Deuteronomy 18

De. 18 15 THE LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me ; unto him ye shall hearken ; according to all that thou desiredst of the LORD thy God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God, neither let me see this great fire any more, that I die not. And the LORD said unto me, They have well said that which they have spoken. I will raise them up a prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee ; and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him. But the prophet, which shall speak a word presumptuously in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die. And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken : the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously, thou shalt not be afraid of him.

20 1 When thou goest forth to battle against thine enemies, and seest horses, and chariots, and a people more than thou, thou shalt not be afraid of them : for the LORD thy God is with thee, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. And it shall be, when ye draw nigh unto the battle, that the priest shall approach and speak unto the people, and shall say unto them, Hear, O Israel, ye draw nigh this day unto battle against your enemies : let not your heart faint ; fear not, nor tremble, neither be ye affrighted at them ; for the LORD your God is he that goeth with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you. And the officers shall speak further unto the people, and they shall say, What man is there that is fearful and faint hearted ? let him go and return unto his house, lest his brethren’s heart melt as his heart. And it shall be, when the officers have made an end of speaking unto the people, that they shall appoint captains of hosts at the head of the people.

When thou drawest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it. And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall become tributary unto thee, and shall serve thee. And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it ; and when the LORD thy God delivereth it into thine hand, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword : but the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take for a prey unto thyself ; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee. Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations. But of the cities of these peoples, which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth : but thou shalt utterly destroy them ; the Hittite, and the Amorite, the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite ; as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee : that they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods ; so should ye sin against the LORD your God.

When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by wielding an axe against them ; for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut them down ; for is the tree of the field man, that it should be besieged 20 of thee ? Only the trees which thou knowest that they be not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down ; and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that maketh war with thee, until it fall.

While Moses lived he was one and all in the house of Jehovah, the mediator between Jehovah and the people in all respects. He was commander-in-chief, deliverer, lawgiver, priest, teacher, chastiser, and judge. There was no function in connection with the representation of God, or with the mediation of the words and acts of God, which he had not discharged, or was not warranted in discharging in the highest (human) form. And he was a prophet in all this and for all this—that is to say, his prophetic gift controlled, pervaded, inspired, and regulated all these functions. K.

In word and deed Moses showed himself an instrument of the Lord, unapproached by any other. He was the prophet without rival in respect of his intercourse with God and of what the Lord did and revealed by him. Of Moses it is said more frequently than of all other prophets together : “God talked with him,” or “God spake to him.” He is not only called “Servant of JEHOVAH” most frequently of all the men of God in the Old Testament, and “Servant of God” (Elohim)—a designation used of him exclusively—but he is also called the greatest among the prophets on account of the intimacy and familiarity of the intercourse he enjoyed with God, and on account of the clear directness which distinguished the revelation given to him. Orelli.

Moses was indeed leader, lawgiver, and worker of miracles to his people, but all these characters fade before the primary one of prophet. Only as a prophet was he leader, lawgiver, and worker of miracles ; and all his greatness belongs to him as a prophet alone. Ewald.

De. 18 : 15-19. This Messianic prophecy predicts another prophet like Moses, who will fulfil and complete his legislation with Divine authority. It does not recognize an order of prophets. If this passage came from the period of the kings and prophets there could hardly fail to be allusions to the prophetic order or to other prophets of Jehovah. We find in Jer. and Is 53, where the Messianic prophet again comes into prominence in the Messianic idea, such references ; and we would expect them in this passage under the same circumstances. Briggs.

This is the clearest promise of Christ that is in all the Law of Moses. What God promised Moses at Mount Sinai (which he relates, verse 18) he promised the people (verse 15), in God’s name. (1) That there should come a prophet by whom God would make known himself and his will to the children of men more fully and clearly than ever he had done before. He is the light of the world, as prophecy was of the Jewish Church. He is the word by whom God speaks to us. (2) That God would raise him up from the midst of them. In his birth he should be one of that nation, should live among them, and be sent to them. In his resurrection he should be raised up at Jerusalem, and from thence his doctrine should go forth to all the world : thus God, having raised up his Son Christ Jesus, sent him to bless us. (3) That he should be like unto Moses. Moses was a lawgiver to Israel and their deliverer out of Egypt ; and Christ not only teaches, but rules and saves ; Moses was the founder of a new dispensation, by signs and wonders and mighty deeds ; and so was Christ, by which he proved himself a teacher come from God. (4) That God would put his words in his mouth (verse 18). What messages God had to send to the children of men, he would send them by him, and give him full instructions what to say and do as a prophet. Hence our Saviour says, My doctrine is not mine originally, but his that sent me. So that this great promise is performed ; this prophet is come, even Jesus, it is he that should come, and we are to look for no other. H.

Christ alone was like unto Moses as a PROPHET, for it is written, There arose not a prophet in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew, face to face, in all the signs and wonders which the Lord sent him to do. This can be understood of Christ only as the apostles expound it (Acts 2 : 22-26). Christ was like unto Moses in respect to his office of mediation between God and his people, but greater than Moses, as being the mediator of a better covenant (or testament) which was established upon better promises. Christ was like unto Moses in excellency ; for as Moses excelled all the prophets, in speaking to God mouth to mouth, so Christ excelled him and all men, in that, being in the bosom of the Father, he hath come down from heaven, and declared God unto us (John 1 : 18 and 3 : 13). Christ was like to Moses in faithfulness, but therein also excelling ; for Moses was faithful in God’s house as a servant, but christ as the son over his own house. Christ was like to Moses in signs and wonders, wherein he also excelled Moses, as the history of the Gospel shows. For he was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God, and all the people. A man approved of God among them, by miracles, signs, and wonders, which God did by him in the midst of them. For he did among them the works which no other man did. Unto him—that is, not unto the diviners, wizards, or any such like, but unto him, and him only—as, Him thou shalt serve (De. 6:13), is expounded Him only (Matt. 4:10). Ainsworth.—He was like to Moses as a legislator. Moses gave laws to Israel by the authority and commandment of God, which the Jews have ever acknowledged as coming from the immediate inspiration of the Almighty. Christ gave a new law, the Gospel contained in the four Evangelists and Acts of the Apostles, on which the Christian Church is founded, and by which all genuine Christians are governed, both in heart and life. To all which may be added, That God never commissioned any human beings to give laws to mankind, but Moses and Christ: and therefore, as a Lawgiver, Christ alone resembles Moses; for, to the present hour, none but themselves have given laws in the name of God, which he has ratified and confirmed by the most indubitable and infallible signs, proofs, and miracles. A. C.—Let us search all the records of universal history, and see if we can find a man who was so like to Moses as Christ was, and so like to Christ as Moses was. If we cannot find such a one, then have we found HIM, of whom Moses in the Law and the prophets did write, to be Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God. Jor-in.

Christ’s allusion to his words as having authority (John 12:48, 49) seems to refer to this passage (verses 18, 19). And the voice from the cloud at Christ’s transfiguration, “Hear ye him,” corresponds to the prominent point of this prophecy, “Unto him shall ye hearken” (verse 15). Moses, present at the transfiguration, must have recognized this identity. H. C.—The woman of Samaria says to Jesus, “I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ; when he is come, he will tell us all things.” As the Samaritans accepted the Pentateuch alone, the notion here expressed, that the Messiah would be a divinely enlightened teacher, cannot have been derived from any other source than the passage before us. The words of the woman bear a striking resemblance to verse 18, “He shall speak unto them all that I shall command him.” Hengs.—When Philip says to Nathanael, “We have found him, of whom Moses in the Law did write,” he can only have thought of this prophecy; for throughout the entire Pentateuch there is only one other Messianic prophecy of a personal character—namely, that of the star and sceptre out of Jacob, the predicates of which were but little adapted to lead Philip to the opinion which he here expressed. This is also true of the Shiloh passage in Gen. 49:10. There is also an allusion to this passage in John 6:14, where the people say, after the feeding of the five thousand, “This is of a truth that prophet that should come into the world.” And Christ undoubtedly had it in his mind when he said, “Had ye believed Moses ye would have believed me, for he wrote of me.” K.—It is evident that the Lord must here have had in view a distinct passage of the Pentateuch—a clear and definite declaration of Moses. But if a single declaration (a direct Messianic prophecy) forms the question at issue, this is the only passage that can possibly be meant; for it is the only prophecy of Christ which Moses, on whose person such stress is laid, uttered in his own name—the only one in which Divine judgments are threatened to the despisers of the Messiah. Hengs.—The interpretation given to our prophecy in the Jewish theology of the period subsequent to the captivity is a proof that this really was the case. What the later prophets proclaimed respecting a new covenant which Jehovah would conclude with his people, and respecting the mediator of this covenant (the “angel of the covenant,” Mal. 3:1), rested upon this prophecy, and was but a further expansion of its interpretation. K.—The sum of the matter is that Jesus the Christ is the greater than Moses—the prophet of prophets, on whom rested, without measure, the Spirit of the Lord D. F.

INTIMATION OF A SUCCESSION OF PROPHETS (verses 20-22).

20-22. The reference to the discrimination of false prophets from true prophets shows that a multiplicity and a succession of prophets was [also] in the view of the speaker; and as a succession of priests, of judges, and of kings was contemplated in this part of the Mosaic legislation, the presumption is that a succession also of prophets was contemplated. W. L. A.—There is a double reference in the entire passage—viz., to the Messiah (verses 15-19) and to the line of divinely inspired prophets under the Hebrew Theocracy (verses 20-22). To keep the Israelites from being carried away by the torrent of superstition, which overflowed and corrupted the nations, true religion was provided with an institution, which should really furnish that knowledge, which false religion pretended to give. A constant succession of true prophets would be a powerful means of weaning God’s people from superstitious practices, and of keeping them from consulting diviners to discover what should befall them. Two tests only of the truth or falsity of the claim to prophetic inspiration are here recognized—viz., first, whether the prophet spoke in the name of Jehovah or of false gods; and, secondly, whether or not a future event, foretold by him, happened according to his word. E. C. W.

The dispensation was not a final one. The kingdom of God had a future which it was the task of prophecy gradually to disclose. The Law enclosed innumerable spiritual germs, which it was the function of prophecy to expand and develop. It had, moreover, underlying its ceremonialism a spiritual basis, which it was the business of the prophets to bring to light, and to recall to people’s minds when they appeared in danger of forgetting it. Prophecy was thus a standing witness to the life, freshness, and power which lay in the heart of a religion largely wrapped up in legal forms. Then there was the necessity for new light and guidance under the conditions of advancing national life, and in times of national emergency. The Law left not a little scope for extended applications of its fundamental principles, and it lay with the prophets to furnish the direction required. All this, in addition to their more general function of rebuking, warning, and testifying, in times of declension, which, with the carrying forward the development of revelation in its relation to Christ and his kingdom, may be regarded as the chief part of their work. It was the greatness of Moses that he was employed by God in inaugurating a new era in the history of his kingdom—in introducing a new order of things—in settling the foundations of a new economy. In this respect he stood at the head of the Old Testament line of prophets, and stood apart from them. “The Law was given by Moses.” He had the ordering and settling of the “house” of God in the form in which it was to last till Christ came, who, “as a Son over his own house,” would revise its arrangements and reconstitute it on a new and better basis (Heb. 3:2-7). Prophets subsequent to Moses stood within the lines of the economy already established. They could enforce and maintain, but while predicting the advent of a new age in which great changes would be wrought, they had no authority of themselves to introduce such changes. It was reserved for Christ to “change times and seasons,” and so to alter and remodel Mosaic institutions or supersede them by new ones, or abolish them by giving the substance for the shadow, as to place the Church upon a permanent and moveless basis, and adapt it for the reception of the Gentile nations. Orr.—There was from time to time a line of prophets who spoke for God. There has come to earth a prophet greater than all beside. They always pointed onward to another; he, never, save as a heavenly gift from him was by him held in reserve, even the gift of the Holy Ghost. Thus God has come into communion with our race, to reveal his mind and will. C. C.