Deuteronomy 4:44

And this is the law which Moses set before the children of Israel:

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

SECOND DISCOURSE.

(44-49) These words form an introduction to the second discourse, which occupies the larger portion of the book—from Deuteronomy 5:1 to the end of Deuteronomy 26. There is no real break between. The present introduction differs from what we find in Deuteronomy 1:1. There is no intimation that this portion of Deuteronomy was a repetition of what had been delivered between Sinai and Kadesh-barnea. What follows is said to have been spoken in the land of Sihon and Og, after the conquest by Israel.

(46) On this side Jordan.—Literally, on the other side. The same expression in Deuteronomy 4:47 is defined by the addition, “toward the sun-rising.”

The whole passage (Deuteronomy 4:44-49) may be editorial, and added by Joshua in Canaan. But there is no necessity for this view.

(48) Mount Sion.—See Note on Deuteronomy 3:9.

Benson Commentary

Deuteronomy 4:44. This is the law — More particularly and fully expressed in the following chapter, to which these words are an introduction.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

4:41-49 Here is the introduction to another discourse, or sermon, Moses preached to Israel, which we have in the following chapters. He sets the law before them, as the rule they were to work by, the way they were to walk in. He sets it before them, as the glass in which they were to see their natural face, that, looking into this perfect law of liberty, they might continue therein. These are the laws, given when Israel was newly come out of Egypt; and they were now repeated. Moses gave these laws in charge, while they encamped over against Beth-peor, an idol place of the Moabites. Their present triumphs were a powerful argument for obedience. And we should understand our own situation as sinners, and the nature of that gracious covenant to which we are invited. Therein greater things are shown to us than ever Israel saw from mount Sinai; greater mercies are given to us than they experienced in the wilderness, or in Canaan. One speaks to us, who is of infinitely greater dignity than Moses; who bare our sins upon the cross; and pleads with us by His dying love.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

These verses would be more properly assigned to the next chapter. They are intended to serve as the announcement and introduction of the address now to be commenced. Deuteronomy 4:44 gives a kind of general title to the whole of the weighty address, including in fact the central part and substance of the book, which now follows in 22 chapters, divided into two groups:

(a) Deuteronomy 5-11,

(b) Deuteronomy 12-26.

The address was delivered when they had already received the first-fruits of those promises Deuteronomy 4:46, the full fruition of which was to be consequent on their fulfillment of that covenant now again about to be rehearsed to them in its leading features.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

44-49. this is the law which Moses set before the children of Israel—This is a preface to the rehearsal of the law, which, with the addition of various explanatory circumstances, the following chapters contain.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Which hath been generally intimated already, but is more particularly and punctually expressed in the following chapter, to which these words are a preface.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And this is the law which Moses set before the children of Israel. Not the law concerning the cities of refuge, but the law of the ten commands repeated in the following chapter; so Jarchi remarks,"this which he should set in order after this section;''as he does in the next chapter, where he repeats in order the ten precepts, and makes observations on the manner of the delivery of them, and urges obedience to them.

Geneva Study Bible

And this is the law which Moses set before the children of Israel:

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

44. And this is the law] So too Sam.; LXX, Vg. and Pesh. omit and. A slight symptom of the fact that this title once stood at the very beginning of an edition of D, the conjunction having been added when other matter was prefixed to it. On law, Tôrah, see Deuteronomy 1:5, Deuteronomy 31:1, etc.

set before] Heb. sam liphne instead of the synonymous nathan liphne usual in D.

children of Israel] Heb. bne Yisra’el. So E, Deuteronomy 10:6; JE (?), Deuteronomy 31:19; Deuteronomy 31:22 f.; P, Deuteronomy 1:3, Deuteronomy 32:51, Deuteronomy 34:8 f. and in titles here, Deuteronomy 4:45-46, Deuteronomy 29:1 (Deut 28:69). In D the usual term is all Israel. (Bne Yisra’el in Deuteronomy 3:18, Deuteronomy 23:18 is no exception, for there and probably also in Deuteronomy 24:7 it means only sons, i.e. males, of Israel.)

44–49. Introduction (or Introductions) to the following Discourses and Laws (5–26)

The appearance of a fresh heading at this point—between the two distinct sets of discourses Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40 and Deuteronomy 5-11, which are further separated by the historical fragment, Deuteronomy 4:41-43—raises questions at the heart of the problem of the structure of the book of Deuteronomy. Does it signify that once the book began here and consisted only of the discourses 5–11 and the laws 12–26; Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40 having been prefixed later? So Graf, Kue., Wellh., König, etc. Or is the appearance of the heading just here compatible with the theory that the whole of 1–26 is the work of one author? So Dillm. and Driver on the ground that a new title would not be unnatural where the actual exposition of the law at last begins (Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40 having been mainly historical). Other alternatives arise from the structure of the heading. Like that in Deuteronomy 1:1-5 it is apparently composite. Deuteronomy 4:44-45 seem two independent titles; Deuteronomy 4:46-49 not only accumulate details after the manner of some other titles in the O.T. but contain a slight difference of style: in 47 D’s towards the sunrising, but in 49 P’s shorter form of the same (see on Deuteronomy 4:41 and the notes below). Other non-deuteronomic phrases are set before and children of Israel, thrice (see below on Deuteronomy 4:44); but both the contents, and with one exception the language, of 46–49 closely recall parts of chs. 2 and 3. Recently there has been a general disposition to break up the heading. Steuernagel supposes 44 and 45 to be respectively the titles of the two documents, in the Sg. and in the Pl. form of address, which he traces throughout chs. 5 ff.; Bertholet takes 44 as the transition from the first introductory address, 1–3, to the legislation proper, 12–26; and 45–49 as an introduction to ch. 5; Cullen takes 44 with 45c, 46a as the title to the original environment of the Law code or ‘Torah,’ but 45ab, 46bc as that of the first combined edition of the ‘Miṣwah’ and ‘Torah’ (see Introd. § 1). The variety of these hypotheses alone shows their precariousness; and there is this further objection to finding in the double title, 44 and 45, headings to the original documents of D, viz. that even in these verses non-deuteronomic phrases occur. The whole passage looks editorial: one piece (Dillmann) in the cumulative style beloved by later scribes rather than a growth from an original nucleus (Driver). Why then was it inserted just here? Dillm.’s and Driver’s answer, because at last with ch. 5 begins the actual exposition of the law, is hardly relevant; because in that case Deuteronomy 4:44 or Deuteronomy 4:45 would have contained some such verb as the expound which we find in the title Deuteronomy 1:5. Indeed, that title is more suitable here than where it stands, for it describes better the expository and hortatory character of 5 ff. than the prevailing historical style of Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40.—On a review of the data and these arguments it seems to the present writer more possible, and even probable, that part of Deuteronomy 1:1-5 (and more particularly 5) originally formed the introduction to the combined discourses and laws, 5–26; that it was divorced from these by the prefixing to them of Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40; and that when the whole book 1–26 was thus constituted, it was found convenient for its practical use to supply a new heading to chs. 5 ff. (Deuteronomy 5:1 being too slight for the purpose), which should at once indicate that a new set of discourses begins here, and at the same time furnish a summary of the historical situation in which the discourses and legislation were delivered as described in chs. 2, 3. Such a suggestion is at least suitable to the salient features of Deuteronomy 4:45-49 : that the language is partly post-deuteronomic and that part of the substance is based on chs. 2, 3.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 44. - This is the Law - the Torah - which Moses set before the children of Israel. "He meaneth that which hereafter followeth; so this belongeth to the next chapter, where the repetition of the laws begins" (Ainsworth); cf. Deuteronomy ver. 1; 6:1; Leviticus 6:9; Leviticus 7:1, etc. Deuteronomy 4:44

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Announcement of the Discourse upon the Law. - First of all, in Deuteronomy 4:44, we have the general notice in the form of a heading: "This is the Thorah which Moses set before the children of Israel;" and then, in Deuteronomy 4:45, Deuteronomy 4:46, a fuller description of the Thorah according to its leading features, "testimonies, statutes, and rights" (see at Deuteronomy 4:1), together with a notice of the place and time at which Moses delivered this address. "On their coming out of Egypt," i.e., not "after they had come out," but during the march, before they had reached the goal of their journeyings, viz., (Deuteronomy 4:46) when they were still on the other side of the Jordan. "In the valley," as in Deuteronomy 3:29. "In the land of Sihon," and therefore already upon ground which the Lord had given them for a possession. The importance of this possession as the first-fruit and pledge of the fulfilment of the further promises of God, led Moses to mention again, though briefly, the defeat of the two kings of the Amorites, together with the conquest of their land, just as he had done before in Deuteronomy 2:32-36 and Deuteronomy 3:1-17. On Deuteronomy 4:48, cf. Deuteronomy 3:9, Deuteronomy 3:12-17. Sion, for Hermon (see at Deuteronomy 3:9).