Deuteronomy 1:10

1:9-18 Moses reminds the people of the happy constitution of their government, which might make them all safe and easy, if it was not their own fault. He owns the fulfilment of God's promise to Abraham, and prays for the further accomplishment of it. We are not straitened in the power and goodness of God; why should we be straitened in our own faith and hope? Good laws were given to the Israelites, and good men were to see to the execution of them, which showed God's goodness to them, and the care of Moses.

The Lord your God hath multiplied you,.... Which was the reason why he could not bear them, or the government of them was too heavy for him, because they were so numerous, and the cases brought before him to decide were so many: and, behold, you are this day as the stars of heaven for multitude; whereby it appeared that the promise to Abraham was fulfilled, Genesis 15:5, they were now 600,000 men fit for war, besides women and children, and those under age, which must make the number of them very large.

Verse 10. - Notwithstanding the cruel oppression to which they were subjected in Egypt, the Israelites had so increased in numbers that they went out of the house of their bondage a mighty host. Ye are this day as the stars of heaven for multitude (cf. Genesis 15:5 ; Genesis 22:17 ). God had promised to Abraham that his seed should be as the stars of heaven for multitude; and Moses here reminds the people that this promise had been fulfilled. This is hardly to be regarded as the utterance of hyperbole. When God gave the premise to Abraham it was to the stars as seen by the patriarch , not as actually existing in the immensity of space, that reference was made; and as the number of stars which can be taken in with the naked eye does not exceed 3000, and as Israel at this time numbered more than 600,000, counting only the adult males ( Numbers 2:32 ), - it might be literally said of them that they had been multiplied as the stars of heaven. The comparison, however, imported nothing more than that their numbers were very great. Deuteronomy 1:10

This appointment of the "captains" (compare Exodus 18:21 ff) must not be confounded with that of the elders in Numbers 11:16 ff. The former would number 78,600; the latter were 70 only. A comparison between this passage and that in Exodus makes it obvious that Moses is only touching on certain parts of the whole history, without regard to order of time, but with a special purpose. This important arrangement for the good government of the people took place before they left Horeb to march direct to the promised land. This fact sets more clearly before us the perverseness and ingratitude of the people, to which the orator next passes; and shows, what he was anxious to impress, that the fault of the 40 years' delay rested only with themselves!

10. ye are this day as the stars of heaven for multitude—This was neither an Oriental hyperbole nor a mere empty boast. Abraham was told (Ge 15:5, 6) to look to the stars, and though they "appear" innumerable, yet those seen by the naked eye amount, in reality, to no more than three thousand ten in both hemispheres. The Israelites already far exceeded that number, being at the last census above six hundred thousand [Nu 26:51]. It was a seasonable memento, calculated to animate their faith in the accomplishment of other parts of the divine promise.

10 . the Lord your God ] See on Deuteronomy 1:6 . as the stars in heaven ] So Deuteronomy 10:22 ; Deuteronomy 28:62 ; and Genesis 22:17 ; Genesis 26:4 ; Exodus 32:13 , in contexts that otherwise betray the editorial hand. It is one of the many hyperboles in D and is not found in the parallel E, Exodus 18.

This land the Lord had placed at the disposal of the Israelites for them to take possession of, as He had sworn to the fathers (patriarchs) that He would give it to their posterity (cf. Genesis 12:7 ; Genesis 13:15 ; Genesis 15:18 ., etc.). The "swearing" on the part of God points back to Genesis 22:16 . The expression "to them and to their seed" is the same as "to thee and to thy seed" in Genesis 13:15 ; Genesis 17:8 , and is not to be understood as signifying that the patriarchs themselves ought to have taken actual possession of Canaan; but "to their seed" is in apposition, and also a more precise definition (comp. Genesis 15:7 with Genesis 15:18 , where the simple statement "to thee" is explained by the fuller statement "to thy seed"). ראה has grown into an interjection equals הנּה. לפני נתן: to give before a person, equivalent to give up to a person, or place at his free disposal (for the use of the word in this sense, see Genesis 13:9 ; Genesis 34:10 ). Jehovah (this is the idea of Deuteronomy 1:6-8 ), when He concluded the covenant with the Israelites at Horeb, had intended to fulfil at once the promise which He gave to the patriarchs, and to put them into possession of the promised land; and Moses had also done what was required on his part, as he explained in Deuteronomy 1:9-18 , to bring the people safety to Canaan (cf. Exodus 18:23 ).

As the nation had multiplied as the stars of heaven, in accordance with the promise of the Lord, and he felt unable to bear the burden alone and settle all disputes, he had placed over them at that time wise and intelligent men from the heads of the tribes to act as judges, and had instructed them to adjudicate upon the smaller matters of dispute righteously and without respect of person. For further particulars concerning the appointment of the judges, see at Exodus 18:13-26 , where it is related how Moses adopted this plan at the advice of Jethro, even before the giving of the law at Sinai. The expression "at that time," in Deuteronomy 1:9 , is not at variance with this. The imperfect ואמר with vav rel., expresses the order of thought and not of time. For Moses did not intend to recall the different circumstances to the recollection of the people in their chronological order, but arranged them according to their relative importance in connection with the main object of his address. And this required that he should begin with what God had done for the fulfilment of His promise, and then proceed afterwards to notice what he, the servant of God, had done in his office, as an altogether subordinate matter.