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Deuteronomy 2:4-25 Bible in Basic English (BBE)

4 And give the people orders, saying, You are about to go through the land of your brothers, the children of Esau, who are living in Seir; and they will have fear of you; so take care what you do:

5 Make no attack on them, for I will not give you any of their land, not even space enough for a man's foot: because I have given Mount Seir to Esau for his heritage.

6 You may get food for your needs from them for a price, and water for drinking.

7 For the blessing of the Lord your God has been on you in all the work of your hands: he has knowledge of your wanderings through this great waste: these forty years the Lord your God has been with you, and you have been short of nothing.

8 So we went on past our brothers, the children of Esau, living in Seir, by the road through the Arabah, from Elath and Ezion-geber. And turning, we went by the road through the waste land of Moab.

9 And the Lord said to me, Make no attack on Moab and do not go to war with them, for I will not give you any of his land: because I have given Ar to the children of Lot for their heritage.

10 (In the past the Emim were living there; a great people, equal in numbers to the Anakim and as tall;

11 They are numbered among the Rephaim, like the Anakim; but are named Emim by the Moabites.

12 And the Horites in earlier times were living in Seir, but the children of Esau took their place; they sent destruction on them and took their land for themselves, as Israel did to the land of his heritage which the Lord gave them.)

13 Get up now, and go over the stream Zered. So we went over the stream Zered.

14 Thirty-eight years had gone by from the time when we came away from Kadesh-barnea till we went over the stream Zered; by that time all the generation of the men of war among us were dead, as the Lord had said.

15 For the hand of the Lord was against them, working their destruction, till all were dead.

16 So when death had overtaken all the men of war among the people,

17 The word of the Lord came to me, saying,

18 You are about to go by Ar, the limit of the country of Moab;

19 And when you come near the land of the children of Ammon, give them no cause of trouble and do not make war on them, for I will not give you any of the land of the children of Ammon for your heritage: because I have given it to the children of Lot.

20 (That land is said to have been a land of the Rephaim, for Rephaim had been living there in earlier times, but they were named Zamzummim by the Ammonites;

21 They were a great people, tall as the Anakim, and equal to them in number; but the Lord sent destruction on them and the children of Ammon took their place, living in their land;

22 As he did for the children of Esau living in Seir, when he sent destruction on the Horites before them, and they took their land where they are living to this day:

23 And the Avvim, living in the small towns as far as Gaza, came to destruction by the hands of the Caphtorim who came out from Caphtor and took their land.)

24 Get up now, and go on your journey, crossing over the valley of the Arnon: see, I have given into your hands Sihon, the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and all his land: go forward to make it yours, and make war on him,

25 From now on I will put the fear of you in all peoples under heaven, who, hearing of you, will be shaking with fear and grief of heart because of you.

Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Deuteronomy 2

Commentary on Deuteronomy 2 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary


Verses 1-23

March from Kadesh to the Frontier of the Amorites. - Deuteronomy 2:1. After a long stay in Kadesh, they commenced their return into the desert. The words, “ We departed...by the way to the Red Sea ,” point back to Numbers 14:25. This departure is expressly designated as an act of obedience to the divine command recorded there, by the expression “ as Jehovah spake to me .” Consequently Moses is not speaking here of the second departure of the congregation from Kadesh to go to Mount Hor (Numbers 20:22), but of the first departure after the condemnation of the generation that came out of Egypt. “ And we went round Mount Seir many days .” This going round Mount Seir includes the thirty-eight years' wanderings, though we are not therefore to picture it as “going backwards and forwards, and then entering the Arabah again” ( Schultz ). Just as Moses passed over the reassembling of the congregation at Kadesh (Numbers 20:1), so he also overlooked the going to and fro in the desert, and fixed his eye more closely upon the last journey from Kadesh to Mount Hor, that he might recall to the memory of the congregation how the Lord had led them to the end of all their wandering.

Deuteronomy 2:2-6

When they had gone through the Arabah to the southern extremity, the Lord commanded them to turn northwards, i.e., to go round the southern end of Mount Seir, and proceed northwards on the eastern side of it (see at Numbers 21:10), without going to war with the Edomites ( התגּרה , to stir oneself up against a person to conflict, מלחמה ), as He would not give them a foot-breadth of their land; for He had given Esau (the Edomites) Mount Seir for a possession. For this reason they were to buy victuals and water of them for money ( כּרה , to dig, to dig water, i.e., procure water, as it was often necessary to dig wells, and not merely to draw it, Genesis 26:25. The verb כּרה does not signify to buy).

Deuteronomy 2:7

And this they were able to do, because the Lord had blessed them in all the work of their hand, i.e., not merely in the rearing of flocks and herds, which they had carried on in the desert (Exodus 19:13; Exodus 34:3; Numbers 20:19; Numbers 32:1.), but in all that they did for a living; whether, for example, when stopping for a long time in the same place of encampment, they sowed in suitable spots and reaped, or whether they sold the produce of their toil and skill to the Arabs of the desert. “ He hath observed thy going through this great desert ” ( ידע , to know, then to trouble oneself, Genesis 39:6; to observe carefully, Proverbs 27:23; Psalms 1:6); and He has not suffered thee to want anything for forty years, but as often as want has occurred, He has miraculously provided for every necessity.

Deuteronomy 2:8-10

In accordance with this divine command, they went past the Edomites by the side of their mountains, “ from the way of the Arabah, from Elath (see at Genesis 14:6) and Eziongeber ” (see at Numbers 33:35), sc., into the steppes of Moab, where they were encamped at that time.

God commanded them to behave in the same manner towards the Moabites, when they approached their frontier (Deuteronomy 2:9). They were not to touch their land, because the Lord had given Ar to the descendants of Lot for a possession. In Deuteronomy 2:9 the Moabites are mentioned, and in Deuteronomy 2:19 the Amorites also. The Moabites are designated as “sons of Lot,” for the same reason for which the Edomites are called “brethren of Israel” in Deuteronomy 2:4. The Israelites were to uphold the bond of blood-relationship with these tribes in the most sacred manner. Ar , the capital of Moabitis (see at Numbers 21:15), is used here for the land itself, which was named after the capital, and governed by it.

Deuteronomy 2:11-12

To confirm the fact that the Moabites and also the Edomites had received from God the land which they inhabited as a possession, Moses interpolates into the words of Jehovah certain ethnographical notices concerning the earlier inhabitants of these lands, from which it is obvious that Edom and Moab had not destroyed them by their own power, but that Jehovah had destroyed them before them, as is expressly stated in Deuteronomy 2:21, Deuteronomy 2:22. “ The Emim dwelt formerly therein ,” sc., in Ar and its territory, in Moabitis, “ a high (i.e., strong) and numerous people, of gigantic stature, which were also reckoned among the Rephaites, like the Enakites ( Anakim ).” Emim , i.e., frightful, terrible, was the name given to them by the Moabites. Whether this earlier or original population of Moabitis was of Hamitic or Semitic descent cannot be determined, any more than the connection between the Emim and the Rephaim can be ascertained. On the Rephaim ; and on the Anakites, at Numbers 13:22.

Deuteronomy 2:12

The origin of the Horites (i.e., the dwellers in caves) of Mount Seir , who were driven out of their possessions by the descendants of Esau, and completely exterminated (see at Genesis 14:6, and Genesis 36:20), is altogether involved in obscurity. The words, “ as Israel has done to the land of his possession, which Jehovah has given them ,” do not presuppose the conquest of the land of Canaan or a post-Mosaic authorship; but “ the land of his possession ” is the land to the east of the Jordan (Gilead and Bashan), which was conquered by the Israelites under Moses, and divided among the two tribes and a half, and which is also described in Deuteronomy 3:20 as the “possession” which Jehovah had given to these tribes.

Deuteronomy 2:13-15

For this reason Israel was to remove from the desert of Moab (i.e., the desert which bounded Moabitis on the east), and to cross over the brook Zered , to advance against the country of the Amorites (see at Numbers 21:12-13). This occurred thirty-eight years after the condemnation of the people at Kadesh (Numbers 14:23, Numbers 14:29), when the generation rejected by God had entirely died out ( תּמם , to be all gone, to disappear), so that not one of them saw the promised land. They did not all die a natural death, however, but “ the hand of the Lord was against them to destroy them ” ( המם , lit., to throw into confusion, then used with special reference to the terrors with which Jehovah destroyed His enemies; Exodus 14:24; Exodus 23:27, etc.), sc., by extraordinary judgments (as in Numbers 16:35; Numbers 18:1; Numbers 21:6; Numbers 25:9).

Deuteronomy 2:16-22

When this generation had quite died out, the Lord made known to Moses, and through him to the people, that they were to cross over the boundary of Moab (i.e., the Arnon, Deuteronomy 2:24; see at Numbers 21:13), the land of Ar (see at Deuteronomy 2:9), “ to come nigh over against the children of Ammon ,” i.e., to advance into the neighbourhood of the Ammonites, who lived to the east of Moab; but they were not to meddle with these descendants of Lot, because He would give them nothing of the land that was given them for a possession (Deuteronomy 2:19, as at Deuteronomy 2:5 and Deuteronomy 2:9). - To confirm this, ethnographical notices are introduced again in Deuteronomy 2:20-22 into the words of God (as in Deuteronomy 2:10, Deuteronomy 2:11), concerning the earlier population of the country of the Ammonites. Ammonitis was also regarded as a land of the Rephaites, because Rephaites dwelt therein, whom the Ammonites called Zamzummim . “ Zamzummim ,” from זמם , to hum, then to muse, equivalent to the humming or roaring people, probably the same people as the Zuzim mentioned in Genesis 14:5. This giant tribe Jehovah had destroyed before the Ammonites (Deuteronomy 2:22), just as He had done for the sons of Esau dwelling upon Mount Seir, namely, destroyed the Horites before them, so that the Edomites “dwelt in their stead, even unto this day.”

Deuteronomy 2:23

As the Horites had been exterminated by the Edomites, so were the Avvaeans ( Avvim ), who dwelt in farms (villages) at the south-west corner of Canaan, as far as Gaza, driven out of their possessions and exterminated by the Caphtorites , who sprang from Caphtor (see at Genesis 10:14), although, according to Joshua 13:3, some remnants of them were to be found among the Philistines even at that time. This notice appears to be attached to the foregoing remarks simply on account of the substantial analogy between them, without there being any intention to imply that the Israelites were to assume the same attitude towards the Caphtorites, who afterwards rose up in the persons of the Philistines, as towards the descendants of Esau and Lot.


Verses 24-37

The Help of God in the Conquest of the Kingdom of Sihon. - Deuteronomy 2:24. Whereas the Israelites were not to make war upon the kindred tribes of Edomites, Moabites, and Ammonites, or drive them out of the possessions given to them by God; the Lord had given the Amorites, who had forced as way into Gilead and Bashan, into their hands.

Deuteronomy 2:24-25

While they were encamped on the Arnon, the border of the Amoritish king of Sihon, He directed them to cross this frontier and take possession of the land of Sihon, and promised that He would give this king with all his territory into their hands, and that henceforward (“ this day ,” the day on which Israel crossed the Arnon) He would put fear and terror of Israel upon all nations under the whole heaven, so that as soon as they heard the report of Israel they would tremble and writhe before them. רשׁ החל , “ begin, take, ” an oratorical expression for “ begin to take” ( רשׁ in pause for רשׁ , Deuteronomy 1:21). The expression, “ all nations under the whole heaven ,” is hyperbolical; it is not to be restricted, however, to the Canaanites and other neighbouring tribes, but, according to what follows, to be understood as referring to all nations to whom the report of the great deeds of the Lord upon and on behalf of Israel should reach (cf. Deuteronomy 11:25 and Exodus 23:27). אשׁר , so that (as in Genesis 11:7; Genesis 13:16; Genesis 22:14). וחלוּ , with the accent upon the last syllable, on account of the ו consec. ( Ewald , §234, a .), from חוּל , to twist, or writhe with pain, here with anxiety.

Deuteronomy 2:26-30

If Moses, notwithstanding this, sent messengers to king Sihon with words of peace (Deuteronomy 2:26.; cf. Numbers 21:21.), this was done to show the king of the Amorites, that it was through his own fault that his kingdom and lands and life were lost. The wish to pass through his land in a peaceable manner was quite seriously expressed; although Moses foresaw, in consequence of the divine communication, that he would reject his proposal, and meet Israel with hostilities. For Sihon's kingdom did not form part of the land of Canaan, which God had promised to the patriarchs for their descendants; and the divine foreknowledge of the hardness of Sihon no more destroyed the freedom of his will to resolve, or the freedom of his actions, than the circumstance that in Deuteronomy 2:30 the unwillingness of Sihon is described as the effect of his being hardened by God Himself. The hardening was quite as much the production of human freedom and guilt, as the consequence of the divine decree; just as in the case of Pharaoh. On Kedemoth , see Numbers 21:13. בּדּרך בּדּרך , equivalent to “upon the way, and always upon the way,” i.e., upon the high road alone, as in Numbers 20:19. On the behaviour of the Edomites towards Israel, mentioned in Deuteronomy 2:29, see Numbers 21:10. In the same way the Moabites also supplied Israel with provisions for money. This statement is not at variance with the unbrotherly conduct for which the Moabites are blamed in Deuteronomy 23:4, viz., that they did not meet the Israelites with bread and water. For קדּם , to meet and anticipate, signifies a hospitable reception, and the offering of food and drink without reward, which is essentially different from selling for money. “ In Ar ” (Deuteronomy 2:29), as in Deuteronomy 2:18. The suffix in בּו (Deuteronomy 2:30) refers to the king, who is mentioned as the lord of the land, in the place of the land itself, just as in Numbers 20:18.

Deuteronomy 2:31

The refusal of Sihon was suspended over him by God as a judgment of hardening, which led to his destruction. “ As this day ,” an abbreviation of “as it has happened this day,” i.e., as experience has now shown (cf. Deuteronomy 4:20, etc.).

Deuteronomy 2:32-33

Defeat of Sihon, as already described in the main in Numbers 21:23-26. The war was a war of extermination, in which all the towns were laid under the ban (see Leviticus 27:29), i.e., the whole of the population of men, women, and children were put to death, and only the flocks and herds and material possessions were taken by the conquerors as prey.

Deuteronomy 2:34-35

מתם עיר (city of men) is the town population of men.

Deuteronomy 2:36

They proceeded this way with the whole of the kingdom of Sihon. “ From Aroër on the edge of the Arnon valley (see at Numbers 32:34), and , in fact, from the city which is in the valley ,” i.e., Ar , or Areopolis (see at Numbers 21:15), - Aroër being mentioned as the inclusive terminus a quo of the land that was taken, and the Moabitish capital Ar as the exclusive terminus , as in Joshua 13:9 and Joshua 13:16; “ and as far as Gilead ,” which rises on the north, near the Jabbok (or Zerka, see at Deuteronomy 3:4), “ there was no town too high for us ,” i.e., so strong that we could not take it.

Deuteronomy 2:37

Only along the land of the Ammonites the Israelites did not come, namely, along the whole of the side of the brook Jabbok, or the country of the Ammonites, which was situated upon the eastern side of the upper Jabbok, and the towns of the mountain, i.e., of the Ammonitish highlands, and “ to all that the Lord had commanded ,” sc., commanded them not to remove. The statement, in Joshua 13:25, that the half of the country of the Ammonites was given to the tribe of Gad, is not at variance with this; for the allusion there is to that portion of the land of the Ammonites which was between the Arnon and the Jabbok, and which had already been taken from the Ammonites by the Amorites under Sihon (cf. Judges 11:13.).