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20 And the LORD was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him: and I prayed for Aaron also the same time.

21. And I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust: and I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the

mount.

22 And at Taberah, and at 'Massah, and at Kibroth-hattaavah, ye provoked the LORD to wrath.

23 Likewise when the LORD sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying, Go up and possess the land which I have given you; then ye rebelled against the commandment of the LORD your God, and ye believed him not, nor hearkened to his voice.

24 Ye have been rebellious against the LORD from the day that I knew you.

25 Thus I fell down before the LORD forty days and forty nights, as I fell down at the

6 Num. 11. 1, 3. 7 Exod. 17. 7.

first; because the LORD had said he would destroy you.

26 I prayed therefore unto the LORD, and said, O Lord GOD, destroy not thy people and thine inheritance, which thou hast redeemed through thy greatness, which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand.

27 Remember thy servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; look not unto the stubbornness of this people, nor to their wickedness, nor to their sin:

28 Lest the land whence thou broughtest us out say, 'Because the LORD was not able to bring them into the land which he promised them, and because he hated them, he hath brought them out to slay them in the wilderness.

29 Yet they are thy people and thine inheritance, which thou broughtest out by thy mighty power and by thy stretched out

arm.

8 Num. 11. 34. 9 Num. 14. 16.

Verse 1. "Cities great and fenced up to heaven."-This is a strong but not unusual hyperbole, of which we have already had some instances, and shall have more. The fact however is interesting, that at this early time, as well as now, it was customary to surround towns with very high walls. Few towns of the least consequence in Western Asia are without walls, which, whatever be their character in other respects, are sure to be lofty. As the use of artillery is still but little known, when a town has a wall too high to be easily scaled, and too thick to be easily battered down, the inhabitants look upon the place as impregnable, and fear little except the having their gates forced or betrayed, or of being starved into surrender. So little indeed is the art of besieging known in the East, that we read of great Asiatic conquerors being obliged, after every effort, to give over the attempt to obtain possession of walled towns, at the fortifications of which a European engineer would laugh. It is therefore no wonder that the, at this time, unwarlike Hebrew shepherds regarded as insurmountable the obstacles which the walls of the Canaanitish cities seemed to offer. Indeed, of all classes of people, there are none in the world so unequal as the nomade dwellers in tents to overcome such an obstacle. However brave and victorious in the field, all their energy and power seem utterly to fail them before a walled town. The writer can speak with some degree of experience on this subject, having resided in an Asiatic town while besieged by a large body of (so called) disciplined Turks and undisciplined Arabs, and having only a very small body of vacillating and inefficient defenders. But although the assailants were assisted by some badly managed cannon and bombs, a high wall of sun-dried brick, by no means remarkable for its strength, offered such effectual resistance, that the besiegers would probably have been obliged to retreat in despair, had not the fear of starvation and the want of interest in defending the place against the lawful authority by which it was invested, induced the chief persons to capitulate on terms very advantageous to themselves. The walls of towns are generally built with large bricks dried in the sun, though sometimes of burnt bricks, and are rarely less than thirty feet high. They are seldom strong and thick in proportion to their height, but are sometimes strengthened with round towers or buttresses, placed at equal distances from each other.

CHAPTER X.

1 God's mercy in restoring the two tables, 6 in continuing the priesthood, 8 in separating the tribe of Levi, 10 in hearkening unto Moses his suit for the people. 12 An exhortation unto obedience. At that time the LORD said unto me, 'Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first, and come up unto me into the mount, and make thee an ark of wood.

2 And I will write on the tables the words that were in the first tables which thou brakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark.

3 And I made an ark of shittim wood, and hewed two tables of stone like unto the

1 Exod. 34. 1.

first, and went up into the mount, having the two tables in mine hand.

4 And he wrote on the tables according to the first writing, the ten 'commandments, which the LORD spake unto you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly: and the LORD gave them unto

me.

5 And I turned myself and came down. from the mount, and put the tables in the ark which I had made; and there they be, as the LORD commanded me.

6 And the children of Israel took their journey from Beeroth of the children of

2 Heb. words.

Jaakan to Mosera: 'there Aaron died, and | LORD, and his statutes, which I command there he was buried; and Eleazar his son thee this day for thy good? ministered in the priest's office in his stead.

7 From thence they journeyed unto Gudgodah; and from Gudgodah to Jotbath, a land of rivers of waters.

8 At that time the LORD separated the tribe of Levi, to bear the ark of the covenant of the LORD, to stand before the LORD to minister unto him, and to bless in his name, unto this day.

9 Wherefore Levi hath no part nor inheritance with his brethren; the LORD is his inheritance, according as the LORD thy God promised him.

10 And I stayed in the mount, according to the first time, forty days and forty nights; and the LORD hearkened unto me at that time also, and the LORD would not destroy thee.

11 And the LORD said unto me, Arise, take thy journey before the people, that they may go in and possess the land which I sware unto their fathers to give unto them. 12 ¶ And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, 13 To keep the commandments of the

14 Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the LORD's thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is.

15 Only the LORD had a delight in thy fathers, to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.

16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiffnecked.

17 For the LORD your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty, and a terrible, which 'regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward :

18 He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment.

19 Love ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.

20 10Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou "cleave, and swear by his name.

21 He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes have seen.

22 Thy fathers went down into Egypt with threescore and ten persons; and now the LORD thy God hath made thee as the stars of heaven for multitude.

6 Or, former days.

7 Heb. go in journey.

8 Psal. 24. 1.

3 Num. 33. 30. 4 Num. 20. 28. 5 Num. 18. 20. 92 Chron. 19. 7. Job 34. 19. Acts 10. 34. Rom. 2. 11. Gal. 2. 6. Eph. 6. 9. Col. 3. 25. 1 Pet. 1. 17. 10 Chap. 6. 13. Matth. 4. 10. Luke 4, 8. 11 Chap. 13. 4. 12 Gen. 46. 27. Exod. 1.5. 13 Gen. 15. 5.

Verse 6. "And the children of Israel took their journey, &c."-Most Biblical critics concur in the opinion that the four verses, from the end of the 5th verse to the beginning of the 10th, must have been introduced into the text through the mistake of some transcriber. The reasons for this opinion are, 1. that the passage has no connection whatever with the context, but quite interrupts the narrative, as any one may perceive, who passing over the intervening verses reads the 10th verse after the 5th; 2. that the list of stages is quite at variance with the part which refers to the same places in Num. xxxiii. 31-3; and 3. that it is not true that the separation of the Levites took place at Jotbathah, but at Sinai, before the Israelites began their journey northward. The discrepancy under the second head will appear from a comparison of the two passages, thus:Num. xxxiii. Moseroth

Deut. x.

.Bene-jaakan.. Hor-hagidgad..Jotbathah.

Beeroth of Bene-jaakan... Mosera.......Gudgodah.....Jotbath. Here we see that, allowing the names in each list to denote the same places, the first makes the Israelites journey from Moseroth to Bene-jaakan, and the second from Bene-jaakan to Mosera. An equally serious difficulty is, that the present text places the death of Aaron at Mosera, two stages before Jotbathah, whereas the regular list in Numbers places the same event at Mount Hor, four stages after Jotbathah. We must confess that there seems to us insurmountable difficulties to the admission of this passage as part of the genuine text. We have not met with any explanation by which we could consider such difficulties obviated; nor have we succeeded in the attempt to frame a better for ourselves. The common explanation, with respect to the discrepancy in the stages, is, that the Israelites may have gone to and fro-that is, from Mosera to Bene-jaakan, and back again to Mosera, and that the present text mentions the journey from Mosera, without noticing the return thither. Every reader will perceive the violence of this conjecture; and as to the death of Aaron at Mosera, the explanation might be admitted that Mosera is another name for Mount Hor, particularly as the adjoining valley is at this day called Mousa; but how then are we to account for the fact that Mosera, which in both lists is next to Bene-jaakan, is placed in the first list at the distance of seven stages from Mount Hor? Even if the difficulties of the list were got over, others, already mentioned, would still remain; and it might, besides, well be asked, how it is that Moses, if he intended to speak of stages at all, while describing his intercourse with the Lord on Mount Sinai, should speak not of places to which the Israelites went from thence, but of others at which the host did not arrive till thirty-eight years after. Upon the whole, however reluctant to consider particular passages as interpolations, we fear that verses 6 and 7 must be given up; some also would relinquish verses 8 and 9; but we are desirous to retain them, as it is possible that "at that time," with which verse 8 begins, may refer not to Jotbath which immediately precedes, but to verse 5, that is, the time of Moses's intercourse with the Lord on the Mount. It may be observed that the Samaritan text has also the verses 6 and 7; but that they are there so read as to be quite in unison with the text of Numbers xxxiii. thus:-6. "The children of Israel journeying from Mosera, pitched their tents in Ben-jaakan. 7. From thence they journeyed, and pitched their tents in

Ged-gad, and from thence in Jotbatha, which is a valley of rivers of waters: and from thence they journeyed, and pitched in Ebronah; from thence they journeyed, and pitched in Eziongaber; from thence they journeyed, and pitched in the wilderness of Zin, which is Kadesh; from thence they journeyed, and pitched in Mount Hor; where Aaron died." From this we may gather, that either this is the true reading, or else that the interpolation took place very early, and its incongruity being perceived by the Samaritans, they mended it to make it agree with the text of Numbers xxxiii.; the latter is most probable, as the passage seems to be copied almost literally from thence.

CHAPTER XI.

1 An exhortation to obedience, 2 by their own expe-
rience of God's great works, 8 by promise of God's
great blessings, 16 and by threatenings.
careful study is required in God's words. 26 The
blessing and curse is set before them.
THEREFORE thou shalt love the LORD thy
God, and keep his charge, and his statutes,
and his judgments, and his commandments,
alway.

2 And know ye this day: for I speak not with your children which have not known, and which have not seen the chastisement of the LORD your God, his greatness, his mighty hand, and his stretched out arm,

3 And his miracles, and his acts, which he did in the midst of Egypt, unto Pharaoh the king of Egypt, and unto all his land;

4 And what he did unto the army of Egypt, unto their horses, and to their chariots; how he made the water of the Red sea to overflow them as they pursued after you, and how the LORD hath destroyed them unto this day;

5 And what he did unto you in the wilderness, until ye came into this place;

6 And what he did unto Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, the son of Reuben: how the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their housholds, and their tents, and all the substance that was in their possession, in the midst of all Israel:

7 But your eyes have seen all the great acts of the LORD which he did.

8 Therefore shall ye keep all the commandments which I command you this day, that ye may be strong, and go in and possess the land, whither ye go to possess it;

9 And that ye may prolong your days in the land, which the LORD Sware unto your fathers to give unto them and to their seed, a land that floweth with milk and honey.

10 ¶ For the land, whither thou goest in to possess it, is not as the land of Egypt, from whence ye came out, where thou sowedst thy seed, and wateredst it with thy foot, as a garden of herbs:

11 But the land, whither ye go to possess

1 Num. 16. 31, and 27. 3. Psal. 106. 17.

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it, is a land of hills and valleys, and drinketh water of the rain of heaven:

12 A land which the LORD thy God 'careth for the eyes of the LORD thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year.

13¶ And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day, to love the LORD your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul,

14 That I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.

15 And I will 'send grass in thy fields for thy cattle, that thou mayest eat and be

full.

16 Take heed to yourselves, that your heart be not deceived, and ye turn aside, and serve other gods, and worship them;

17 And then the LORD's wrath be kindled against you, and he shut up the heaven, that there be no rain, and that the land yield not her fruit; and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the LORD giveth you.

18 Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes.

19 And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

20 And thou shalt write them upon the door posts of thine house, and upon thy gates:

21 That your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth.

22 ¶ For if ye shall diligently keep all these commandments which I command you, to do them, to love the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, and to cleave unto him;

2 Or, living substance which followed them. 3 Heb. was at their feet. 5 Heb. give. Chap. 6, 8, 7 Chap. 4. 10, and 6. 7.

4 Heb. seeketh.

23 Then will the LORD drive out all these nations from before you, and ye shall possess greater nations and mightier than yourselves.

24 Every place whereon the soles of your feet shall tread shall be your's: from the wilderness and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even unto the uttermost sea shall your coast be.

25 There shall no man be able to stand before you for the LORD your God shall lay the fear of you and the dread of you upon all the land that ye shall tread upon, as he hath said unto you.

26 ¶ Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse;

27 A blessing, if ye obey the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you this day:

28 And a curse, if ye will not obey the commandments of the LORD your God, but

8 Josh. 1.3. Chap. 28. 2. 10 Chap. 28. 15.

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turn aside out of the way which I command you this day, to go after other gods, which ye have not known.

29 And it shall come to pass, when the LORD thy God hath brought thee in unto the land whither thou goest to possess it, that thou shalt put "the blessing upon mount Gerizim, and the curse upon mount Ebal.

30 Are they not on the other side Jordan, by the way where the sun goeth down, in the land of the Canaanites, which dwell in the champaign over against Gilgal, beside the plains of Moreh?

31 For ye shall pass over Jordan to go in to possess the land which the LORD your God giveth you, and ye shall possess it, and dwell therein.

32 And ye shall observe to do all the statutes and judgments which I set before you this day.

11 Chap. 27. 12, 13. Josh. 8. 33. 12 Chap. 5. 32.

Verse 10. "Wateredst it with thy foot."-There is certainly no intention here to compare the two countries as to fertility-Egypt being perhaps, without exception, the most fertile country in the world; but there is an interesting comparison as to the process of irrigation. Of Canaan it is said that it is watered, without human labour, by the rain of heaven; which rarely or almost never falls in Egypt, where the fertility of the country depends upon the Nile and its annual inundation, which is made available for the purposes of irrigation, in the fullest extent, only by means of the numerous canals and trenches, which require every year to be cleaned out, and the dykes carefully repaired. The word rendered "foot" is probably here, as in other places, used metaphorically to denote "labour;" and the force of the comparison is, that Egypt was watered with labour, and Canaan without any, or with comparatively little. There may be a particular point in this reference if, as many suppose, the digging and lining of canals, for the purposes of irrigation, was among the "hard bondage in mortar and in brick" with which the lives of the Israelites were "made bitter" in Egypt. In this case, it must have been a great satisfaction to them to learn that no such labours, even as voluntarily undertaken, would be required in Canaan, or were indeed at all applicable to that country. But besides this metaphorical sense, of labour necessary for equalizing the inundation and extending its benefits to places which would not naturally partake of them, there are other senses in which it may literally be described as "watered by the foot." Although the saturation of the ground by the inundation may, in ordinary circumstances, be sufficient to produce the crop of corn without any further irrigation, it is not so with the gardens and plantations, which require afterwards to be watered every three or four days. The water for this purpose is obtained either from the Nile itself, or from cisterns which were filled during the inundation. Hence engines of various kinds for raising water are placed all along the Nile, from the sea to the cataracts, and also at the cisterns in which the water is reserved. Philo, who lived in Egypt, describes one of these machines, which was used by the peasantry in his time, as being worked by the feet-that is, so far as his account may be understood, the machine was worked by the men ascending revolving steps, something on the principle of the tread-mill. Niebuhr also mentions such an engine as used by the Egyptians for watering their lands, and conjectures that Moses here alludes to something similar. This machine is called by the Arabs sakki tdir beridsjel, that is, an hydraulic machine worked by the feet. Then, when the water is raised, by whatever machine, it is directed in its course by channels cut in the ground, which convey the water to those places where it is wanted; and when one part of the ground is sufficiently watered, a person closes that channel by turning the earth against it with his foot, and at the same time opening a new channel by striking back with his foot, or with a mattock, the earth with which its entrance had been closed. A considerable number of illustrations of the custom of watering and of raising water by the foot might be adduced from China, India, and other Oriental countries; but as such good ones are afforded by Egypt itself, it seems scarcely necessary to look further.

11. "A land of hills and valleys.”—This points out another contrast to Egypt, which is an exceedingly low and level country.

14. "The first rain and the latter rain."-This doubtless refers to the rains of spring and autumn, between which-that is, from spring to autumn-there is the long interval of a dry and hot summer, almost never refreshed with rains. It is not, however, agreed whether the "first rain" means the spring or autumn rain. It might be easy to determine this, if it were not that the Jews had two seasons for beginning their year, one in spring and the other in autumn. But as the spring year was the common civil year, it is reasonable to conclude that the autumnal rain is that distinguished as the first or former rain. Accordingly, the Rabbins, and the generality of interpreters, are of opinion that the ( joreh) “first” or “former" rain means that of autumn; and the (p, malkosh) "latter rain" that of spring. We concur in this also, because, in point of fact, the autumn rains are the first rains, and the spring rains the last. It is a very great mistake, which we see even now generally stated, that rain seldom falls except at these two seasons; that is, in September or October for the autumn, and in March or April for the spring. It is true that the rains may be the most copious at those seasons, but still it continues to rain occasionally throughout the winter months; and thus it

seems probable that the rains of autumn are "the early rains," as commencing, and the spring rains "the latter rains," as terminating, the period in which rain falls. The former and latter rains are spoken of in Scripture, as of the highest importance to agriculture, not because they were the only rains, but because, from their copiousness and the critical time of their occurrence, the prosperity of the crops depended almost entirely upon them.

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1 Monuments of idolatry are to be destroyed. 5 The place of God's service is to be kept. 15, 23 Blood is forbidden. 17, 20, 26 Holy things must be eaten in the holy place. 19 The Levite is not to be forsaken. 29 Idolatry is not to be enquired after. THESE are the statutes and judgments, which ye shall observe to do in the land, which the LORD God of thy fathers giveth thee to possess it, all the days that ye live upon the earth.

2 Ye shall utterly destroy all the places, wherein the nations which ye shall possess served their gods, upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and under every green

tree:

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with fire; and ye shall hew down the graven images of their gods, and destroy the names of them out of that place.

4 Ye shall not do so unto the LORD your God.

5 But unto the place which the LORD your God shall 'choose out of all your tribes to put his name there, even unto his habitation shall ye seek, and thither thou shalt

come:

6 And thither ye shall bring your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, and your tithes, and heave offerings of your hand, and your vows, and your freewill offerings, and the firstlings of your herds and of your flocks:

7 And there ye shall eat before the LORD your God, and ye shall rejoice in all that ye put your hand unto, ye and your housholds,

4 Heb. break down. 51 Kings 8. 29. 2 Chron. 7. 12.

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