Deuteronomy 32:10

32:7-14 Moses gives particular instances of God's kindness and concern for them. The eagle's care for her young is a beautiful emblem of Christ's love, who came between Divine justice and our guilty souls, and bare our sins in his own body on the tree. And by the preached gospel, and the influences of the Holy Spirit, He stirs up and prevails upon sinners to leave Satan's bondage. In ver. 13,14, are emblems of the conquest believers have over their spiritual enemies, sin, Satan, and the world, in and through Christ. Also of their safety and triumph in him; of their happy frames of soul, when they are above the world, and the things of it. This will be the blessed case of spiritual Israel in every sense in the latter day.

Deuteronomy 32:10 . He found him in a desert land — Not by chance, but as it were looking out and seeking for him. He did, indeed, manifest himself to Israel in Egypt; but it was in the wilderness of Sinai that God found him in an eminent manner, revealed his will to him, entered into covenant with him, and imparted himself, and his grace and blessing to him. By this word found, he also signifies both their lost condition in themselves, and that their recovery was not from themselves, but only from God, who sought and found them out by his grace. It ought to be observed, however, that the Hebrew word מצא , matsa, here rendered found, signifies also to suffice, or provide sufficiently for, as appears from Numbers 11:22 , Joshua 17:16 ; Jdg 21:14 , and some other passages. And this sense of the word agrees best to the context here; for it cannot be said so properly, that God found the Israelites in the desert, as that he sustained them, and provided sufficiently for them there. Accordingly it is so rendered by the Seventy and Chaldee, the Samaritan and Arabic versions. Compare Deuteronomy 8:15 ; Jeremiah 2:6 . In a waste howling wilderness — In a place destitute of all the necessaries and comforts of life, which also was a type of that desolate and comfortless condition in which all men are before the grace of God finds them out; where, instead of the voices of men, is nothing heard but the howlings and yellings of ravenous birds and beasts.

He led him — He conducted him from place to place by his cloudy pillar and providence. Or, he compassed him about by his provident care, watching over him and preserving him on every side. As the apple of his eye — As men use to keep the apple of their eye, that is, with singular care and diligence, this being, as a most tender, so a most useful part. What a striking idea does this give us of the care which God took of Israel. And similar to this is the care which he takes of all his spiritual Israel, his true people and servants!

(10) The whole of this verse is in the pictorial present in the Hebrew— “He findeth him in a desert land, In a waste howling wilderness; He compasseth him about, He instructeth him, He guardeth him as the apple of his eye.” He found him.—This beautiful expression is common to the Old and New Testaments as a description of God’s first revelation of Himself to man. In the case of Hagar it is written (Genesis 16:7), “the angel of Jehovah found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness.” Concerning Jacob, that “He found him in Bethel,” when Jacob said “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not” (Hosea 12:4; Genesis 28:16). A series of similar passages is closed by the three examples of the lost sheep, the lost money, and the son that had been lost, and was found (Luke 15). He led him about.—The commoner meaning is given in the margin. Rashi has this remark: “He caused them to abide round about His glory (Shechinah), the tent of the congregation in the middle, and four standards on the four sides.”

Verse 10. - God's fatherly care of Israel. In the desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness ; literally, in the land of the desert , in the waste (the formless waste; the word used is that rendered, Genesis 1:2 , "without form"), the howling of the wilderness . "Israel is figuratively represented as a man without food or water, and surrounded by howling, ferocious beasts, and who must needs have perished had not God found him and rescued him" (Herxheimer). The apple of his eye ; literally, the mannikin ( אִישׁון ) of his eye, the pupil; so called because in it, as in a mirror, a person sees his own image reflected in miniature (Gesenius), or because, being the tenderest part of the eye, it is guarded as one would a babe (cf. Psalm 17:8 ; Proverbs 7:2 ; Zechariah 2:12 ). By Delitzsch and others this explanation of the word is rejected as not philologically justified, there being no evidence that the termination ון had a diminutive force; and as not in keeping with the earnestness of the passages in which this word occurs. They prefer the explanation man image to mannikin . Anyhow, the use of the word here must be taken as indicating that Israel is ever in the eye of the Lord, the object of his constant and tenderest care. Deuteronomy 32:10

He found him, not by chance but as it were looking out and seeking for him, He met with him there. He did indeed manifest himself to him in Egypt, but it was in the wilderness at Sinai; where he found God, and God found him in an eminent manner, and revealed his mind and will to him, and entered into covenant with him, and imparted himself and his grace and blessing to him, that being the place appointed in Egypt for God and Israel to meet together, Exodus 3:12 . By this word he also signifies both their lost condition in themselves, and that their recovery was not from themselves, but only from God, who sought and found them out by his grace. In a desert land; in a place destitute of all the necessaries and comforts of life, which also was a type of that desolate and comfortless condition in which all men are before the grace of God finds them out. See Song of Solomon 3:6 8:5 Ezekiel 16:1 Hosea 9:10 13:9 . In the waste howling wilderness, where instead of the voices of men, is nothing heard but the howlings, and yellings, and screeches of ravenous birds and beasts. See Isaiah 43:20 Micah 1:8 . He led him about; he conducted them from place to place by his cloudy pillar and providence. See Exodus 13:18 , &c. Or, he compassed him about, by his provident care over him, watching over him and preserving him on every side. Compare Psalm 32:7 .

10 In a desert land He found him, In the void and howl of the waste. He swept around him, He scanned him, As the pupil of His eye He watched him. 11 As an eagle stirreth his nest, Fluttereth over his young, Spreadeth his wings, doth catch them, Beareth them up on his pinions, 12 The Lord alone was his leader, And never a strange god with Him. 10 . found him ] This and the following vbs. are in the Heb. imperf.; this for the sake of vividness, the rest expressive of iteration. On Israel being found in the desert , cp. Hosea 9:10 , Jeremiah 2:2 . The O.T. tradition is constant that the Hebrews were originally nomad, desert tribes (see the present writer’s Early Poetry of Israel , 39 ff., 56 ff.; and above on Deuteronomy 1:28 ). void and howl ] Or the void of the howl = howling void . compassed him about ] Rather keeps circling around him . cared ] Rather regarded or scanned him penetratingly. kept ] Better watched or guarded . apple of his eye ] Pupil is a happier rendering of the Heb. ’îshôn (Ar. ’insân ), mannikin , the image reflected in the centre of the eye.