Discovery BoxDeuteronomy 4:32-37
Context4:32 Indeed, ask about the distant past, starting from the day God created humankind 1 on the earth, and ask 2 from one end of heaven to the other, whether there has ever been such a great thing as this, or even a rumor of it. 4:33 Have a people ever heard the voice of God speaking from the middle of fire, as you yourselves have, and lived to tell about it? 4:34 Or has God 3 ever before tried to deliver 4 a nation from the middle of another nation, accompanied by judgments, 5 signs, wonders, war, strength, power, 6 and other very terrifying things like the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes? 4:35 You have been taught that the Lord alone is God – there is no other besides him. 4:36 From heaven he spoke to you in order to teach you, and on earth he showed you his great fire from which you also heard his words. 7 4:37 Moreover, because he loved 8 your ancestors, he chose their 9 descendants who followed them and personally brought you out of Egypt with his great power
Deuteronomy 32:30
Context32:30 How can one man chase a thousand of them, 10
and two pursue ten thousand;
unless their Rock had delivered them up, 11
and the Lord had handed them over?
Joshua 6:20
Context6:20 The rams’ horns sounded 12 and when the army 13 heard the signal, 14 they gave a loud battle cry. 15 The wall collapsed 16 and the warriors charged straight ahead into the city and captured it. 17
Joshua 10:12-13
Context10:12 The day the Lord delivered the Amorites over to the Israelites, Joshua prayed to the Lord before Israel: 18
“O sun, stand still over Gibeon!
O moon, over the Valley of Aijalon!”
10:13 The sun stood still and the moon stood motionless while the nation took vengeance on its enemies. The event is recorded in the Scroll of the Upright One. 19 The sun stood motionless in the middle of the sky and did not set for about a full day. 20
Joshua 10:2
Context10:2 All Jerusalem was terrified 21 because Gibeon was a large city, like one of the royal cities. It was larger than Ai and all its men were warriors.
Joshua 7:23
Context7:23 They took it all from the middle of the tent, brought it to Joshua and all the Israelites, and placed 22 it before the Lord.
Psalms 77:14
Context77:14 You are the God who does amazing things;
you have revealed your strength among the nations.
Psalms 78:12
Context78:12 He did amazing things in the sight of their ancestors,
in the land of Egypt, in the region of Zoan. 23
Psalms 147:20
Context147:20 He has not done so with any other nation;
they are not aware of his regulations.
Praise the Lord!
[4:32] 1 tn The Hebrew term אָדָם (’adam) may refer either to Adam or, more likely, to “man” in the sense of the human race (“mankind,” “humankind”). The idea here seems more universal in scope than reference to Adam alone would suggest.
[4:32] 2 tn The verb is not present in the Hebrew text but has been supplied in the translation for clarification. The challenge has both temporal and geographical dimensions. The people are challenged to (1) inquire about the entire scope of past history and (2) conduct their investigation on a worldwide scale.
[4:34] 3 tn The translation assumes the reference is to Israel’s God in which case the point is this: God’s intervention in Israel’s experience is unique in the sense that he has never intervened in such power for any other people on earth. The focus is on the uniqueness of Israel’s experience. Some understand the divine name here in a generic sense, “a god,” or “any god.” In this case God’s incomparability is the focus (cf. v. 35, where this theme is expressed).
[4:34] 4 tn Heb “tried to go to take for himself.”
[4:34] 5 tn Heb “by testings.” The reference here is the judgments upon Pharaoh in the form of plagues. See Deut 7:19 (cf. v. 18) and 29:3 (cf. v. 2).
[4:34] 6 tn Heb “by strong hand and by outstretched arm.”
[4:36] 7 tn Heb “and his words you heard from the midst of the fire.”
[4:37] 8 tn The concept of love here is not primarily that of emotional affection but of commitment or devotion. This verse suggests that God chose Israel to be his special people because he loved the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob) and had promised to bless their descendants. See as well Deut 7:7-9.
[4:37] 9 tc The LXX, Smr, Syriac, Targum, and Vulgate read a third person masculine plural suffix for the MT’s 3rd person masculine singular, “his descendants.” Cf. Deut 10:15. Quite likely the MT should be emended in this instance.
[32:30] 10 tn The words “man” and “of them” are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied in the translation for clarity.
[32:30] 11 tn Heb “sold them” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).
[6:20] 12 tc Heb “and the people shouted and they blew the rams’ horns.” The initial statement (“and the people shouted”) seems premature, since the verse goes on to explain that the battle cry followed the blowing of the horns. The statement has probably been accidentally duplicated from what follows. It is omitted in the LXX.
[6:20] 13 tn Heb “the people.”
[6:20] 14 tn Heb “the sound of the horn.”
[6:20] 15 tn Heb “they shouted with a loud shout.”
[6:20] 16 tn Heb “fell in its place.”
[6:20] 17 tn Heb “and the people went up into the city, each one straight ahead, and they captured the city.”
[10:12] 18 tn Heb “Then Joshua spoke to the
[10:13] 19 tn Heb “Is it not written down in the Scroll of the Upright One.” Many modern translations render, “the Scroll [or Book] of Jashar,” leaving the Hebrew name “Jashar” (which means “Upright One”) untranslated.
[10:13] 20 tn Heb “and did not hurry to set [for] about a full day.”
[10:2] 21 tn This statement is subordinated to v. 1 in the Hebrew text, which reads literally, “When Adoni-Zedek…they feared greatly.” The subject of the plural verb at the beginning of v. 2 is probably the residents of Jerusalem.
[7:23] 22 tn Heb “poured out,” probably referring to the way the silver pieces poured out of their container.
[78:12] 23 sn The region of Zoan was located in the Egyptian delta, where the enslaved Israelites lived (see Num 13:22; Isa 19:11, 13; 30:4; Ezek 30:14).
