2 Notes
Deuteronomy 8
Summary: Moses warns the Israelites that they should remember God when they get settled in the Promised Land and not to think of their accomplishments as their own.
8:1 Be careful to follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may live and increase and may enter and possess the land that the LORD promised on oath to your forefathers.
8:2 Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands.
Verse 2 says that God led the Israelites through the desert for forty years to test them “in order to know what was in [their] hearts.” This is odd because there are many verses that claim that God is all-knowing like Psalm 44:21, “He knoweth the secrets of the heart.” (Acts 1:24; Job 42:2; 1 John 3:20 etc) If that is true, why would God need to “test” the Israelites to find out what they would do?
8:3 He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.
8:4 Your clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years.
An interesting aside: God says that he made it so that the Israelites clothing did not wear out, nor did their feet grow so that they would not need new shoes the entire 40-years that they were traveling in the desert.
8:5 Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the LORD your God disciplines you.
8:v6 Observe the commands of the LORD your God, walking in his ways and revering him.
8:7 For the LORD your God is bringing you into a good land—a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills;
8:8 a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey;
8:9 a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.
8:10 When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you.
8:11 Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day.
8:12 Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down,
8:13 and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied,
8:14 then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
8:15 He led you through the vast and dreadful desert, that thirsty and waterless land, with its venomous snakes and scorpions. He brought you water out of hard rock.
8:16 He gave you manna to eat in the desert, something your fathers had never known, to humble and to test you so that in the end it might go well with you.
8:17 You may say to yourself, “My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.”
8:18 But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today.
Moses then pleas for the Israelites to not forget God when they move into the Promised Land and become powerful, as they might begin to think that it all was because of their own effort. Moses tells them to always remember that God is the one who gives you the ability to become wealthy.
Thinking about this sentiment logically conjures an awkward supposition: if God makes one have the ability to produce wealth or not, is he not overriding our free will? If one starts a business and becomes wealthy, it is because God made it that way, not because of your own hard work. With that, where does free will come into play? Why work hard for anything if it is God who makes you succeed or not?
8:19 If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed.
8:20 Like the nations the LORD destroyed before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the LORD your God.
Final Thoughts on Chapter 8:
At the end of the chapter, Moses says God will destroy the Israelites if they do not follow his laws. When have you ever threatened literally to kill someone you loved, say your child, if they stopped listening to you? Deuteronomy seems to go back and forth between pleasant invocations to faith, to absolute threats of genocide for non-compliance.
