“Love ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.”Read the surrounding chapter
Time, place, and setting
- Time
- Moses speaks in the fortieth year, in the eleventh month, before Israel crosses the Jordan. Deuteronomy 1:3. 1 Exodus chronology remains disputed. 19 20
- Place
- The land of Moab, east of the Jordan, looking toward the land Israel is to enter. Deuteronomy 1:5; 34:1. Horeb and wilderness places belong to the recalled history. 1
The command means hear or listen. Its root also has contextual uses for heeding and obeying; Deuteronomy calls for a response to what is heard. 3
Not every occurrence includes every possible sense. The command in Deuteronomy 6 belongs beside the call to love God and keep his words. 1
Deuteronomy 6:4 to 9: Hear and love
The Shema calls Israel to listen and love the Lord with heart, soul and might. The Hebrew root can denote attentive hearing or obedient response, depending on context. 3 Love includes covenant loyalty. 4 The words belong in the heart and in ordinary conversation. Devotion is not confined to a sanctuary or a moment of religious emotion. 1
The teaching scene continues in verses 20 to 25: when a child asks about the commands, the answer begins with rescue from slavery. Rescue precedes covenant obligations. 16 A family therefore passes on a story and a way of life, rather than unexplained rules. Households shape several commands. 15
Deuteronomy 8:10 to 18: The danger of forgetting
Moses imagines the people becoming full, settled and prosperous. The danger is that success will rewrite their memory. They may begin to claim that their power alone produced their wealth. Verse 18 recalls God’s provision within his covenant with Israel. It is not an unconditional formula that a Christian can activate to secure business income. The paragraph challenges pride and forgetfulness before it can be used to make promises.
Divine love motivates the people’s loyalty elsewhere in Deuteronomy. 11 Their response belongs to the whole ethical journey. 6 Ancient treaty features also help explain why remembered provision precedes obligations, although the speeches are not identical to a formal treaty document. 8 To read verse 18 well, retain its land, covenant and remembered wilderness setting rather than detaching one attractive phrase.
Deuteronomy 10:17 to 19 and 15:7 to 11: Love with open hands
The greatness of God is linked with justice for the fatherless and widow and love for the stranger. Israel is told to love the stranger because it remembers being strange in Egypt. Release must not obstruct generosity. 5 This is more demanding than approving mercy in general while protecting every personal advantage in practice.
Comparative ancient law clarifies the setting without replacing the passage. Hammurabi regulates debt service and differentiates injury remedies by status. 18 Such comparisons do not prove that Deuteronomy simply copies another law collection. The particular ancient arrangement and the Christian obligation to love need careful connection. Food, shelter, wages and fair treatment remain meaningful expressions of compassion, even when a modern church does not enact Israel’s entire civil system.
Deuteronomy 17:14 to 20 and 18:15 to 22: Authority under the word
The king is warned against accumulating horses, wives, silver and gold in ways that turn his heart away. He must have the instruction, read it and avoid lifting his heart above his brothers. Scripture is a limit on authority as well as a guide for it. Worship at the chosen place remains an interpretive question with the Ebal ceremony in view. 9 Distinguishing an altar from a complete sanctuary helps avoid an oversimplified account. 17
The promised prophet in chapter 18 belongs within the prohibition of forbidden spiritual practices and the evaluation of prophetic words. Acts 3:22 applies the passage to Jesus. Christian interpretation should give explicit biblical connections more weight than invented symbolic correspondences. 21 Scripture governs. 2 A claim of gifting does not excuse deception or disregard for what God has actually said.
Deuteronomy 24:1 to 4: Read the whole case
The divorce passage involves a sequence of marriage, separation, another marriage and a prohibition concerning return to the first husband. The later discussion with Jesus distinguishes permission from obligation. 10 It does not justify describing Moses as commanding every husband to divorce a wife. The detailed grammatical reconstruction remains debated, so a short guide should not present one proposal as the final solution to every pastoral question.
The rest of chapter 24 concerns livelihood, wages, pledges, individual responsibility and gleanings. Read the marriage case in a collection attentive to the consequences of people’s conduct. Its ancient legal setting differs from current law and Christian pastoral care. Serious marital difficulty requires more than a verse fragment and a confident pronouncement. Accuracy includes knowing what a passage addresses and what it does not settle.
Deuteronomy 27 to 30: Consequences and a changed heart
Chapter 27’s ceremony joins curse declarations with altar, sacrifice and rejoicing. 7 Chapter 28 addresses covenant life in the land, including national blessing and disaster. Malachi later reuses this covenant language to confront unfaithfulness. 14 Those contexts cannot be replaced with a claim that every sick person must have failed spiritually. Deuteronomy’s warnings concern a specified covenant relationship rather than a universal method for diagnosing suffering.
Chapter 30 promises return and divine circumcision of the heart, so the people may love God and live. The book’s concluding movement holds human responsibility beside hope for divine transformation. 13 The appeal to choose life is defined by loving, hearing and holding fast to God. This cannot be reduced to positive thinking. It asks for a changed orientation toward the One whose instruction is being heard.
Deuteronomy 32 and 34: Compassion and continuation
The song of chapter 32 confronts unfaithfulness, yet verse 36 includes compassion when the people’s strength is gone. Its later quotation in Hebrews raises a genuine question about judgment and vindication. 12 A proposal for a positive reading should remain a proposal, rather than a silent replacement of the KJV wording. Read the surrounding song and the full warning and encouragement in Hebrews.
Moses dies in Moab, and Joshua is full of the Spirit of wisdom. The public commissioning in Numbers 27 provides important background concerning recognition and responsibility. 22 Chronologies remain disputed. 19 20 Its narrative significance is clear even while that debate continues: a beloved leader’s death does not end God’s work, and the coming generation must hear, love and serve faithfully.
Sources
Numbered references support the material above. Scripture quotations use the KJV.
- The Holy Bible, King James VersionKJV translators · 1611
Deuteronomy 1 to 34; Exodus 20; Numbers 27; supporting New Testament passages, especially Matthew 4, Matthew 19, Mark 12, Romans 10 and Hebrews 10 and 13, identified in the discussion
View the source - Statement of FaithPentecostal Church of God
The Scriptures; The Godhead; Man, His Fall, and Redemption; Salvation; The Church; The Ministry; The Baptism of the Holy Ghost; Sanctification
- A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old TestamentFrancis Brown, S. R. Driver and Charles A. Briggs · 1906
Entry shama, Qal senses 1f, 1j to 1o; listening, hearing a case and obeying
View the source - NET Bible Translation and Study NotesNET Bible translation and editorial team
Deuteronomy 6:4 to 7, notes 7 to 12; 6:20 to 25, notes 25 to 32
View the source - Introduction to the Old Testament, Hebrew BibleChristine Hayes · 2006
Lecture 10, law collections and the nature of biblical justice; Deuteronomy 15 and 24 discussion
View the source - The Ethics of Deuteronomy: An Exegetical and Theological StudyJ. G. Millar · 1995
Tyndale Bulletin 46.2, pp. 389 to 392; published dissertation summary
View the source - The Theology of Deuteronomy 27Paul A. Barker · 1998
Tyndale Bulletin 49.2, pp. 277 to 281 and 297 to 299
View the source - The Fall and Rise of Covenant, Law and TreatyKenneth A. Kitchen · 1989
Tyndale Bulletin 40, pp. 118 to 120 and 127 to 130
View the source - Deuteronomy and the Central SanctuaryGordon J. Wenham · 1971
Tyndale Bulletin 22, pp. 103 to 105 and 113 to 116
View the source - Did Moses Permit Divorce? Modal weqatal as Key to New Testament Readings of Deuteronomy 24:1 to 4Andrew Warren · 1998
Tyndale Bulletin 49.1, pp. 39 to 41 and 54 to 56
View the source - God's Love According to Hosea and Deuteronomy: A Prophetic Reworking of a Deuteronomic Concept?Carsten Vang · 2011
Tyndale Bulletin 62.2, pp. 173 to 174 and 189 to 191
View the source - Judgement or Vindication? Deuteronomy 32 in Hebrews 10:30John Proctor · 2004
Tyndale Bulletin 55.1, pp. 65 to 66 and 78 to 80
View the source - Book of Deuteronomy GuideBibleProject editorial team
About; Deuteronomy 1 to 11; Deuteronomy 27 to 34; title explanation
View the source - Covenant Continuity and Fidelity: Inner Biblical Allusion and Exegesis in MalachiJonathan Gibson · 2015
Tyndale Bulletin 66.2, pp. 314 to 315; published dissertation summary, Deuteronomy 28, 15:21 and 33 references
View the source - The Israelite Household and the Decalogue: The Social Background and Significance of Some CommandmentsChristopher J. H. Wright · 1979
Tyndale Bulletin 30, pp. 102 to 103 and 113 to 118
View the source - The Finger of God and the Forming of a Nation: The Origin and Purpose of the DecalogueDavid L. Baker · 2005
Tyndale Bulletin 56.1, pp. 19 and 23 to 24
View the source - Sacrifice and Centralisation in the Pentateuch: Is Exodus 20:24 to 26 Really at Odds with Deuteronomy?Benjamin Foreman · 2019
Tyndale Bulletin 70.1, p. 2, law collections and competing historical proposals; pp. 13 and 19 to 20, altar and sanctuary distinction
View the source - The Code of HammurabiHammurabi; English translation by L. W. King
Clauses 117 to 119, debt service; clauses 196 to 201, status differentiated injury remedies
View the source - The Biblical Date for the Exodus Is 1446 BC: A Response to James HoffmeierBryant G. Wood · 2007
Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 50.2, pp. 249 to 250 and 253
View the source - What Is the Biblical Date for the Exodus? A Response to Bryant WoodJames K. Hoffmeier · 2007
Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 50.2, pp. 227 to 230 and 235 to 239
View the source - The Exodus in the New TestamentRobin Ernest Nixon · 1963
Printed pp. 11 to 13 and 29 to 30, host PDF pagination differs
View the source - The Significance of Joshua's Reception of the Laying on of Hands in Numbers 27:12 to 23Keith Mattingly · 2001
Andrews University Seminary Studies 39.2, pp. 198 to 200 and 204 to 207
View the source