Deuteronomy 18 Study Notes

18:1 Part of the promise of the Lord to Abraham was that he and his descendants would inherit a land within which they could discharge their ministry as a people chosen to represent him to the nations (Gn 12:1-3; 13:14-17). However, the Levitical priests would have no such portion or inheritance. In addition, the Levites would be assigned forty-eight cities throughout the land where they would minister to the local people (v. 6; Nm 35:1-7).

18:2-5 The Lord bestowed an inheritance among the other tribes but was himself the inheritance of Levi. Their office was considered so holy that they could partake of the parts of the sacrifices that otherwise belonged to the Lord but that could not be consumed by the laity. In addition, the people gave them the firstfruits of their produce and livestock since they had no farm lands (Nm 18:1-32).

18:6-7 Should a Levite decide to leave his own town, one of forty-eight set aside for Levites (cp. v. 1), he could go to the place the Lord chooses—the central sanctuary (12:5). This actually happened on a wide scale in late Israelite history but only because many of the Levitical towns had been destroyed in the reformation of King Josiah because of their idolatry (2Kg 23:4-20).

18:8 This passage is somewhat obscure but seems to suggest that Levites did own private properties handed down from father to son. These could be sold, but these added assets should not be used against a Levite to deny him his fair share of the benefits of his office (Nm 5:9-10). One important principle that emerges is that persons in ministry must not be saddled by material things but, at the same time, must be provided for out of the generosity of God’s people.

18:9 Detestable customs refers to anything, especially of a religious nature, that is offensive to the Lord. Israel must not imitate these practices that were characteristic of paganism because they had been chosen from among the nations to show a better way (Ex 19:5-6; cp. Lv 18:1-5; Dt 7:6).

18:10-11 Divination, the consulting of natural phenomena such as animal entrails, smoke formations, oil slicks, and the like, was undertaken to determine the plans and purposes of the gods before they happened. A spiritist is another way of referring to necromancy, the “science” of inquiring of the dead (1Sm 28:3,9; Is 8:19). All such things are essential to religious systems that have no concept of divine revelation. Having no other means of knowing the future, they attempt to elicit this knowledge by forbidden means.

18:12 A major reason for the expulsion and destruction of the Canaanite nations is that they practiced these detestable acts and were therefore likely to infect God’s people with their abominable customs (7:4).

18:13-14 In the context of this verse, to be blameless before the Lord was to avoid all the pagan practices outlined in vv. 10 and 11. “Blameless” refers not to sinless perfection but to the avoidance of all that the Lord detests.

18:15 In stark contrast to the pagan prophets stood the office of the prophet of the Lord called and equipped by him alone. Such spokesmen of God had appeared sporadically throughout Israel’s history, including Abraham (Gn 20:7), Miriam the sister of Moses (Ex 15:20), and most prominently, Moses himself (Nm 12:6-8; Dt 34:10).

18:16-18 Like Moses, the prophet would be an Israelite. He would not conjure up his own message or resort to pagan manipulations but would be a vehicle of divine revelation, speaking only what God put into his mouth (Ex 4:15-16; 7:1-2).

18:19-20 Though this passage has clear messianic overtones (Jn 1:21,25), the admonition about the prophet-to-come suggests an order of prophets, primarily the “canonical” prophets, the authors of the various OT Prophetic books.

18:21-22 The question arises as to how to tell a false prophet from a prophet of the Lord. A fundamental test presented here is that any prophet whose message does not come true or is not fulfilled has spoken . . . presumptuously. He must not be feared because he has no capacity to do harm except as he misleads God’s people. A classic OT example is Hananiah, who predicted that the Babylonian exile would end in two years rather than the seventy Jeremiah had prophesied (Jr 25:11-12; 28:1-4; 29:10; Dn 9:1-2). Jeremiah confronted him with the truth that the exile would last as long as he had predicted and that Hananiah would never live to see its fulfillment. In fact, Hananiah died the very year of his false message (Jr 28:12-17).