20                    

Deuteronomy 17

Continuing the discourse commenced in the previous chapter, we find insistence on the fact that no false sacrifices must be offered and no false worshipers permitted to approach. For dealing with such, a method was minutely laid down. First there must be careful inquiry and for condemnation there must be three, or at the least two, witnesses. Where cases of peculiar difficulty arose they must be remitted to the priests and to the supreme judge, that is, to the religious and civil court.

Then followed a revelation of the threefold medium through which the government of God must be interpreted­ the king, the priest, and the prophet. In dealing with the king the words of Moses were those of prophetic foresight. He saw what would happen in the history of the people after they had come into the land. Therefore the principles of appointment were declared. The king must be chosen of God and be of the people's own nation. He was not to multiply horses, wives, silver, or gold. All these things were characteristic of the kings of the nations round about them, and it was provided that Israel's king must live a simpler life for the fulfillment of a higher ideal, Moreover, he must be a student and doer of the law.

This is a remarkable portrait of God's ideal of kingship. It would be an interesting exercise to measure the kings of men throughout history by this ideal. Such a procedure would inevitably issue in a twofold consciousness. First, we would find that the measure in which the kings of men have conformed to the ideal is the measure in which they have contributed to the strength of national life; and, on the contrary, the measure by which they have violated these principles has been the measure of the disaster resulting from their rule.

Deuteronomy 18

In dealing with the priest who was already found among the people by the appointment of God, the fact that he was to have no inheritance in the land was restated. Then a special provision was made for any priest whose heart drove him to some particular service. He also must be cared for by the people.

Finally, turning to the subject of the prophet, Moses enjoined the people to beware of the false and to know the true In dealing with the false prophets he described their methods. They would be the practice of secret things, of dealing with the spiritual forces of evil in a professed attempt to discover the will of God.

The true prophet was then promised and described. The description given is brief but graphic. He would be one of themselves, receiving the words of God and uttering them to the people. All the true prophets of God that followed fulfilled this ideal in measure. The proportion in which they spoke to the nation the will of God with authority was the proportion in which they did so.

As we study these words concerning king and priest and prophet, we inevitably realize that the perfect fulfillment in each case came ultimately with the coming of the Son of God. He was at once King of His brethren without inheritance in His own land; Priest, abiding in the service of God and ministered to by the people of God; Prophet of His brethren, speaking the word of God in all fulness and in all purity.

Deuteronomy 19

Still with his mind on the fact that the people were coming into the land, Moses made further applications of the laws to the new conditions. His words now had to do with life and land and truth and justice.

Cities of refuge were to be provided in order that in the administration of the law which safeguards human life there should be strict justice. The accidental killing of a man was not to be counted equal to premeditated murder. Deliberate killing was to be followed by the death penalty, the cities of refuge offering no harbor to the guilty.

The words concerning the land were brief but clear. No man was to remove an ancient landmark. The far­ reaching importance of this will be understood when it is remembered how absolutely man depends on the land for physical sustenance.

Truth as between man and man in all dealings must be maintained at all costs. Anything in the nature of false witness was to be severely punished.

The final words have in them a note of great severity as they sternly insist on the necessity for the strictest justice in all human interrelationships.

Deuteronomy 20

It is necessary to bear in mind that these people were being led into the land not merely to find a possession for themselves as an established nation, but first as the scourge of God against a corrupt and corrupting people. In view of this fact war was inevitable, and therefore particular instructions were now given for the people's guidance in war.

First, they were charged to keep before them the vision of God, which alone would enable them to be free from fear in the presence of the foe. Before they went into battle it was ordained that the priest should authoritatively announce the presence of the authority and power of God.

Then the army itself was to be sifted. Men whose hearts were for the time being set on other things, houses, or vineyards, or wives, were not to go into the fighting line. Moreover, those who failed to see the vision of God and therefore were faint­hearted were to be refused.

Before attacking far­distant cities, an offering of peace was to be made. Where there was submission, a certain measure of leniency was to follow. In the case of the cities which the Lord gave them as an inheritance, the war was to be one of extermination. The reasons for this already have been revealed.

In connection with these commands occurs one of those remarkable evidences of the divine attention to the smallest matters. No trees were to be cut down which were of value to the sustenance of the people.