Deuteronomy 3:23-27

Denial to Moses of the Promised Land

3:23 Moreover, at that time I pleaded with the Lord, 3:24 “O, Lord God, ¹  you have begun to show me ²  your greatness and strength. ³  (What god in heaven or earth can rival your works and mighty deeds?) 3:25 Let me please cross over to see the good land on the other side of the Jordan River – this good hill country and the Lebanon!” ⁴  3:26 But the Lord was angry at me because of you and would not listen to me. Instead, he ⁵  said to me, “Enough of that! ⁶  Do not speak to me anymore about this matter. 3:27 Go up to the top of Pisgah and take a good look to the west, north, south, and east, ⁷  for you will not be allowed to cross the Jordan.

Numbers 20:11-12

20:11 Then Moses raised his hand, and struck the rock twice with his staff. And water came out abundantly. So the community drank, and their beasts drank too.

The Lord’s Judgment

20:12 Then the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust me enough ⁸  to show me as holy ⁹  before ¹⁰  the Israelites, therefore you will not bring this community into the land I have given them.” ¹¹ 

Numbers 20:24

20:24 “Aaron will be gathered to his ancestors, ¹²  for he will not enter into the land I have given to the Israelites because both of you ¹³  rebelled against my word ¹⁴  at the waters of Meribah.

Numbers 27:14

27:14 For ¹⁵  in the wilderness of Zin when the community rebelled against me, you ¹⁶  rebelled against my command ¹⁷  to show me as holy ¹⁸  before their eyes over the water – the water of Meribah in Kadesh in the wilderness of Zin.”

[3:24]  ¹ tn Heb “Lord Lord.” The phrase אֲדֹנָי יְהוִה (’adonay yÿhvih) is customarily rendered by Jewish tradition as “Lord God.” Cf. NIV, TEV, NLT “Sovereign Lord.”

[3:24]  ² tn Heb “your servant.” The pronoun is used in the translation to clarify that Moses is speaking of himself, since in contemporary English one does not usually refer to oneself in third person.

[3:24]  ³ tn Heb “your strong hand” (so NIV), a symbol of God’s activity.

[3:25]  ⁴ tn The article is retained in the translation (“the Lebanon,” cf. also NAB, NRSV) to indicate that a region (rather than the modern country of Lebanon) is referred to here. Other recent English versions accomplish this by supplying “mountains” after “Lebanon” (TEV, CEV, NLT).

[3:26]  ⁵ tn Heb “the Lord.” For stylistic reasons the pronoun (“he”) has been used in the translation here.

[3:26]  ⁶ tn Heb “much to you” (an idiom).

[3:27]  ⁷ tn Heb “lift your eyes to the west, north, south, and east and see with your eyes.” The translation omits the repetition of “your eyes” for stylistic reasons.

[20:12]  ⁸ tn Or “to sanctify me.”

[20:12]  ⁹ sn Using the basic meaning of the word קָדַשׁ (qadash, “to be separate, distinct, set apart”), we can understand better what Moses failed to do. He was supposed to have acted in a way that would have shown God to be distinct, different, holy. Instead, he gave the impression that God was capricious and hostile – very human. The leader has to be aware of what image he is conveying to the people.

[20:12]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “in the eyes of.”

[20:12]  ¹¹ tn There is debate as to exactly what the sin of Moses was. Some interpreters think that the real sin might have been that he refused to do this at first, but that fact has been suppressed from the text. Some think the text was deliberately vague to explain why they could not enter the land without demeaning them. Others simply, and more likely, note that in Moses there was unbelief, pride, anger, impatience – disobedience.

[20:24]  ¹² sn This is the standard poetic expression for death. The bones would be buried, often with the bones of relatives in the same tomb, giving rise to the expression.

[20:24]  ¹³ tn The verb is in the second person plural form, and so it is Moses and Aaron who rebelled, and so now because of that Aaron first and then Moses would die without going into the land.

[20:24]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “mouth.”

[27:14]  ¹⁵ tn The preposition on the relative pronoun has the force of “because of the fact that.”

[27:14]  ¹⁶ tn The verb is the second masculine plural form.

[27:14]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “mouth.”

[27:14]  ¹⁸ sn Using the basic meaning of the word קָדַשׁ (qadash, “to be separate, distinct, set apart”), we can understand better what Moses failed to do. He was supposed to have acted in a way that would have shown God to be distinct, different, holy. Instead, he gave the impression that God was capricious and hostile – very human. The leader has to be aware of what image he is conveying to the people.