Deuteronomy 9 Study Notes

9:1-6 These verses contain a balance between the human (vv. 1,3) and the divine (vv. 3-5). Note the repeated use of drive out (vv. 1,3,4 [2x],5).

9:1 The nations greater and stronger than Israel are the seven listed in 7:1, all of which were essentially Canaanite by that time. This description is probably hyperbolic to show the impossibility of their being overcome by Israel without God’s help. It also recalls the account of the spies who, forty years earlier, had reported that the cities of Canaan were large and fortified and the people were gigantic (Nm 13:28,33). Joshua and Caleb had said that Israel could still prevail because the Lord would be with them (Nm 13:30; 14:7-8).

9:2 The Anakim were a giant people so feared that a proverb arose comparing any difficult situation to that of facing the Anakim. Joshua defeated them later (Jos 11:21-23).

9:3 The depiction of God as a consuming fire reflects not only his righteous judgment (4:24; Ex 24:17; Nm 26:10; 2Sm 22:9; Is 30:27,30; 33:14; Ezk 22:31; Zph 1:18; Heb 12:29) but also his role as a warrior leading his hosts in holy war (Ex 15:6-7; Ps 18:7-15; 21:9; 50:3-5; Rv 1:12-16).

9:4-5 God sometimes saves his own because of their righteousness and other times he condemns his enemies because of their wickedness. It is important to know the difference and to realize that often what is thought to be a reward for personal righteousness may be God’s response to the unrighteousness of others.

9:6 Israel’s possession of the land would take place not because of her righteousness, for, in fact, she was anything but righteous. She was a stiff-necked people, a nation like a stubborn ox that would not submit to the yoke and pull its load. Any good thing that came to her from the Lord—including the conquest of Canaan—issued only from the grace of God. The very definition of biblical grace is receiving what one does not deserve. God’s bestowal of such grace was based on his election of Israel to be his people and the self-obligation under which he put himself to fulfill the promises he had made to the patriarchs.

9:7-9 The provocation at Horeb concerned the fabrication of a golden calf by Aaron and many of the people while Moses was receiving the Ten Commandments (Ex 32:1-6). The Lord was so angered by their idolatry that he wanted to destroy his people, but he was so committed to them by virtue of the everlasting covenant he had made with Abraham that absolute destruction was unthinkable.

9:10 The reference to God’s finger is an anthropomorphism, which is the attribution of human characteristics to God. As Jesus told the Samaritan woman: “God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth” (Jn 4:24). Since he has no physical body, “God’s finger” must be construed as his direct involvement in the inscription on the stone tablets. Inasmuch as he ordinarily revealed himself through dreams and visions (Nm 12:6), the more immediate process of inscripturation (the writing of Scripture) here is striking.

9:11 The commandments were engraved on two stone tablets because each party to a covenant must have a copy.

9:12 The cast image was in the form of a calf, but it likely was not a pagan deity but an attempt to represent the Lord himself. Israel was no doubt familiar with the powerful Apis bull of Egyptian mythology and also with El (also called “Bull”), chief of the Canaanite pantheon.

9:13-14 The Lord could carry out his threat and still be true to the Abrahamic promise that his seed would never end by preserving Moses. The Exodus narrative records Moses’s intercession in response to the threat. God made this threat on two different occasions (Ex 32:9-14; Nm 14:12).

9:15-17 Moses’s shattering of the tablets was more than an act of justifiable rage. Just as the commandments now lay in a thousand pieces, so Israel had smashed the covenant seemingly beyond repair. It also anticipated the shattering of the calf image to signify the removal of idolatry from the nation (v. 21).

9:18-20 Moses’s acknowledgement that the Lord listened to him and averted his intended wrath teaches not only that Moses was a faithful advocate but that God hears the prayers of those who earnestly intercede with him for others (Jms 5:13-18).

9:21 The disposition of the sinful calf revealed the impotence of idols and dramatized how anything that competes for the worship of the true God is to be dealt with. Moses’s example had to be repeated many times in Israel’s history (1Kg 15:13; 2Kg 11:18; 18:4; 23:4).

9:22-24 The three place names in v. 22 have ominous meanings. Taberah (Nm 11:1-3) means “blaze.” Massah (Ex 17:1-7) means “testing.” Kibroth-hattaavah (Nm 11:31-34) means “graves of craving.”

9:25 This picks up from v. 18.

9:26-27 Moses’s prayer that the Lord would remember his servants rose not out of any fear that he would no longer retain them in his consciousness but out of a desire that he would act to keep his covenant promises to them. “Remember” when in reference to God always carries with it an implicit response or action.

9:28 Moses appealed to God’s concern for the honor of his name. God had acted so far to show the nations what kind of God he was. See Moses’s intercession in Nm 14:13-16.

9:29 For Israel to be God’s inheritance meant that they belonged to him (7:6) and also that he belonged to them, a unique relationship that gave each of them exclusive claims on the other.