Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Deuteronomy 32:36

For the LORD shall judge his people, and repent himself for his servants, when he seeth that [their] power is gone, and [there is] none shut up, or left.

36  For the Lord shall judge for His people,

And relent for His servants’ sake,

When He sees that their grip is gone,

Nor fast nor free remaineth;

37  And shall say, Where be their gods

The rock whereon they refuged,

38  Which ate the fat of their sacrifice,

Drank the wine of their pouring?

Let them arise to your help,

Let them be a covert above you!

36. judge his people ] As the parallel line shows, this means ‘will judge for his people.’

power ] Lit. hand, i.e. hold or grip.

nor fast nor free ] Heb. ‘ar w e ‘azb, an alliterative phrase for the whole population. Whether it means in and out of prison, or under and free of taboo or ritual uncleanness, is doubtful.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Deu 32:36

For the Lord shall judge His people.

Power for the powerless

I. The people whom Jehovah owns and claims as His people and His servants. God has a people peculiarly His own. You must be blind; indeed, when looking into your Bible, not to see that this fact is one of the most prominent things set forth in the Book of God. Moreover, this people, whom Jehovah calls His people and His servants, are held by Him as His especial property, as His own inheritance. The Lords portion is His people. What a portion! One might easily understand the Psalmist, and the prophet too, when they said, The Lord is my portion, saith my soul; and a blessed portion it is for a poor ruined sinner to have the covenant God as his portion. But reverse it, and see how God claims His people, and calls them His portion, as if they were worth something–as if they were of some value. I must not, however, overlook the second term employed in our text–servants. His servants ye are to whom ye obey. If, then, your life, your heart, your soul, and all your powers are wholly at the service of God; if that service is your delight, and you meet Him in it, surely you may come to the Conclusion that you belong to His servants. But there is another point: that His people and His servants essentially differ from all people beside. They were separated from among the nations, Gods people and Gods servants differ from the world in their life, in their language, and in their laws.

II. The exigencies to which they were reduced. They are said, in my text, to be seen by their own God as having lost all their power, and none shut up or left–a most affecting description of Gods chosen people under the ruined condition into which sin has brought them; and also of the extremity to which they are reduced in personal experience, before Gods deliverance appears on their behalf. What a marked description of mans ruin under the fall, and by actual sin!–so utterly undone as to have no power! God saw that their power was gone. When the poor sinner is first awakened by the grace of God, and begins to feel the importance of obtaining salvation, he does not believe that he has no power, but sets to immediately to put forth his power, determines upon reading much, hearing much, praying much, avoiding much that is evil, and doing much that is good. Moreover, in the language of my text, the people and servants of God are to be expelled from all false refuges, None shut up or left. There are exigencies in the believers experience with regard to things spiritual and to things providential that answer exactly to this description–none shut up or left–as regards experience, not a hope left; not a vestige of supposed strength–not a false refuge but will be swept away as a refuge of lies; not a helper left. Moreover, it may imply, in spiritual experience, no comfort shut up or left, no reserve, nothing to fall back upon, not a promise to cling to, not a sermon which he is supposed to have heard to profit, but rises up in judgment against him! What! none of his holier feelings? No, none of them. What, none of his earnest prayers and his believing confidence? No, none of them–none shut up or left. Now, whether as to the spiritual experience, or the providential experience of His people, He frequently, to show His wisdom, His grace, His power, His love and condescension, strips man of his all, that He Himself may become his all, and that Christ may be found to be all in all to him.

III. By the Lords judging His people I understand His judging for them; judging His enemies on account of their cruelty; judging for them so as to decide that they are His own–that the chastisement has been carried on long enough, and that their enemies shall then be punished, as in the preceding verse, To Me belongeth vengeance. This is what I understand by His judging His people. The other phrase, repent Himself for His servants, means an alteration, of course, in the events of Providence, and in His manner of dealing with His people; that He changes the order of things. From this we derive the spiritual truth, that however the Lord chastises His people, and however long the chastisement may continue, there will come a moment when the Lord will repent Himself, or change His course, and say, Their affliction is at an end, and I will not afflict or grieve My people any more. Then shall the froward Ephraim be spoken to as by the prophet, I have seen his ways, and I will heal him. God is a never-failing Deliverer to His people; and we will glance at a few things in which this is manifested. The first is, that His covenant faithfulness is called forth when His peoples faithlessness has arisen to its utmost height and been chastised. If you ask me what pertains to a Christian in himself, I should, for one, confess, after all the years I have known of the Lord, that one word, faithlessness, would mark all. If I am asked what constitutes the character and conduct of the Deity towards His Church and people in every age, amidst all their afflictions, and when they are reduced to the lowest ebb, I should say, Righteousness is the girdle of His loins, and faithfulness the girdle of His reins. One word more; entire deliverance is certain when God interferes. He who has delivered will deliver; and be assured, poor tried soul, whoever thou art, and in whichever of those exigencies thou art placed–be assured of this one thing, that if the Lord has begun to judge for you, has changed the course and order of His proceedings for you, has created a ray of hope and given you spiritual desires which you did not before possess, has communicated the ability to pour out your soul in pleading with Him, and to hang upon Him though it appears as it were by a thread, He will perfect your deliverance in due time. Every enemy shall be vanquished. Every difficulty shall disappear. (J. Irons.)

Mans extremity, Gods opportunity

To ungodly men the time of their fall is fatal; there is no rising again for them. They mount higher and higher upon the ladder of riches; but at last they can climb no higher, their feet slide, and all is over. This calamity hasteneth on (Deu 32:35). It is not so with three characters of whom we will now consider: they are judged in this world that they may not be condemned hereafter (1Co 11:32; Psa 37:24).

I. The Lords own Church.

1. A Church may be sorely tried–power gone, none left.

(1) By persecution.

(2) By removals, death, poverty.

(3) By the lack of a faithful ministry.

(4) By general falling off of members. Various circumstances may scatter a people–internal dissension, pestilent heresy, lack of spiritual life.

2. But it may then cry to God.

(1) If indeed His people, the covenant stands, and He will judge them.

(2) If still His servants, the bond holds on His side, and He will repent Himself for them.

(3) His eye is ever upon them, and their eye should be up to Him.

3. He will return and revive His own Church (Deu 32:39).

4. Meanwhile the trial is permitted–

(1) To find out His servants and drive out hypocrites (Isa 33:14).

(2) To test the faith of sincere saints, and to strengthen it.

(3) To manifest His own grace by supporting them under the trying times, and by visiting them with future blessing.

(4) To secure to Himself the glory when the happier days are granted.

II. The tried believer.

1. His power may be gone. Bodily health fails, prudence is baffled, skill is taken away, courage sinks, even spiritual force departs (Samuel 3:17, 18).

2. His earthly help may fail. A man without a friend moves the compassion of God.

3. He may be assailed by doubts and fears, and hardly know what to do with himself (Job 3:23-26).

4. His hope lies in the compassion of God: He has no pleasure in putting His people to grief (Mic 7:19).

5. Such sharp trials may be sent because–

(1) Nothing less would cure the evil hidden within.

(2) Nothing less might suffice to bring the whole heart to God alone.

(3) Nothing less might affect the believers future life.

(4) Nothing less might complete his experience, enlarge his acquaintance with the Word, and perfect his testimony for God.

III. The convinced sinner. He is cleaned out of all that wherein he prided himself.

1. His self-righteousness is gone.

2. His ability to perform acceptable works is gone.

3. His secret hopes which were shut up are now all dead and buried.

4. His proud romantic dreams are gone.

5. His worldly delights, his bold defiance, his unbelief, his big talk, his carelessness, his vain confidence, are all gone.

6. Nothing is left but the pity of God. When the tide has ebbed out to the very uttermost, it turns. The prodigal had spent all before he returned. Empty-handed sinners are welcome to the fulness of Christ. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 36. The Lord shall judge his people] He has an absolute right over them as their Creator, and authority to punish them for their rebellions as their Sovereign; yet he will repent himself – he will change his manner of conduct towards them, when he seeth that their power is gone – when they are entirely subjugated by their adversaries, so that their political power is entirely destroyed; and there is none shut up or left – not one strong place untaken, and not one family left, all being carried into captivity, or scattered into strange lands. Or, he will do justice to his people, and avenge them of their adversaries; see De 32:35.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

For, or, nevertheless, or, but yet, as the particle chi is sometimes used, as Job 5:7; Isa 9:1; 49:25. Having spoken of the dreadful calamity which would come upon his people, he now turns his discourse into a more comfortable strain, according to the usual method of the prophets, and here begins to show that after God had humbled and sorely chastised his people, yet at last he would have mercy upon them, and turn their captivity, as it here follows.

Shall judge his people, i.e. shall plead their cause, shall protect and deliver them, as that phrase is oft used. See Psa 7:8; 10:18; Isa 1:17; 11:4; Jer 5:28; 22:16.

Repent himself for his servants, i.e. repent of the evils he hath brought upon them, will change his course and carriage towards them.

None shut up, or left: none shut up, either in their strong cities or castles, or other hiding-places, or in the enemys hands or prisons, whence there might be some hope or possibility of redemption; and none left, as the poor and contemptible people are neglected and usually left by the conquerors in the conquered land, as 2Ki 25:12, but all seem to be cut off; and the people quite destroyed. So this phrase is used 1Ki 14:10; 21:21; 2Ki 9:8; 14:26.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

For the Lord shall judge his people,…. The true church and members of it, in opposition to the false and apostate church; his chosen and covenant people, whom he gave to Christ, and who are redeemed by his blood, and effectually called by his grace; the people he shall call out of Babylon, or preserve from the corruptions of it before its fall; and who are the objects of his love and delight; a distinct, peculiar, and special people, near unto him, and all righteous: these he will judge at this time, distinguish between them and the followers of antichrist; he will take their cause in hand, and plead it, and do justice to them; he will right their wrongs and injuries, and take vengeance on their enemies; he will protect and defend them, reign and rule over them. Now will be the time, when the witnesses slain are raised, that he will take to himself his great power and reign, and the time of the dead when they will be judged, and a reward given to his servants and prophets, to his saints, and all that fear his name; and when he will destroy them that have destroyed the earth, Re 11:17; so the Targum of Jonathan interprets this of the word of the Lord that shall judge his people in mercy:

and repent himself for his servants; by whom are meant not only the ministers of the Gospel, his witnesses that prophesy in sackcloth, and who will be slain when they have finished their testimony; but all that are effectually called by grace, who though they have been the servants of sin, and the vassals of Satan, yet by the grace of God become the servants of God and of righteousness; dislike and cast off their old masters; readily, willingly, and cheerfully, take upon them the yoke of Christ, and freely obey him, constrained by his love, and influenced by views of interest in him: and so serve him without any selfish views, owning that, when they have done all they can, they are but unprofitable servants: now for or on account of these he will repent himself, because of the evils he has suffered to come upon them, being moved with pity, and compassion to them in their miserable circumstances, as they will be in when the witnesses his servants will be slain; not that, properly speaking, repentance is in God; he never changes his mind, counsel, and purposes; he never alters his love, his choice, nor his covenant; or repents of his gifts, and calling of special grace; though he is sometimes said to repent of outward good things he has bestowed, or promised to bestow conditionality; and of evils he has threatened or inflicted; yet this is only to be understood of a change of his outward dealings and dispensations with men, according to his changeable will; and this will be the case now with respect to his servants, whom he will have suffered to be slain, and lie unburied; but repenting or changing his manner of conduct to them will revive them, and cause them to ascend to heaven; see Re 11:11;

when he seeth that [their] power is gone; not the hand and power of the enemy, going and prevailing over them, and strong upon them, as the Targum of Jonathan and Jarchi; but rather the hand and power of the righteous, as the Targum of Jerusalem; and respects not their internal power and strength, which they have not in themselves, but in Christ; though the exertion of that power, and the exercise of their graces, as faith, and hope, and love, will be greatly declined; but their external power, and protection which they had from Protestant princes; they being removed, and others not like them succeeding, or apostatizing to the church of Rome: the outward court or national establishments are a fence and protection to the inward court worshippers, or servants of God; when that shall be given to the Gentiles, the Papists, as it will, Re 11:2; the power or hand, the protecting sheltering hand of the saints, will be gone, and they will become a prey to their adversaries:

and [there is] none shut up or left; a phrase used to express the miserable state and condition of a people, when none are left, but all are carried off, or cut off, and destroyed, and there is none to help them; see 1Ki 14:10; when there are none shut up in garrisons, and left there to defend a people; or there are none shut up in prison, or any left to till the ground; which is sometimes the case when a nation is conquered, and the greater part are carried captives; but it denotes such a general destruction, that there are none remaining any where, and thus it will be at the slaying of the witnesses. This passage has respect to their dead bodies, which will not be shut up in graves, nor any left to bury them, Re 11:9. There will scarcely be a professor of religion, or any that will appear to favour the witnesses slain in any respect; there will be

“none to support and uphold,”

as the Targum of Jerusalem; not to support and uphold the true religion, or to help the people of God in these their distresses: and when the Lord shall see all this, he will look upon them with an eye of pity and compassion; he will repent for his servants, according to the multitude of his tender mercies; and will plead their cause, and judge them, and will put on the garments of vengeance, and repay fury and recompense to his and their enemies, Isa 59:15; who will insultingly say as follows.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

36. For the Lord shall judge his people. Some connect this sentence with what precedes it, and thus take the word judge for to punish, and the Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews, seems to support their opinion, inasmuch as he proves by this testimony how fearful a thing it is “to fall into the hands of the living God.” (Hebrews10:30, 31.) But there is no reason why the Apostle should not have accommodated to a different purpose what was set forth by Moses for the consolation of the godly, in order that believers might be the more heedful, the nearer they saw God to show Himself as the Judge of His Church; unless it be perhaps preferred to construe the words of Moses thus: Although God should judge His people, yet at length He will be propitiated, or touched with repentance, so as to temper the vehemence of His anger. Whichever way we understand them will be of little difference in the main; for, after Moses has threatened the despisers of God, and the apostates, who desire to be accounted members of His household the Church, he now turns to the strangers and denounces against them that the cruelty which they have exercised towards the Israelites shall not be unpunished, because God will at length be mindful of His covenant, and will pardon His elect people. If you take the word judge for to govern, or to undertake their cause, the particle for must be rendered adversatively, as though it were said nevertheless or but; if we prefer the other sense, it will be equivalent to although, or even though. Doubtless the object of Moses is to encourage the hopes of the pious, who have profited by God’s chastisement, by showing that He will mitigate His severity towards His elect people, and in His wrath will remember mercy. (Hab 3:2.) Thus, then, Moses here teaches the same thing which God afterwards more clearly unfolded to David:

“

If thy children forsake my law,… I will visit their transgressions with the rod of man,… nevertheless my loving-kindness will I not take away from them,” etc. (287) (Psa 89:30; 2Sa 7:14, 15.)

For nothing is more fitted to sustain us in afflictions than when God promises that there shall be some limit to them, so that He will not utterly destroy those whom He has chosen. Whenever, therefore, the ills which we suffer tempt us to despair, let this lesson recur to our minds, that the punishments, wherewith God chastises His children, are temporary, since His promise will never fail that “his anger endureth but a moment,” (Psa 30:5,) whilst the flow of His mercy is continual. Hence, too, that lesson which is especially directed to the Church: (288)

“

For a moment I afflicted thee, but I will pursue my mercies towards thee for ever.” (Isa 54:8.)

He here calls them His servants, not because they had deserved His pardon by their obedience, but because He condescends to acknowledge them as His own; for this honor has reference to His gratuitous election; as when David says, “I am thy servant, and the son of thine handmaid,” (Psa 116:16,) he assuredly arrogates nothing peculiar to himself; but only boasts that he from the womb had been of God’s family, just as slaves are born in the house of their masters. At the same time we must observe that, whenever God declares that He will be merciful to His servants, he only refers to those who heartily seek for reconciliation, and not to the reprobate, who are carried away to destruction by their desperate obstinacy. In short, to the end that God should repent of His severity, repentance is required on the part of sinners; as he teaches elsewhere:

“

Turn ye unto me,… and I will turn unto you.” (Zec 1:3.)

Instead of shall repent, some translate the word, shall console himself. (289) Jerome, regarding the drift of the passage rather than the meaning of the word, translates it shall have mercy.

We must, however, remark the time which God prefixes for the exertion of His grace, viz., when all their power (virtus) shall have departed from them, and all shall be reduced to almost entire destruction; for the word hand is used for vigor; (290) as though it were said that God would be by no means content with a light chastisement, and consequently would not be appeased until they should have come to extremities. This circumstance is well worthy of notice, so flint our hopes may not fail us even in the most severe afflictions of the Church; but that we may be assured that although all may be in the worst state possible, still the due season of reparation will come even yet.

That none should remain behind, or shut up or left, is almost a proverbial phrase in Hebrew; as when it is said, (1Kg 14:10,) “I will cut off from Jeroboam,… him that is shut up and left in Israel,” i.e., as well in the city as in the country, or at home as abroad. And this is again repeated respecting the posterity of Ahab. ( Ibid. 21:21.) And hence it is plain that they are mistaken (291) who explain this as referring to riches shut up in treasure-houses, and cattle dispersed through the fields. And this will be still more apparent from another passage in which the Prophet unquestionably referred to this, “The Lord saw the affliction of Israel, that it was very bitter; for there was not any shut up, nor any left,” and inasmuch as He had not determined to blot out His people,” he saved them by the hand of Jeroboam;” as much as to say, that God, as He had promised, had pity upon His people in their extreme destitution. (2Kg 14:26.)

(287) C. evidently quoted from memory, and amalgamated the two citations.

(288) Here also the substance, and not the words of the passage, are given.

(289) LXX Παρακληθήσεται V. “ miserebitur. ” Addition in Fr., “Le mot de repentir s’accorde mieux au stile de l’Escriture;” the word repent accords best with the style of Scripture.

(290) Vide margin, A. V.

(291) This notion is attributed in Poole to “many of the Hebrews, and Malvenda.”

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

(36) For the Lord shall judge His people.Quoted in Heb. 10:30, in connection with the previous verse. According to this view shall judge means shall punish, not shall defend.

And repent Himself for His servants.Or, and will be comforted over His servants. Comp. Eze. 5:13, I will cause my fury to rest upon them, and I will be comforted; and also Isa. 1:24, &c.

None shut up, or left.Comp. 1Ki. 14:10; 1Ki. 21:21; 2Ki. 9:8, and especially Deu. 14:26.

(37,38) He shall say,Where are their gods? . . . let them rise up and help you.He did say so in Jdg. 10:14.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

36. For the Lord shall judge his people, and repent himself for his servants Jehovah will judge will administer justice to his people and yet he will have compassion on them, for the expression rendered repent himself is better translated have compassion upon.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments