Deuteronomy 32:12

12 [so] Yahweh alone guided him, and {there was no foreign god accompanying him}.

Deuteronomy 32:12 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 32:12

[So] the Lord alone did lead him
Out of Egypt, through the wilderness, to the land of Canaan, going before them in a pillar of fire and cloud; though this is not to be understood to the exclusion of the ministry of Moses and Aaron, by whom he led them, ( Psalms 77:20 ) ; it may be interpreted of the people being alone in the wilderness when led:

and [there was] no strange god with him;
with Israel; so Aben Ezra, no idolatry among them then; to which sense are the Targums of Jerusalem and Jonathan; but it may rather signify that the Lord alone was the leader of his people, and he had no assistant in that work, and therefore all the glory should be given to him: he is the leader of his people, in a spiritual sense, out of a state of unregeneracy, which is a state of darkness and bondage; out of the ways of sin, and from the pastures of their own righteousness, into an open state of grace, which is a state of light and liberty; in Christ the way, and in the paths of faith, truth, holiness, and righteousness, unto the heavenly glory, typified by the land of Canaan, the blessings of which are next described: the Jews say F26, this will be in the days of the King Messiah; when there will be no abominable thing in Israel, the Lord alone shall lead him.


FOOTNOTES:

F26 Tikkune Zohar, Correct. 18. fol. 32. 2. 36. 2.

Deuteronomy 32:12 In-Context

10 He found him in a desert land, and in a howling, desert wasteland; he {encircled him}, he cared for him, he protected him like the {apple} of his eye.
11 As an eagle stirs up its nest, hovers over its young, spreads out its wings, takes them, carries them on its pinions,
12 [so] Yahweh alone guided him, and {there was no foreign god accompanying him}.
13 And he set him on the high places of [the] land, and he fed [him] the crops of [the] field, and he nursed him with honey from crags, and [with] oil from flinty rock,
14 [With] curds from [the] herd, and [with] milk from [the] flock, with [the] fat of young rams, and rams, the offspring of Bashan, and with goats [along] with the finest kernels of wheat, and [from] the blood of grapes you drank fermented wine.

Footnotes 2

  • [a]. That is, Jacob, standing for Israel
  • [b]. Literally "and there was not with him a god foreign/strange"
Scripture quotations marked (LEB) are from the Lexham English Bible. Copyright 2012 Logos Bible Software. Lexham is a registered trademark of Logos Bible Software.