Deuteronomy 9: Just because I’m in a bad mood…
Deuteronomy: Part 9 of 34
Not Because of Israel’s Righteousness
1 Hear, Israel: You are now about to cross the Jordan to go in and dispossess nations greater and stronger than you, with large cities that have walls up to the sky.
Let’s keep in mind the word ‘greater’ here. Stronger we all understand, so what is ‘greater’? Well, both of these words are about comparing one to the other. So the Anakites are not only stronger, but greater. That implies something better than what it is being compared to. So the Anakites are better than the Israelites and yet they are the one who are going to be destroyed. Gotta love the logic.
2 The people are strong and tall—Anakites! You know about them and have heard it said: “Who can stand up against the Anakites?”
3 But be assured today that the LORD your God is the one who goes across ahead of you like a devouring fire. He will destroy them; he will subdue them before you. And you will drive them out and annihilate them quickly, as the LORD has promised you.
Yep, just murder them. So easy for you to do.
4 After the LORD your God has driven them out before you, do not say to yourself, “The LORD has brought me here to take possession of this land because of my righteousness.” No, it is on account of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is going to drive them out before you.
Well, so much for greater. Now they are wicked. But how wicked? Why not compare that to the Israelites? The Israelites had to be tamed by God by making them jump through hoops to please him, so why couldn’t that be done for the Anakites as well? Then they wouldn’t be wicked in God’s eyes either. Nope, he’s playing favourites again.
5 It is not because of your righteousness or your integrity that you are going in to take possession of their land; but on account of the wickedness of these nations, the LORD your God will drive them out before you, to accomplish what he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
After all you’ve accused the Israelites of in the past, you now call them righteous?
6 Understand, then, that it is not because of your righteousness that the LORD your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people.
Yeah, sock puppets with stiff necks.
The Golden Calf
7 Remember this and never forget how you aroused the anger of the LORD your God in the wilderness. From the day you left Egypt until you arrived here, you have been rebellious against the LORD.
That’s not exactly righteous then is it. Why not just wipe them out as well.
8 At Horeb you aroused the LORD’s wrath so that he was angry enough to destroy you.
Yet they still live? How can they be destroyed and still here at the same time?
9 When I went up on the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant that the LORD had made with you, I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water.
Forty days and forty nights? And you lived? On what? Fava Beans and a nice Chianti?
10 The LORD gave me two stone tablets inscribed by the finger of God. On them were all the commandments the LORD proclaimed to you on the mountain out of the fire, on the day of the assembly.
11 At the end of the forty days and forty nights, the LORD gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant.
So Moses held the Lords stones in his hands?
12 Then the LORD told me, “Go down from here at once, because your people whom you brought out of Egypt have become corrupt. They have turned away quickly from what I commanded them and have made an idol for themselves.”
Such evil people. So immoral. Yet you love them and care for them and call them righteous. Isn’t that sweet?
13 And the LORD said to me, “I have seen this people, and they are a stiff-necked people indeed!
Maybe they need a good Chiropractor? A little Reiki massage? A modicum of the laying on of hands?
14 Let me alone, so that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven. And I will make you into a nation stronger and more numerous than they.”
Ok, so let’s say Moses keeps quiet and lets you go off and kill all his people without muttering a word. What then huh? How do you make him into a nation stronger and more numerous if you killed all his people? Were you going to diddle Moses and make him have your love child?
15 So I turned and went down from the mountain while it was ablaze with fire. And the two tablets of the covenant were in my hands.
16 When I looked, I saw that you had sinned against the LORD your God; you had made for yourselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. You had turned aside quickly from the way that the LORD had commanded you.
Well you buggered off for forty days and nights and left them alone. Idle hands and all that? What do you expect?
17 So I took the two tablets and threw them out of my hands, breaking them to pieces before your eyes.
God makes them and gives them to you and your break them into pieces. So of course because your his good buddy he doesn’t just snuff out your pilot light does he! Sure sure.
18 Then once again I fell prostrate before the LORD for forty days and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water, because of all the sin you had committed, doing what was evil in the LORD’s sight and so arousing his anger.
After all that he let’s you get away with I think you arouse more than his anger dude.
19 I feared the anger and wrath of the LORD, for he was angry enough with you to destroy you. But again the LORD listened to me.
Far freaking out! He knows all and yet you are trying to tell us a mortal can change his mind? All knowing implies he knows the future and changing his mind implies he doesn’t know the future. Make up your mind if you have one.
20 And the LORD was angry enough with Aaron to destroy him, but at that time I prayed for Aaron too.
21 Also I took that sinful thing of yours, the calf you had made, and burned it in the fire. Then I crushed it and ground it to powder as fine as dust and threw the dust into a stream that flowed down the mountain.
22 You also made the LORD angry at Taberah, at Massah and at Kibroth Hattaavah.
23 And when the LORD sent you out from Kadesh Barnea, he said, “Go up and take possession of the land I have given you.” But you rebelled against the command of the LORD your God. You did not trust him or obey him.
24 You have been rebellious against the LORD ever since I have known you.
25 I lay prostrate before the LORD those forty days and forty nights because the LORD had said he would destroy you.
Geez, I starting to wish he had. At least then they wouldn’t have to listen to you whining and whinging all the time. What a drama queen you’re turning out to be!
26 I prayed to the LORD and said, “Sovereign LORD, do not destroy your people, your own inheritance that you redeemed by your great power and brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand.
27 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Overlook the stubbornness of this people, their wickedness and their sin.
28 Otherwise, the country from which you brought us will say, ‘Because the LORD was not able to take them into the land he had promised them, and because he hated them, he brought them out to put them to death in the wilderness.’
Which he did to so many of them anyway. That alone shows his impotence when put to the test. He can’t even control his own temper.
29 But they are your people, your inheritance that you brought out by your great power and your outstretched arm.”
Moses, dude, you really should have hired a scriptwriter. This is pure crap.