1883 Haydock Douay Rheims Bible
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| Deuteronomy 32:1 | Hear, *O ye heavens, the things I speak, let the earth give ear to the words of my mouth. | Year of the World 2553, Year before Christ 1451. Speak. Hebrew and Septuagint, "Heaven attend, and I will speak." (Haydock) --- Never was there an exordium more pompous, or better adapted to the subject. Moses calls those who never die to witness what he asserts, as if to insinuate that these truths ought never to be forgotten. See Numbers 4:6. Virgil (Aeneid xii.) imitates this style, Esto nunc sol testis et haec mihi terra precanti, (Calmet) which he puts in the mouth of Aeneas, to whom Latinus replies, Haec eadem Aenea, terram, mare, sidera juro. |
| Deuteronomy 32:2 | Let my doctrine gather as the rain, let my speech distil as the dew, as a shower upon the herb, and as drops upon the grass. | Gather, as rain does from vapours; (Menochius) so let the sum of what I have taught you be collected into this short canticle, and penetrate your hearts. (Haydock) --- Chaldean, "may my discourse be as delightful as the rain." Septuagint, "may my apophthegm (or sententious discourse, Calmet) be expected with earnestness, like rain," when the soil is thirsty. (Haydock) --- Preachers are compared to clouds, and their speech to rain, Isaias 60:8., and Ecclesiasticus 39:4. --- Drops. Some explain this and the former term in the original, of "a stormy and vehement shower," while others attach this idea only to the last part of the sentence. (Calmet) --- The lawgiver wishes to engage the hearts of his audience by mildness, though he is forced also to thunder, in order to rouse their attention, ver. 15. (Haydock) --- Sound doctrine produces much fruit in good dispositions, as rain causeth the seed to push forth which has been sown in an excellent soil. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:3 | Because I will invoke the name of the Lord: give ye magnificence to our God. | Invoke, or praise. (Vatable) --- Magnificence; admire and fear his greatness. (Calmet) --- The first duty of men is to praise God, the next to confess their sins, ver. 5. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:4 | The works of God are perfect, and all his ways are judgments: God is faithful, and without any iniquity, he is just and right. | Right. You cannot complain of having been first abandoned by God. All his works and proceedings are entitled to praise. Hebrew, "This rock, (hatsur) his works are perfect." (Calmet) --- Septuagint, "God, his works are true." (Haydock) --- God is often styled a rock, to denote this strength, ver. 18., and Psalm 62:8. |
| Deuteronomy 32:5 | They have sinned against him, and are none of his children, in their filth: they are a wicked and perverse generation. | Filth, or idolatry. The fidelity of God is contrasted with the infidelity of his people, who deserve not to be called his children. The Septuagint, Chaldean, Syriac, and Arabic, seem to have read in a different manner from what the Hebrew does at present. (Calmet) --- As it stands it is quite unintelligible: Corrupit, non filii ejus, macula eorum. Two letters have been carelessly inserted, and la has been placed after lu, contrary to the Samaritan text, which is perfectly clear: "They are corrupted, they are not his, but filii maculae, children defiled." (Houbigant, prol. 75.) --- Capellus (p. 288,) condemns the Septuagint as he follows a wrong punctuation, and translates, "they did not sin against him, reprehensible children;" whereas, it more properly signifies, "they sinned, not his, but children deserving reprehension, (or children of blame, they did not belong or stick close to him) being a crooked and perverse generation." (Haydock) --- Their wickedness cannot be attributed to God. He is no less powerful and holy, though they have given themselves up to the service of idols. (St. Augustine, q. 55.) (Calmet) --- He had given them all necessary instructions and assistance; so that, finding them always prone to evil, the more favours he heaped upon them, he was on the point of exterminating all the guilty at once, ver. 26. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:6 | Is this the return thou makest to the Lord, O foolish and senseless people? Is not he thy father, that hath possessed thee, and made thee, and created thee? | Possessed thee, as his peculiar inheritance. (Menochius) --- Hebrew, "has purchased thee, made thee, and established thee." The Septuagint render this last word like the Vulgate as they seem to have read, ibnoc. (Calmet) |
| Deuteronomy 32:7 | *Remember the days of old, think upon every generation: ask thy father, and he will declare to thee: thy elders, and they will tell thee. Job 8:8. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:8 | When the Most High divided the nations: when he separated the sons of Adam, he appointed the bounds of people according to the number of the children of Israel. | Israel. He suffered the people of Chanaan to occupy as much land as would be requisite for the Israelites. Septuagint, "according to the number of the angels of God." Hence many of the ancients gathered that there were seventy angel guardians of provinces, and as many languages; while others did not pretend to determine the exact number. But the version which they have followed, is in opposition to all the rest. (Calmet) --- They have also disputed on this occasion, whether the elect will be equal in number to the good angels, as St. Gregory thinks; (hom. 34, in Luke xv.) or they will only fill up the places of those who have fallen. See Mag. Sent. 2:9. Abenezra observes, that interpreters understand this text as alluding to the dispersion of nations, (Genesis xi.) when God decreed that the land of the seven nations should belong to and be sufficient for the Israelites. (Amama) (Haydock) --- The Hebrew may be rendered, "He fixed the limits of each people. At that time the children of Israel were few in number, (9) when the Lord chose his people," etc. Long after the division of the earth, (which the Lord had ordered, Acts 17:26,) the Israelites were very few in number, as Jacob observes, Genesis 34:30. See Deuteronomy 26:5., and Psalm 104:9, 12. (Calmet) --- But this explication does not satisfy Houbigant, (p. 76, Prol.) no more than that of Le Clerc. He is convinced that a word has been transposed, and another left out, as the Samaritan copy has Israel twice, and he would therefore translate, "He divided his people according to the number of the sons of Israel." In his eternal decrees, He allotted twelve portions of land in Chanaan to the descendants of Jacob, and these Josue was ordered to mark out for them. See Josue 4:5. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:9 | But the Lord's portion is his people: Jacob the lot of his inheritance. | Lot. Hebrew literally, "the cord," in allusion to the ancient method of dividing lands with a cord. Herodotus (II. 6,) observes, that the length of one, in the Upper Egypt, was 60 stadia, or 7700 paces, while it was only half as much in the Lower Egypt. |
| Deuteronomy 32:10 | He found him in a desert land, in a place of horror, and of waste wilderness: he led him about, and taught him: and he kept him as the apple of his eye. | He found. Septuagint and Chaldean, "he gave him what was sufficient, in the desert land." God made a choice of a nation destitute of every thing, that they might confess with gratitude that they had received all from him. (Calmet) --- "Taught him" both by "instructions," and by various "chastisements." Septuagint, epaideusen. (Haydock) --- The space of forty years was necessary (Calmet) to eradicate the propensity to evil, and the corrupt manners of the Hebrews, who were therefore conducted through a wilderness, where they might not be contaminated by the company of other nations, (Haydock) but might have leisure to meditate on the law of God. (Calmet) --- Eye, with the utmost care. (Menochius) --- He protected those whom he had chosen out of pure mercy. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:11 | As the eagle enticing her young to fly, and hovering over them, he spread his wings, and hath taken him, and carried him on his shoulders. | Shoulders, as (Exodus 19:4,) upon the wings of eagles. It is said that the eagle hovers over the nest, to encourage her young ones to fly, and when she sees them exhausted, she takes them upon her back. This similitude shews the extreme affection of God towards his people. Hebrew and Chaldean may also be, "as an eagle makes (Calmet; or stirs up) her nest, hatches her young, spreads her wings over them, and bears them upon her wings, so the Lord alone was his leader." (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:12 | The Lord alone was his leader: and there was no strange god with him. | With him, to stand up in their defence, though the Israelites adored but too many others in the desert. |
| Deuteronomy 32:13 | He set him upon high land: that he might eat the fruits of the field, that he might suck honey out of the rock, and oil out of the hardest stone. | High land, in a place of safety, both against the enemy, and the inundations of water. The Nile renders Egypt like one continued sea for about 80 days, in the summer season. (Calmet) --- God had already begun to put the Israelites in possession of the fertile countries east of the Jordan, where there were several high mountains. (Haydock) --- But when this canticle should be recited, in after ages, they would also enjoy the other regions, which had been promised unto them, on the west. Moses speaks, like a prophet, of things to come, as if they were already past. (Menochius) --- Stone. Bees make honey in such places, and olive trees flourish on the side of a hill. Vestiges still remain of the industry with which the Jews have formerly cultivated their territory, supporting the earth with walls (Calmet) when it was in danger of falling down, or of becoming barren, for want of moisture. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:14 | Butter of the herd, and milk of the sheep, with the fat of lambs, and of the rams of the breed of Basan: and goats with the marrow of wheat, and might drink the purest blood of the grape. | Butter or "cream," as the former article was probably not yet discovered, Genesis 18:8. (Calmet) --- The proofs of this assertion, from the original, chemath, and from the Scripture, frequently representing butter as a liquid, seem not, however, very solid. See Judges 5:25., and Proverbs 30:33. The Septuagint have literally, "the butter of oxen," but the latter name includes all of the species. (Haydock) --- Basan. The Septuagint have, "the young of bulls and of he-goats;" though they generally translate "fat sheep." See St. Jerome in Isaias liii. --- Wheat. Hebrew, "fat of the kidneys of wheat." --- Grape. See Genesis 49:11. Androcides wrote to Alexander, who loved wine too much, "when thou art about to drink wine, remember, O king, that thou art drinking the blood of the earth." (Pliny, [Natural History?] 14:15.) |
| Deuteronomy 32:15 | The beloved grew fat, and kicked: he grew fat, and thick and gross, he forsook God who made him, and departed from God his Saviour. | Beloved. Hebrew yeshurun, is supposed to be a diminutive of Israel, Deuteronomy 33:5., and 26. (Calmet) --- Protestants, "Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked; thou art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou art covered with fatness; then he forsook God, which made him, and lightly esteemed the rock of his salvation." This sudden change of persons is not found in the Septuagint. "And Jacob eat, and was filled, and the beloved kicked; he grew fat, thick, and broad, and he abandoned God....and revolted from God his Saviour." (Haydock) --- Temporal prosperity occasioned the revolt of the Jews against their benefactor. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:16 | They provoked him by strange gods, and stirred him up to anger with their abominations. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:17 | They sacrificed to devils and not to God: to gods whom they knew not: that were newly come up, whom their fathers worshipped not. | Devils. Hebrew, "to the destroyers, or to those of the fields." See Leviticus 17:7., and Baruch 4:7, 35. (Calmet) --- Knew not. Septuagint, "revered not." (Haydock) --- Hebrew may be, "who knew them not," who had bestowed nothing upon them, Deuteronomy 29:26. --- Come up. Hebrew, "of the neighbourhood;" gods whose origin they knew, (Calmet) as well as the people who had given them that title; (Haydock) gods of human invention. (Menochius) --- Novelty allureth to the worship of idols and to heresy. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:18 | Thou hast forsaken the God that begot thee, and hast forgotten the Lord that created thee. | Created. Septuagint, "gave thee food." Hebrew, "of the rock that begat thee, thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee, (Haydock) or praises thee," the source of thy felicity. (Calmet) --- Calvin (Institutes 1:11. 9[19?],) to insinuate that Catholics adore pictures, as the Israelites did the golden calf, pretends that they could not have forgotten that God delivered them out of Egypt. Thus he contradicts the Scriptures! (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:19 | The Lord saw, and was moved to wrath: because his own sons and daughters provoked him. | Daughters. The women of Israel, who were not less addicted to idolatry than the men. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:20 | And he said: I will hide my face from them, and will consider what their last end shall be: for it is a perverse generation, and unfaithful children. | From them. The Jews themselves acknowledged, in the siege of Jerusalem, that God had abandoned and given up to destruction his once beloved people. (Josephus, Jewish Wars 7:8.) (Calmet) --- Consider, or look on their utter ruin with indifference, or rather with complacency. (Haydock) --- I will laugh at your destruction, Proverbs 1:16. (Calmet) --- God loves without seeing any preceding merit in his creatures, but he never abandons them till they have first proved unfaithful. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:21 | They have provoked me with that which was no god, and have angered me with their vanities: *and I will provoke them with that, which is no people, and will vex them with a foolish nation. Jeremias 15:14.; Romans 10:19. | Vanities. Septuagint, "idols." (Haydock) --- Nation. The Gentiles were of this description, when they were called to the true faith. This excited the indignation of the Jews, as they would neither enter heaven themselves, nor suffer others to obtain that happiness, Romans 1:19. (Theodoret, q. 41.) "An association bound together by law, constitutes a nation. A multitude which has no laws, or bad ones, is unworthy of the name." (Grotius) --- The Jews looked upon all others with sovereign contempt. (Calmet) --- Now, in their turn, they are despised. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:22 | A fire is kindled in my wrath, and shall burn even to the lowest hell: and shall devour the earth with her increase, and shall burn the foundations of the mountains. | A fire. He alludes to the destruction of Sodom, (Calmet) which may be considered as a figure of that which will overtake the whole world at the last day, and excruciate both the souls and the bodies of the reprobate in the flames of hell. (Haydock) --- Fire also denotes war, the horrors of which overwhelmed the Jews both at the first and the last sieges of Jerusalem. (Calmet) |
| Deuteronomy 32:23 | I will heap evils upon them, and will spend my arrows among them. | Arrows. Pestilence, famine, war, sickness, and death, are termed the arrows of God. |
| Deuteronomy 32:24 | They shall be consumed with famine, and birds shall devour them with a most bitter bite: I will send the teeth of beasts upon them, with the fury of creatures that trail upon the ground, and of serpents. | Birds. This refers in a particular manner to those who are deprived of sepulture, and hung on a gibbet, Deuteronomy 27:26. Josephus (Jewish Wars 6:12,) informs us, that the multitude of Jews who were to be crucified, was so great, that sufficient wood could not be procured to make crosses for them, nor was there place for them to stand. Hebrew, "they shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with burning heat;" (Haydock) or with the disease called the carbuncle. (Calmet) --- But the Septuagint and Chaldean explain it of "birds." (Haydock) --- Bite. Septuagint, "with a painful contraction of the nerves." Chaldean, "infested with evil spirits." --- Beasts. Thus God forced the people of Samaria to obey his law, 4 Kings 17:25. --- Fury, "venom." (Pagnin) (Menochius) |
| Deuteronomy 32:25 | Without, the sword shall lay them waste, and terror within, both the young man and the virgin, the sucking child with the man in years. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:26 | I said: Where are they? I will make the memory of them to cease from among men. | Men. Hebrew, "I said I will disperse or exterminate them." Samaritan, "my fury shall consume them." We may translate, "I had resolved to destroy them; 27. But," etc., (Calmet) or Protestants, "I said I would scatter them into corners, and would....were it not that I feared the wrath of the enemy," etc. --- Where are they? in the mouth of God, shews an utter destruction, so that no vestiges of them remain. Their memory is perished. (Haydock) --- God sometimes defers punishing the sinner for just reasons. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:27 | But for the wrath of the enemies, I have deferred it: lest perhaps their enemies might be proud, and should say: Our mighty hand, and not the Lord, hath done all these things. | Wrath. The enemies of the Israelites wished nothing more than their destruction. If therefore God had gratified this desire, by punishing his people, as they deserved, the enemy would have presently insinuated, that He had not been able to drive them out, or that (Haydock) he was fickle, etc. --- Mighty. (excelsa;) "lifted up." This expression shews the pride and insolence of those who make use of it, as if they despised God and all his laws. Procopius mentions this wicked inscription, to be still seen at Rome, "I lift up my hands to (or against) God, who destroyed me, though innocent, in the 20th year of my age." Pos. Procius, (Calmet) who seems to have been a woman, quae vixi, etc. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:28 | They are a nation without counsel, and without wisdom. | Wisdom. Interpreters generally explain this and the eight following verses, of those nations whom God employed to scourge his people, though some understand it all of the Israelites. (Calmet) --- The words may be applied to all who transgress the law of God, as this is a sure mark of folly and impiety, and the Lord earnestly wishes that all should be converted, ver. 29. True wisdom reflects on the past, present, and future, (Worthington) in order to make provision for the last great conflict. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:29 | *O that they would be wise, and would understand, and would provide for their last end. Jeremias 9:12. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:30 | How should one pursue after a thousand, and two chase ten thousand? Was it not because their God had sold them, and the Lord had shut them up? | Thousand. In the battles which the Israelites had fought, the hand of God had appeared so visibly in their defence, giving them the victory over nations much more numerous, (Calmet) that all must confess their defeat must be in punishment of some former transgression, and that it is not the mighty hand of the enemy, but God himself, who chastises his people, as he had foretold, Deuteronomy 28:7, 25, 49. (Haydock) --- Of this the neighbouring nations were convinced, as Achior declared to the Holofernes, Judith 5:17. When the Hebrews neglected the law of God they were oppressed, and their conversion was presently rewarded with liberty, (Calmet) and a profusion of blessings. |
| Deuteronomy 32:31 | For our God is not as their gods: our enemies themselves are judges. | Judges. The Egyptians, Amalecites, etc., had witnessed the miracles which God had now wrought for 40 years' time, in favour of his people. (Haydock) --- They knew also how the Israelites had been punished for their sins. (Menochius) --- Though they followed a false religion themselves, they could discern the beauty of the true one. (Worthington) --- Video meliora proboque---Deteriora sequor. (Ovid) |
| Deuteronomy 32:32 | Their vines are of the vineyard of Sodom, and of the suburbs of Gomorrha: their grapes are grapes of gall, and their clusters most bitter. | Bitter. The enemies of Israel, were of an accursed progeny. (Haydock) --- They imitated the vices of those wicked cities. Moses cautioned his people to beware of the root of bitterness, Deuteronomy 29:18. (Calmet) --- If they should neglect the admonition, and become like the Chanaanites, they knew what they had to expect. (Haydock) --- Their works being hateful to the Lord, (Menochius) he would surely punish them. The fruits which grow near the lake of Sodom, though sometimes fair to the eye, (Haydock) are full of dust, "black and empty, they fall to ashes," in cinerem vanescunt. (Tacitus v.; Josephus, Jewish Wars 5:5.) Growing on a bituminous soil, they could not but have a disagreeable taste. (Calmet) --- The authors of the Universal History call in question what the ancients have reported concerning the fruits of Sodom. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:33 | Their wine is the gall of dragons, and the venom of asps, which is incurable. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:34 | Are not these things stored up with me, and sealed up in my treasures? | Treasures. Whether we refer to the preceding remarks to the faithless Israelites, whose corruption was less pardonable, as they had received so many favours from above, or to their proud and cruel enemies, who exceeded the bounds of moderation in their wars, God keeps an exact account of all, and will shortly punish both, according to their deserts. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:35 | *Revenge is mine, and I will repay them in due time, that their foot may slide: the day of destruction is at hand, and the time makes haste to come. Ecclesiasticus 28:1.; Romans 12:19.; Hebrews 10:30. | Time. Men are eager to punish their enemies, for fear lest they should escape. But God defers his chastisements frequently in this world, designing to make his enemies feel the weight of his indignation for all eternity. How consoling it is for the just, to think they have God for an avenger. "If thou, says Tertullian, remit the injury, which thou hast received, into his hands, he is the avenger....How much ought patience to endure, in order to make God a debtor." Adeo satisidoneus patientiae sequester Deus. --- That. Septuagint, "when" (Calmet) they shall fall and come to ruin. (Menochius) |
| Deuteronomy 32:36 | The Lord will judge his people,* and will have mercy on his servants: he shall see that their hand is weakened, and that they who were shut up have also failed, and they that remained are consumed. 2 Machabees 7:6. | People who have been guilty, that he may spare them, when they repent. (Menochius) --- "He will give judgment in favour of his people," etc. (Houbigant) --- Servants. He will not involve the innocent in the ruin of the rebellious. (Menochius) --- But, at the same time, he will have them to be convinced that their salvation came not from themselves. He will assist them when all human aid has proved abortive, (Haydock) and when they are reduced to the utmost distress. See Isaias 35:3., and 3 Kings 21:21. Those who may have thought themselves secure in their sins, will not escape punishment. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:37 | And he shall say: *Where are their gods, in whom they trusted? Jeremias 2:28. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:38 | Of whose victims they ate the fat, and drank the wine of their drink-offerings: Let them arise and help you, and protect you in your distress. | Wine. Hence the Jews abhor the wine of Christians, whom they consider as the greatest enemies of God. The pagans were accustomed to make libations to their idols, even in their ordinary repasts. (Calmet) --- The fat was always sacred to God, Leviticus 3:17. (Menochius) |
| Deuteronomy 32:39 | See ye that I alone am, and there is no other God besides me: *I will kill, and I will make to live: I will strike, and I will heal, **and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. 1 Kings 2:6.; Tobias 13:2.; Wisdom 16:13.; Job 10:7.; Wisdom 16:15. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:40 | I will lift up my hand to heaven, and I will say: I live for ever. | For ever. God can swear by no one greater than himself, Hebrews 6:13. |
| Deuteronomy 32:41 | If I shall whet my sword as the lightning, and my hand take hold on judgment: I will render vengeance to my enemies, and repay them that hate me. | Lightning, equally terrible and penetrating: fulminis acta modo. (Virgil, Aeneid ix.) (Calmet) --- Judgment, to punish with rigour my declared enemies. (Haydock) --- These verses seem to regard the idolatrous nations, (Menochius) though God will not fail to punish the guilty, wherever they may be found. (Haydock) |
| Deuteronomy 32:42 | I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh, of the blood of the slain and of the captivity, of the bare head of the enemies. | Enemies. I will tear the crown from off their head. Chaldean, I will destroy the king, as well as the meanest captives. Protestants, "from the beginning of revenges upon the enemy." At the very first I will completely destroy them. (Haydock) --- I will punish them for the slaughter and captivity of my people, whom they have shaved, as a mark of their servile condition. (Menochius) --- Their bare head, or vain counsels, will be detected and punished. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:43 | *Praise his people, ye nations, for he will revenge the blood of his servants: and will render vengeance to their enemies, and he will be merciful to the land of his people. 2 Machabees 7:6. | People. Though God afflicted the Israelites for a time, he was always disposed to receive them to his favour again, upon their repentance; and he will even receive them into his Church, before the day of judgment, Romans 11:25. (Calmet) --- This decided predilection for them, would naturally induce other nations to praise them. Grabe's Septuagint reads, "Rejoice ye heavens with him, and let all the sons of God adore him, and let all the angels of God strengthen them, because He revengeth the blood of his sons; and he will continue to do so, and he will punish his enemies, and will render to those who hate him; and the Lord will purify the land of his people." (Haydock) --- In some editions of the Septuagint, after Let all the angels of God adore him, (cited [in] Hebrews 1:6.; Cappel.) they read, Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people, which St. Paul quotes, Romans 15:10; and then they add, "And Moses wrote this canticle on that day, and he taught it to the children of Israel; (Calmet) 44. and Moses came forth to the people, and spoke all the words of this law, in the ears of the people, he and Jesus, the son of Nave," by which name they designate Josue, the son of Nun. (Haydock) --- He assisted Moses in singing the canticle, as his colleague in office, to whom the obligation of withdrawing the people from idolatry would henceforth devolve. (Menochius) --- God always preserved some of the Jews from the general corruption, till the time of the Messias. (Worthington) |
| Deuteronomy 32:44 | So Moses came and spoke all the words of this canticle, in the ears of the people, and Josue, the son of Nun. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:45 | And he ended all these words, speaking to all Israel. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:46 | And he said to them : Set your hearts on all the words which I testify to you this day: which you shall command your children to observe and to do, and to fulfil all that is written in this law: | |
| Deuteronomy 32:47 | For they are not commanded you in vain, but that every one should live in them: and that doing them, you may continue a long time in the land whither you are going over the Jordan to possess it. | Live. Hebrew, "it is your life." They were to cherish the law as their own lives; for their prosperity and length of days depended on their observance of it. |
| Deuteronomy 32:48 | And the Lord spoke to Moses the same day, saying: | |
| Deuteronomy 32:49 | Go up into this mountain Abarim, (that is to say, of passages) unto Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, over-against Jericho: and see the land of Chanaan, which I will deliver to the children of Israel to possess, and die thou in the mountain. | Passages. The author of the Vulgate has given this explication of Abarim. (Calmet) |
| Deuteronomy 32:50 | When thou art gone up into it, thou shalt be gathered to thy people, *as Aaron thy brother died in Mount Hor, and was gathered to his people: Numbers 20:26.; Numbers 27:13. | |
| Deuteronomy 32:51 | *Because you trespassed against me, in the midst of the children of Israel, at the waters of contradiction, in Cades, of the desert of Sin: and you did not sanctify me among the children of Israel. | Cades. Hebrew, "at the waters of Meriba-Cadesh," etc. |
| Deuteronomy 32:52 | Thou shalt see the land before thee, which I will give to the children of Israel, but thou shalt not enter into it. Numbers 20:12.; Numbers 27:14. | Into it. By repeating this reproach and judgment, God excited in his servant the most lively sentiments of repentance for his fault, Numbers xx. (Haydock) --- Aaron had been deprived of the sight of this delightful country. If they had been labouring for its acquisition alone, the reflection must have been very cutting. But they had a better country in view, though they had greatly desired to enter into that land which was to be ennobled and purified by the birth and blood of the Son of God. (Haydock) --- Having received the order from God in the evening, after Moses had taught his canticle to the people, he immediately set his house in order, and on the following morning he gave his last blessing to the tribes of Israel, and was attended by the chiefs to the foot of the mountain. (Salien) |