 Alright, so we have now covered Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers. Numbers we saw had to do with two numberings of the people. We also saw why there had to be two numberings. The first was God's preparation for them to enter in to be an army of soldiers who can conquer the inheritance which has been given to them. And that is why the first numbering is done to count them as soldiers and find out exactly how many there are in their army. But the second numbering is very sad that entire previous generation because of their disobedience, they all were condemned to perish in the wilderness. And we see that only the younger generation enters and so the second numbering is done to find out now how many are available of the new generation which has grown up. So those were the things that we saw in Numbers. Now coming to Deuteronomy, the term itself in the Greek literally means a second law. Or you know DEU that would be the phrase for the numeral 2. So DEU second law or you can say a second edition of the law or you can say a repetition of the law. So those are the terms that we can use to interpret the term Deuteronomy. Now why was the law repeated a second time? First time they have already heard it. It was given to them in great detail at Mount Sinai. Why is this law once again being taught a second time? And it's specifically because now this new generation is going to go inside the Promised Land. And when the Mount Sinai event took place, many of them were extremely young or maybe not even born. And so now they have to be reminded once again of the laws which the Lord has laid down. So which is why there's a second repetition given over here in this book of all the laws which the Lord has taught. And also this Deuteronomy is supposed to be like a warning to them to remind them of the really bad example which their parents had set in not trusting God. And so they are being exhorted not to be like their parents but to be people who will trust God and obey him. So Deuteronomy can almost be called a summary of the previous four books. All that God had taught in Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers is kind of summarized over here in our book of Deuteronomy. It consists of a series of fable messages. You know Moses is now reaching the end of his life. And so in each fable message he keeps reminding the people. He says see this is what God taught. So remember to do this. Follow what the Lord has said. So it's like a series of fable messages in which he is encouraging them to hold on to God. And we see narrative history. We also see portions of law where the instructions and the laws which have been given are again listed and enumerated. And we also have another small example of a new type of genre which we have not seen in the other four books. That would be a song. Of course once we come to Psalms we will find lots of songs. But over here in book of Deuteronomy there is one single song and that is the song of Moses in which he talks about all that Israel has gone through up to that point and how God has been faithful and he exhorts them to hold on to the Lord and be faithful to him. So in the song of Moses we see a kind of summary of all the history that has happened to the nation up to this point of time. So it's supposed to be like a memorial where they are recollecting what God has done and they should fill them up with gratitude. It should also fill them up with faith. You know looking back on all that God has done for them so far. So it should build them up in their spirit and they should feel encouraged that now the one who has been faithful all this while will continue to be faithful even in the future. So usually things were written in the form of a song so that people could literally by heart the words and keep repeating it and learning from it. So poetry and songs are generally written in such a way that it's easy to memorize, easy to remember. So Moses would have composed this portion in the form of a song specifically so that the new generation can memorize it so that they will always remember what God did for them as a nation in the past. So once they enter the promised land there are going to be many challenges and songs like this will be a reminder to them of what God has done for them. One very popular passage in the Book of Deuteronomy that would be chapter 28 and most of us are familiar with that. That's chapter 28 is where you have a list of the blessings and the curses. So that's one of the more popular well-known portions. Yeah there are quotations from this Book of Deuteronomy. 90 quotations it says in my notes. I don't know whether that's correct or wrong but that's a large number if it is true. I do know that there are lots of quotations from the Book of Deuteronomy in the New Testament but they probably don't really mean the entire full quotes. They probably mean just words and phrases found in the Book of Deuteronomy which are also found in the New Testament books. But yeah there are some very important references taken in the New Testament from the Book of Deuteronomy. The chief main example is that when Jesus had to deal with Satan in the wilderness where Satan had come to tempt him, all the three quotations that Jesus uses to stand on the Word of God, all of them are taken from the Book of Deuteronomy. So sometimes when I teach Deuteronomy there's a tendency for people to kind of doze off because they think it's all just law and law is so dry. But look at that, Jesus knew his Deuteronomy inside out, he knew it by heart and so when Satan came and tempted, he quoted from this Book. So because he did not just see it as law, he saw it as the will of his father. His father had expressed his will and his desire in this Book of Deuteronomy. So Jesus learnt it, memorised it so that it would be a reminder to him always of what his father wants and what he should do to please his father. So we can look at laws and instructions as just something that must be followed or we can look upon them as statements that are literally expressing the desire of God and it's our desire to please him. So if we think of it in that way, it would give us motivation to really follow those instructions which the Lord has delivered. Another thing that we could say about the Book of Deuteronomy, Jesus quotes many times from the Book of Deuteronomy when he's talking to the Jewish people. And that's mainly because the Jews of his day considered Deuteronomy to be one of the most authoritative books in this first five books, the Pentateuch. So in the Pentateuch, they regarded Deuteronomy to be the most authoritative simply because it's a nice summary of all that has been mentioned in the first four books and it clearly tries to bring out what exactly the expectations of God are. So it is considered a very authoritative book and Jesus makes a note of this and he uses quotations from this book to defend his arguments whenever he has discussions with them. It is also said by some scholars that most probably the Book of Deuteronomy would have been used as the basis for the Sermon on the Mount. Now I don't really know much about this but that's just something that people say that probably Matthew chapters 5-7 were probably influenced by the Book of Deuteronomy. Coming to the structure of the book, maybe we could consider chapters 1-4 as the first section because here in these chapters, Moses talks about the past history of Israel and how God has brought them out of Egypt and all of that. Chapters 5-28 would be one huge chunk and be called the second section because here you have a lot of instructions, all the laws which are being repeated in great detail on how to live a godly life, how to live in a way that is pleasing to the Lord. So that would be one major section. Chapters 29 and 30 could be one separate section because that is where all the people stand in front of Moses and they make a commitment to God saying that they are going to keep the covenant which God has given them. So in some of your Bibles, the heading over there will be renewal of the covenant. So chapters 29 and 30 is where the people, they come into the presence of God and they say yes, we will follow the covenant which was originally given at Sinai. So there's a renewal of the covenant which is done where the people take a pledge and say from now on yes, we shall do these things. The last section maybe could be chapters 31 to 34 where you have Moses handing over authority to Joshua and in the last chapter is where we see God showing Moses the promised land. Of course, he's not allowed to enter because of his disobedience but he is able to see the land and he finally is taken by God to Mount Nebo where he dies and he's probably the only person for whom the funeral service was done by God himself. It's not human beings who did this funeral service. God does the funeral service personally and attends to his body so we do not know where the Lord chose to bury it. But God does the funeral service for this man. Amazing man but he could not see the promised land because he chose not to obey the Lord regarding the rock. Instead of speaking to the rock and bringing out water, he strikes the rock and a man of his maturity should have known better because he had walked with God, followed him in every way, knew the heart of God, knew what pleases him, what displeases him, had a heart of compassion just like God. So a man of that level, when he was told to speak to the rock, he should have done that and so when he dishonours God by doubting whether God would really be able to bring water out of that rock just if he simply talks to it, he thinks maybe God needs a little assistance, let me hit it and maybe something would come out of it. But the thing about the Old Testament is that everything in Old Testament has got symbolism. Every single deed, every single act is pointing in some way towards Christ. So going around striking the rock two, three times like as if Jesus has to be crucified two, three times, it would lead to a lot of wrong doctrine. So God was trying to bring out a theological point, the rock would need to be struck just once and that would be enough, living waters would come out. So you see there's a comparison being drawn with Jesus over there and Moses unaware of all of that, he strikes it when he is not supposed to strike it. He is supposed to speak and he disobeys and because of that theological mistake which he has generated accidentally, he is not allowed to enter the promised land. So we see some key important prophecies, there are four main prophecies in the book of Deuteronomy which actually talk about, which prophesy about what's going to happen to Israel in the future. So we have a prophecy about how they will victoriously enter into the land of Canaan and that gets fulfilled in the book of Joshua. This is there in your textbook, so you can actually look at it. There's also a prediction of how they're going to sin against God in the land of Canaan and we see the fulfillment of that happening in kings and in judges. There's also a prophecy given about how they are going to be sent away captive to a foreign land. So even the exile is also prophesied beforehand in the book of Deuteronomy and of course even their return from exile, how God will once again restore them. All of these things are recorded, you know, already even before these events took place, all these things were recorded beforehand in the book of Deuteronomy. Just coming to some maybe some themes and concepts which we find in this book of Deuteronomy. We could maybe look at the, okay, maybe we can look at Deuteronomy chapters 27 to 29 which kind of form a core, the main central theme in this book of Deuteronomy because that is where the people come together and they take their pledge, this new generation takes its pledge saying, yes, from now on we shall follow the Lord. Okay, so that we see that happening in chapters 27, 28, 29. So in chapter 27, Deuteronomy 27, this very specific instruction given to the people, maybe one of us could actually read that out. Deuteronomy chapter 27, if you could maybe read verses 2 and 3, Deuteronomy 27, 2 and 3. Yeah, okay, so God asks them to take some very large stones and to coat it with plaster. Yeah, some bibles translated as white washing it. Whatever the point is that you're going to be applying something white on those stones so that you can carve out words, you can inscribe words into that. And that will be a reminder to the people because the other instruction that is given is that in verse 5 it says also build an altar. So every time the people would come over there to make their sacrifices, their eyes would automatically go to these large stones which are there in the side with all of the laws written down on it. And it would be a reminder to them that they are supposed to keep these laws. Okay, so it would serve as the reminder to them. And in chapter 28 is where we have the blessings and the curses which are listed. So the promise which God makes to the Israelites is that if they would obey him and stay faithful to him, he would reward them with a lot of abundance. They would not lack in any way. They would always have a sufficient, you know, a sufficiency in terms of economic needs and also God promises that they would be safe and secure because all the other nations would be afraid of them. God actually says that he says that if you would stay faithful to me, the other nations will be afraid of you. They will not even have the guts to come and wage a war against you. So this is the promise that God makes. On the other hand, God wants them. If you choose to disobey these laws which I have given and you are not honoring me by following them, then your harvest, your crops will fail, your health will fail. And also the Lord says that he will remove his protection from the people and then the enemy will be able to come and attack them. So all these things are given in chapter 28 and then we come to chapter 29 where all the people they stand over there and they say, yes, we shall obey what God has told because we don't want the curses of God coming upon us. So 27, 28, 29 form the very core of the Book of Deutronomy. We see a lot of passages in Book of Deutronomy where again and again they are told to teach their children in the ways of God. They are told to teach their children and remind their children of these laws. Why? Because God does not want a repetition of what happened earlier in Egypt because when they went over there, Joseph invited them to that place. They all settled down over there and then maybe after about 100 years after Joseph's death, they all just completely forgot their God. They reached a stage where they couldn't even remember his name. So which is why Moses says, when I go to them and I talk about the Lord, they say, who is he? What do I say? So things had become that bad because the earlier generations did not teach their children the ways of God. So over here in the Book of Deutronomy, you have Deutronomy 49, Deutronomy 67, Deutronomy chapters 20 to 25, 11, 19, 32, 46. In all of these passages, we see instruction given to train up their children in the laws of God so that they will not forget him the way they had forgotten him earlier and God will be able to bless them rather than curse them. So you have many references to this. Then coming to the 10 commandments which are mentioned here in Deutronomy chapter 5, we see that it's almost identical to the list which is there in Exodus 20. Exodus 20 is where God gives the commandments for the first time and we have those commandments repeated over here in Deutronomy chapter 5. The one main difference that we see, there's a small little difference in the way it's phrased. The wording is a little different between the two passages. But one main difference that we see between the Exodus 20 passage and this Deutronomy 5 passage, the main difference we see is regarding the Sabbath. In both the places, God says you must observe the Sabbath. But the explanation why you should observe the Sabbath is a little different because if we were to go to Exodus chapter 20 verse 11, let us see what God says about the Sabbath. If we could have one person read out Exodus chapter 20 verse 11. So there's a great significance over here of why all these Israelites should dedicate one day for rest and only focus on God and worshipping him and just relaxing and resting. So it was supposed to be a day of rest and it was supposed to be a day of worship. And the reason why God says they should do this is because on the seventh day, he had already finished all his works of creation and he rested from his work. Now, does that mean that God was tired after doing the creation? God has no human limitations. So over there when it says he rested, that would be Old English. Basically it's saying he stopped. So yeah, it would be in the sense of he stopped. So when it says rested, for instance, if I'm doing my homework and if I say that I have rested from my homework and now I will go out and talk with my friends. So I am not resting in the sense that I'm exhausted. I'm resting in the sense I have now seized from this activity and now I will go on to do something else. So the seventh day, the Sabbath talks about completion, how God has finished creating everything that you could possibly need for a good life. It has all been set up. It has all been established. Everything that is possibly required for this human race has been provided and there's nothing more to do. So God has rested from his activity because there is nothing more, nothing extra to be given. Already everything that humans require, he has finished creating and so he rests from it and so the people, the Israelites are supposed to remember this and say, yes, when you created, you created everything that we could possibly require. All our needs are met in you and so we can rest in you. We don't have to slog on the seventh day, the way we are slogging on all the other days because you are the one from whom provision comes. You are the one from whom health and protection and all of that comes. So on the seventh day, we can remind ourselves that all that is required for humans was already created so perfectly that nothing more additional was needed and God rested. So we are supposed to rest in that knowledge. So what would be a New Testament parallel for us? For us, the Sabbath would be a time when we would remind ourselves that on the cross, Jesus did everything required for us to be able to live on this earth and also to enjoy a reward in heaven. So all that is required has already been provided in him. So we do not have to be anxious and we do not have to be so desperate that we go and work even on the seventh day. Now there are some people who will not get a break on Sunday but then they are given a break on some other day during the week. So we all are expected to have a day of rest. We don't need to slog seven days a week every single week because we have a God who knows how to take care of our needs. He knows how to take care of our finances. So we don't have to be desperate like the rest of the world which thinks that they have to work, work, work and earn and earn otherwise they will not be able to survive. We never have to do that because God has finished his work, completed what is required and all our needs can be met in him. So there's a very beautiful interpretation for why the Sabbath should be celebrated and that's given in Exodus 20. And an extra piece of information is given regarding the Sabbath in Deuteronomy 5. So if one of us could read out Deuteronomy 5 verse 15. Okay, so now they are told not only are you just supposed to remember what God accomplished at the time of creation but now there's something additional, something very personal that was done for you people specifically, you people as a nation where God personally came down to you when you did not even know his name anymore, where you had even forgotten him. You were in that condition and you were crying out in your pain and God whom you were ignoring, heard you and cared enough to do something about it and he raised up a deliverer for you and so not only has he provided everything that is required on this earth he is even today personally involved in your lives. He came to you when you did not even care about him and were not even worshipping him, he came to you and he redeemed you with signs and wonders and miracles. So it should be a reminder to them that they are resting in him not just because he has provided all that creation they are also resting in him because now he is personally involved in their lives and with his mighty outstretched arm he can do for them all that they require. So which is why whatever your work schedule may be whether or not you get an off on Sunday do make sure that you do take a day off rest sometime during the week and on that day dedicate it to the Lord and reflect on what he has done for you so far and based on that all that he can do for you in the future so it should be a day of rest not just physically but even in your heart where you are reminding yourself of all that he has done and all that he will continue to be for you and your family. So we do need this Sabbath we do need a day of rest where we can back off from the things of the world and remind ourselves of from where our true provision comes it does not come from the job it does not come from our skills and talents it comes from the Lord directly and as long as we place him first in our lives all the other things will anyway follow like it says in Matthew 11.33 Yes now it just ok the question asked over here in the class was that shouldn't the Sabbath be on a Sunday specifically so in those days in the early church it says that every day they were meeting together to talk about the things of God to learn to fellowship ok so they were doing it every single day they were meeting together according to the culture of their times and according to whatever work they had maybe that was alright and then things changed no longer were they farming communities no longer were there people involved in certain commercial works life changed the nature of life changed so as time went by they had to adjust and make a time for themselves when they could gather and remember what the Lord has done so they began to use the pagan holidays as their day their day off when they can come together and worship the Lord so which is why as time went by they were no longer gathering on a daily basis because that was becoming impossible now they had grown in numbers they were a much larger believer community so then they began to have fixed days and their days coincided with some pagan holiday so while all the pagans would be celebrating their holiday these people would be coming together to reflect on what God has done for them and then as time still went on and on and people came up with this whole Sunday to Saturday business they felt that ok as one particular day is being set aside many of these places began to be Christianized many of the countries began to be Christianized and so then they set apart Sunday as the day so in the Bible God did not say Sunday should be the day when you should have the Sabbath he did say that one day out of the seven days should be a day of Sabbath that he was very clear about so depending on the culture that you are living in now depending on your circumstances today so if Sunday is impossible for you and you cannot then you would have to find a day where you can have a day of rest and also some kind of spiritual nutrition so some people they choose a Bible study or something or a midweek service many churches now provide that because they know there are people who cannot get their nutrition on Sunday and their fellowship on Sunday so they try to arrange a midweek service or a midweek Bible study or something like that which would cater to the needs of the people so the church should be willing to come up with those alternatives for people so that the people can continue to have their Sabbath so that they can continue to renew themselves and strengthen themselves in the Lord so I would basically say that maybe it's not a rule that it has to be only Sunday but I'm very very sure God expects us to have one day out of the seven days he's very serious about that it should be a time of rest from work and also a time of rest in him in his presence so I think those things are more important for him again that's just my opinion okay there are some questions which people raise about who wrote the last portion of Deutronomy the last chapter where it talks about Moses dying because a dead man cannot write about his funeral so which is why they say that most probably it was Joshua because anyway Joshua was going to take over from Moses so all the written scrolls which Moses would have written down he would have handed it over to Joshua so it would be easy for Joshua to add extra material that God is asking him to add so Joshua probably is the one who would have added the last chapter but then some others say that maybe it was the 70 elders who were serving under Moses maybe one of them would have done it so we don't really know but it's only those who want to criticize the word of God who come up with these questions they say how could a dead man do it so this is all fake no it's not all fake there are good reasonable explanations of how someone could have written down this last portion after the person had died okay another thing that maybe we would need to know about Deutronomy is that it's interesting because Deutronomy is written in a particular writing style it's like a contract so from the first millennium BC no second millennium BC second millennium BC at that time archaeologists have found many many treaties belonging to a nation called the Hittites so a lot of Hittite treaties have been discovered by archaeologists from the second millennium BC and in these writings in these treaties they used a particular format to write out the treaty so in that same pattern Deutronomy has been written now when it came to the first millennium BC one century later the writing style had changed and treaties were written in a different way so that actually helps us to identify exactly around what time Deutronomy was written because they used the particular writing style which was used in the second millennium BC and so I will just very briefly go through that because what we have in the Bible is not just somebody the work of someone's mind these are all writings with historical backing behind them they are not just things which someone fabricated in their head these are all backed up by historical archaeological evidence so over here in the same way the Hittite treaty would begin with a preamble where you have an introduction in the same way even in Deutronomy chapter 1 verses 1 to 5 is like an introduction and the speaker over there is Yahweh who is speaking then the next portion in this treaty would be where they would talk about all the things that the king has done in the past and all the things that he has accomplished there would be a list of all his accomplishments in the same way when we look over here in Deutronomy Deutronomy chapter 1 verse 6 up to chapter 4 verse 49 about all of God's acts all the things which God did on behalf of Israel so again we have a comparison between the Hittite treaty format and the Deutronomy format then the next thing after talking about the king and what he has achieved then they would actually come down to all the conditions in the treaty condition number 1, condition number 2 so those would be listed out and we see that happening in Deutronomy chapters 5 up to chapter 26 where all the things which God expects the people to be doing all that is listed out and then in the end of the treaty there would be some specific things mentioned if you look at any of the Hittite treaties you would basically see these main features if the person who is signing the treaty and entering into the treaty if they are following it these are the benefits they are going to get but if they refuse to keep the treaty if they break the treaty then these will be the the punishment or that would be the consequences of their disobedience to the treaty so in the same way here also in our Deutronomy we see the benefits and the curses mentioned and finally in the end there would be a there would be a portion at the end of the treaty saying that this treaty has been overseen supervised by so and so God and so if you don't follow the treaty may the wrath of that God come down upon you or something like that would be the wording in the Hittite treaty and over here we do not have that kind of a witness from some imaginary deity rather we have the witness of Moses who reminds them of all that God has done and so God the one God is the one who is saying that he will keep his end of the bargain so in a song format this truth is brought out that the God who has always overlooked and overseen and provided for them in the past he will continue to do so even in the future so those of you who are interested if you were to go online you would actually find that you would find articles where they literally write down the Hittite treaty in detail and then in the next column they would write out deutronomy and show what a close comparison can be done between this the document the deutronomy document and the Hittite treaties so so what we are reading is all based in history it's not just something imaginary so do we have any questions at this point of time alright there is complete silence in the class and I have noticed this generally happens whenever I teach deutronomy which is actually very unfortunate okay if we do not have any more questions we will conclude the class so maybe we can close with the word of prayer Lord we just thank you so much that you have given your law not to bring a burden upon us but to express your heart to express what you desire and so Lord we pray that you would help us to look at your law at your instructions not as something that must be observed out of a sense of duty but rather things that we can do to bring joy to your heart because Lord as believers it is our desire to honor you it is our desire to do things which are pleasing to you so we pray that you would give us hearts that will look upon your instructions not as obligations that must be fulfilled but rather or Lord as things that we can do to bring delight to your heart I pray that you would also help us to learn from all the other aspects of deutronomy that are mentioned in this book thank you Lord in Jesus name amen thank you so much for listening and we will meet again next week the Hitter Treaty thing maybe I could put up the link for that so I can give you a link for that