Deuteronomy 1:8

1:8 Look! I have already given the land to you. ¹  Go, occupy the territory that I, ²  the Lord, promised ³  to give to your ancestors ⁴  Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and to their descendants.” ⁵ 

Deuteronomy 2:12

2:12 Previously the Horites ⁶  lived in Seir but the descendants of Esau dispossessed and destroyed them and settled in their place, just as Israel did to the land it came to possess, the land the Lord gave them.) ⁷ 

Deuteronomy 2:14

2:14 Now the length of time it took for us to go from Kadesh Barnea to the crossing of Wadi Zered was thirty-eight years, time for all the military men of that generation to die, just as the Lord had vowed to them.

Deuteronomy 3:20

3:20 You must fight ⁸  until the Lord gives your countrymen victory ⁹  as he did you and they take possession of the land that the Lord your God is giving them on the other side of the Jordan River. Then each of you may return to his own territory that I have given you.”

Deuteronomy 4:19

4:19 When you look up ¹⁰  to the sky ¹¹  and see the sun, moon, and stars – the whole heavenly creation ¹²  – you must not be seduced to worship and serve them, ¹³  for the Lord your God has assigned ¹⁴  them to all the people ¹⁵  of the world. ¹⁶ 

Deuteronomy 5:9

5:9 You must not worship or serve them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God. I punish ¹⁷  the sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons for the sin of the fathers who reject ¹⁸  me, ¹⁹ 

Deuteronomy 5:31

5:31 But as for you, remain here with me so I can declare to you all the commandments, ²⁰  statutes, and ordinances that you are to teach them, so that they can carry them out in the land I am about to give them.” ²¹ 

Deuteronomy 8:19

8:19 Now if you forget the Lord your God at all ²²  and follow other gods, worshiping and prostrating yourselves before them, I testify to you today that you will surely be annihilated.

Deuteronomy 9:12

9:12 And he said to me, “Get up, go down at once from here because your people whom you brought out of Egypt have sinned! They have quickly turned from the way I commanded them and have made for themselves a cast metal image.” ²³ 

Deuteronomy 9:28

9:28 Otherwise the people of the land ²⁴  from which you brought us will say, “The Lord was unable to bring them to the land he promised them, and because of his hatred for them he has brought them out to kill them in the desert.” ²⁵ 

Deuteronomy 30:20

30:20 I also call on you ²⁶  to love the Lord your God, to obey him and be loyal to him, for he gives you life and enables you to live continually ²⁷  in the land the Lord promised to give to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

Deuteronomy 31:7

31:7 Then Moses called out to Joshua ²⁸  in the presence of all Israel, “Be strong and courageous, for you will accompany these people to the land that the Lord promised to give their ancestors, ²⁹  and you will enable them to inherit it.

Deuteronomy 31:23

31:23 and the Lord ³⁰  commissioned Joshua son of Nun, “Be strong and courageous, for you will take the Israelites to the land I have promised them, and I will be with you.” ³¹ 

[1:8]  ¹ tn Heb “I have placed before you the land.”

[1:8]  ² tn Heb “the Lord.” Since the Lord is speaking, it is preferable for clarity to supply the first person pronoun in the translation.

[1:8]  ³ tn Heb “swore” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT). This refers to God’s promise, made by solemn oath, to give the patriarchs the land.

[1:8]  ⁴ tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 11, 21, 35).

[1:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “their seed after them.”

[2:12]  ⁶ sn Horites. Most likely these are the same as the well-known people of ancient Near Eastern texts described as Hurrians. They were geographically widespread and probably non-Semitic. Genesis speaks of them as the indigenous peoples of Edom that Esau expelled (Gen 36:8-19, 31-43) and also as among those who confronted the kings of the east (Gen 14:6).

[2:12]  ⁷ tn Most modern English versions, beginning with the ASV (1901), regard vv. 10-12 as parenthetical to the narrative.

[3:20]  ¹¹ tn The words “you must fight” are not present in the Hebrew text, but are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[3:20]  ¹² tn Heb “gives your brothers rest.”

[4:19]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “lest you lift up your eyes.” In the Hebrew text vv. 16-19 are subordinated to “Be careful” in v. 15, but this makes for an unduly long sentence in English.

[4:19]  ¹⁷ tn Or “heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven(s)” or “sky” depending on the context.

[4:19]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “all the host of heaven.”

[4:19]  ¹⁹ tn In the Hebrew text the verbal sequence in v. 19 is “lest you look up…and see…and be seduced…and worship them…and serve them.” However, the first two actions are not prohibited in and of themselves. The prohibition pertains to the final three actions. The first two verbs describe actions that are logically subordinate to the following actions and can be treated as temporal or circumstantial: “lest, looking up…and seeing…, you are seduced.” See Joüon 2:635 §168.h.

[4:19]  ²⁰ tn Or “allotted.”

[4:19]  ²¹ tn Or “nations.”

[4:19]  ²² tn Heb “under all the heaven.”

[5:9]  ²¹ tn In the Hebrew text the form is a participle, which is subordinated to what precedes. For the sake of English style, the translation divides this lengthy verse into two sentences.

[5:9]  ²² tn Heb “who hate” (so NAB, NIV, NLT). Just as “to love” (אָהַב, ’ahav) means in a covenant context “to choose, obey,” so “to hate” (שָׂנֵא, sane’) means “to reject, disobey” (cf. the note on the word “loved” in Deut 4:37; see also 5:10).

[5:9]  ²³ tn Heb “visiting the sin of fathers upon sons and upon a third (generation) and upon a fourth (generation) of those who hate me.” God sometimes punishes children for the sins of a father (cf. Num 16:27, 32; Josh 7:24-25; 2 Sam 21:1-9). On the principle of corporate solidarity and responsibility in OT thought see J. Kaminsky, Corporate Responsibility in the Hebrew Bible (JSOTSup). In the idiom of the text, the father is the first generation and the “sons” the second generation, making grandsons the third and great-grandsons the fourth. The reference to a third and fourth generation is a way of emphasizing that the sinner’s punishment would last throughout his lifetime. In this culture, where men married and fathered children at a relatively young age, it would not be unusual for one to see his great-grandsons. In an Aramaic tomb inscription from Nerab dating to the seventh century b.c., Agbar observes that he was surrounded by “children of the fourth generation” as he lay on his death bed (see ANET 661). The language of the text differs from Exod 34:7, the sons are the first generation, the grandsons (literally, “sons of the sons”) the second, great-grandsons the third, and great-great-grandsons the fourth. One could argue that formulation in Deut 5:9 (see also Exod 20:50) is elliptical/abbreviated or that it suffers from textual corruption (the repetition of the words “sons” would invite accidental omission).

[5:31]  ²⁶ tn Heb “commandment.” The MT actually has the singular (הַמִּצְוָה, hammitsvah), suggesting perhaps that the following terms (חֻקִּים [khuqqim] and מִשְׁפָּטִים [mishpatim]) are in epexegetical apposition to “commandment.” That is, the phrase could be translated “the entire command, namely, the statutes and ordinances.” This would essentially make מִצְוָה (mitsvah) synonymous with תּוֹרָה (torah), the usual term for the whole collection of law.

[5:31]  ²⁷ tn Heb “to possess it” (so KJV, ASV); NLT “as their inheritance.”

[8:19]  ³¹ tn Heb “if forgetting, you forget.” The infinitive absolute is used for emphasis; the translation indicates this with the words “at all” (cf. KJV).

[9:12]  ³⁶ tc Heb “a casting.” The MT reads מַסֵּכָה (massekhah, “a cast thing”) but some mss and Smr add עֵגֶל (’egel, “calf”), “a molten calf” or the like (Exod 32:8). Perhaps Moses here omits reference to the calf out of contempt for it.

[9:28]  ⁴¹ tc The MT reads only “the land.” Smr supplies עַם (’am, “people”) and LXX and its dependents supply “the inhabitants of the land.” The truncated form found in the MT is adequate to communicate the intended meaning; the words “the people of” are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[9:28]  ⁴² tn Or “wilderness” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV, NLT).

[30:20]  ⁴⁶ tn The words “I also call on you” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons. In the Hebrew text vv. 19-20 are one long sentence, which the translation divides into two.

[30:20]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “he is your life and the length of your days to live.”

[31:7]  ⁵¹ tn The Hebrew text includes “and said to him.” This has not been included in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[31:7]  ⁵² tn Heb “fathers” (also in v. 20).

[31:23]  ⁵⁶ tn Heb “he.” Since the pronoun could be taken to refer to Moses, the referent has been specified as “the Lord” in the translation for clarity. See also the note on the word “you” later in this verse.

[31:23]  ⁵⁷ tc The LXX reads, “as the Lord promised them, and he will be with you.” This relieves the problem of Moses apparently promising to be with Joshua as the MT reads on the surface (“I will be with you”). However, the reading of the LXX is clearly an attempt to clarify an existing obscurity and therefore is unlikely to reflect the original.