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the Week of Proper 22 / Ordinary 27
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Green's Literal Translation

Deuteronomy 32:18

You forgot the Rock that brought you into being and ceased to care for God who formed you.

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Backsliders;   Death;   God;   Idolatry;   Ingratitude;   Instruction;   Jesus Continued;   Psalms;   Reproof;   The Topic Concordance - Abhorrence;   Creation;   Destruction;   Forgetting;   Foundation;   Hiding;   Hunger;   Idolatry;   Man;   Worship;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - Ingratitude to God;   Rocks;  

Dictionaries:

- Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - God, Names of;   Providence of God;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Jeremiah;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Birth;   Hope;   Hymn;   Names of God;   Pentateuch;   Poetry;   Rock;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Almighty;   Anger (Wrath) of God;   Children (Sons) of God;   Deuteronomy;   Poetry;   Targums;   Zin;   Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament - Hymn;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - Hymns;   1910 New Catholic Dictionary - canticle;   The Hawker's Poor Man's Concordance And Dictionary - Rock;   People's Dictionary of the Bible - Deuteronomy;   Wilson's Dictionary of Bible Types - Rock;  

Encyclopedias:

- Condensed Biblical Cyclopedia - Other Laws;   Moses, the Man of God;   International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Baruch, Book of;   Begotten;   Children of God;   Deuteronomy;   Form;   God;   God, Names of;   Rock;   Semites;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Hafṭarah;   ḥayyim ben Zebulon Jacob Perlmutter;   Names of God;   Poetry;   Scroll of the Law;   Sidra;   Small and Large Letters;   Song of Moses;  

Parallel Translations

Legacy Standard Bible
You neglected the Rock who begot you,And forgot the God who brought you forth.
New American Standard Bible (1995)
"You neglected the Rock who begot you, And forgot the God who gave you birth.
Bishop's Bible (1568)
Of God that begat thee thou art vnmyndfull, and hast forgotten God that made thee.
Easy-to-Read Version
You people left the Rock who made you; you forgot the God who gave you life.
Revised Standard Version
You were unmindful of the Rock that begot you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth.
World English Bible
Of the Rock that became your father, you are unmindful, Have forgotten God who gave you birth.
King James Version (1611)
Of the Rocke that begate thee thou art vnmindfull, and hast forgotten God that formed thee.
King James Version
Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee.
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Thy rocke that begat ye, hast thou despysed: and hast forgotten God that made the.
American Standard Version
Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, And hast forgotten God that gave thee birth.
Bible in Basic English
You have no thought for the Rock, your father, you have no memory of the God who gave you birth.
Update Bible Version
Of the Rock that begot you you are unmindful, And have forgotten God that gave you birth.
Webster's Bible Translation
Of the Rock [that] begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee.
New English Translation
You have forgotten the Rock who fathered you, and put out of mind the God who gave you birth.
New King James Version
Of the Rock who begot you, you are unmindful, And have forgotten the God who fathered you.
Contemporary English Version
You turned away from God, your Creator; you forgot the Mighty Rock, the source of your life.
Complete Jewish Bible
You ignored the Rock who fathered you, you forgot God, who gave you birth.
Darby Translation
Of the Rock that begot thee wast thou unmindful, And thou hast forgotten God who brought thee forth.
Geneva Bible (1587)
Thou hast forgotten the mightie God that begate thee, and hast forgotten God that formed thee.
George Lamsa Translation
But you forsook the Mighty One who bore you, and you forgot the God who made you glorious.
Good News Translation
They forgot their God, their mighty savior, the one who had given them life.
Amplified Bible
"You were unmindful of the Rock who bore you, And you forgot the God who gave you birth.
Hebrew Names Version
Of the Rock that became your father, you are unmindful, Have forgotten God who gave you birth.
JPS Old Testament (1917)
Of the Rock that begot thee thou wast unmindful, and didst forget God that bore thee.
New Living Translation
You neglected the Rock who had fathered you; you forgot the God who had given you birth.
New Life Bible
You did not think of the Rock Who gave you birth. You forgot the God Who gave you birth.
New Revised Standard
You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you; you forgot the God who gave you birth.
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Thou hast forsaken God that begot thee, and forgotten God who feeds thee.
English Revised Version
Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, And hast forgotten God that gave thee birth.
Berean Standard Bible
You ignored the Rock who brought you forth; you forgot the God who gave you birth.
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Of the Rock who had begotten thee, thou wast unmindful, - And didst forget GOD who had given thee birth.
Douay-Rheims Bible
Thou hast forsaken the God that begot thee, and hast forgotten the Lord that created thee.
Lexham English Bible
The rock who bore you, you neglected, and you forgot God, the one giving you birth.
English Standard Version
You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth.
New American Standard Bible
"You forgot the Rock who fathered you, And forgot the God who gave you birth.
New Century Version
You left God who is the Rock, your Father, and you forgot the God who gave you birth.
Christian Standard Bible®
You ignored the Rock who gave you birth; you forgot the God who gave birth to you.
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Thou hast forsake God that gendride thee, and thou hast foryete `thi Lord creatour.
Young's Literal Translation
The Rock that begat thee thou forgettest, And neglectest God who formeth thee.

Contextual Overview

15 But Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked; you grew fat, thick and sated. And he abandoned God who made him, and fell away from the Rock of his salvation. 16 With strange gods they moved Him to jealousy; and with idols they provoked Him to anger. 17 They sacrificed to demons who were not God, to gods whom they did not know, new ones who came lately. Your fathers had not dreaded them. 18 You forgot the Rock that brought you into being and ceased to care for God who formed you.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

the Rock: Deuteronomy 32:4, Deuteronomy 32:15, Isaiah 17:10

forgotten: Deuteronomy 6:12, Deuteronomy 8:11, Deuteronomy 8:14, Deuteronomy 8:19, Psalms 9:17, Psalms 44:20-22, Psalms 106:21, Isaiah 17:10, Isaiah 22:10, Isaiah 22:11, Jeremiah 2:32, Jeremiah 3:21, Hosea 8:14

Reciprocal: Deuteronomy 32:6 - requite 1 Samuel 12:9 - forgat 2 Chronicles 12:1 - he forsook Psalms 50:22 - consider Psalms 78:11 - General Psalms 81:11 - would none Psalms 103:2 - forget not Isaiah 27:11 - therefore Isaiah 44:21 - Remember Isaiah 51:13 - forgettest Ezekiel 22:12 - and hast Hosea 2:13 - forgat Hosea 13:6 - therefore Luke 6:48 - rock

Cross-References

Genesis 32:4
And he commanded them, saying, You shall say to my lord, to Esau: Your servant Jacob says this: I have sojourned with Laban and remained until now.
Genesis 32:5
And it is mine to have oxen, and asses, flocks, and slaves and slave-girls. And I have sent to tell my lord, to find favor in your eyes.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Of the rock [that] begat thee thou art unmindful,.... The same with the rock of salvation, Deuteronomy 32:15; repeated and expressed in different words, that their wretched ingratitude might be taken notice of and observed: begetting is ascribed to this rock, as regeneration is to Christ, 1 John 2:29; and was true of some among the Jews: some choose to render the words, "the rock of thy kindred" k; being a near kinsman, a brother through his incarnation, which aggravated their unmindfulness of him:

and hast forgotten God that formed thee: for the rock they were unmindful of and forgot is the true God and eternal life, the essential Word of God, as both the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem interpret it; him the Jewish nation forgot; they forgot the characters given of him in the promises and prophecies of the Old Testament; and therefore they knew him not when he came and fulfilled the voices of the prophets they were ignorant of in condemning him: hence they were unmindful of his person, his offices, his works, his benefits, and the great salvation by him; as indeed too many are that call themselves Christians: some observe that the word here used signifies bringing forth children with pain, and so way respect the bitter sorrows and sufferings of Christ, sometimes expressed by a word l which signifies the pains of women in childbirth, Acts 2:24; and called the travail of his soul, Isaiah 53:11; and so a further aggravation of their ingratitude, that they should forget him that suffered so much, at least on account of some of them; for, those he endured to bring forth children unto God, or to gather together the children of God, scattered abroad both in Judea and in the whole world, John 11:51.

k צור ילדך "rupem cognationis tuae", i.e. "fratrum tuorum", Van Till; see Rom. ix. 4, 5. l מחללך "parturientis te", Montanus; "parturitorem tuum", Van Till.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Song of Moses

If Deuteronomy 32:1-3 be regarded as the introduction, and Deuteronomy 32:43 as the conclusion, the main contents of the song may be grouped under three heads, namely,

(1) Deuteronomy 32:4-18, the faithfulness of God, the faithlessness of Israel;

(2) Deuteronomy 32:19-33, the chastisement and the need of its infliction by God;

(3) Deuteronomy 32:34-42, God’s compassion upon the low and humbled state of His people.

The Song differs signally in diction and idiom from the preceding chapters; just as a lyrical passage is conceived in modes of thought wholly unlike those which belong to narrative or exhortation, and is uttered in different phraseology.

There are, however, in the Song numerous coincidences both in thoughts and words with other parts of the Pentateuch, and especially with Deuteronomy; while the resemblances between it and Psalms 90:0: “A Prayer of Moses,” have been rightly regarded as important.

The Song has reference to a state of things which did not ensue until long after the days of Moses. In this it resembles other parts of Deuteronomy and the Pentateuch which no less distinctly contemplate an apostasy (e. g. Deuteronomy 28:15; Leviticus 26:14), and describe it in general terms. If once we admit the possibility that Moses might foresee the future apostasy of Israel, it is scarcely possible to conceive how such foresight could be turned to better account by him than by the writing of this Song. Exhibiting as it does God’s preventing mercies, His people’s faithlessness and ingratitude, God’s consequent judgments, and the final and complete triumph of the divine counsels of grace, it forms the summary of all later Old Testament prophecies, and gives as it were the framework upon which they are laid out. Here as elsewhere the Pentateuch presents itself as the foundation of the religious life of Israel in after times. The currency of the Song would be a standing protest against apostasy; a protest which might well check waverers, and warn the faithful that the revolt of others was neither unforeseen nor unprovided for by Him in whom they trusted.

That this Ode must on every ground take the very first rank in Hebrew poetry is universally allowed.

Deuteronomy 32:1-3

Introduction. Heaven and earth are here invoked, as elsewhere (see the marginal references), in order to impress on the hearers the importance of what is to follow.

Deuteronomy 32:4

He is the Rock, his work is perfect - Rather, the Rock, perfect is his work. This epithet, repeated no less than five times in the Song Deuteronomy 32:15, Deuteronomy 32:18, Deuteronomy 32:30-31, represents those attributes of God which Moses is seeking to enforce, immutability and impregnable strength. Compare the expression “the stone of Israel” in Genesis 49:24; and see 1 Samuel 2:2; Psalms 18:2; Matthew 16:18; John 1:42. Zur, the original of “Rock,” enters frequently into the composition of proper names of the Mosaic time, e. g., Numbers 1:5-6, Numbers 1:10; Numbers 2:12; Numbers 3:35, etc. Our translators have elsewhere rendered it according to the sense “everlasting strength” Isaiah 26:4, “the Mighty One” Isaiah 30:29; in this chapter they have rightly adhered to the letter throughout.

Deuteronomy 32:5

Render: “It” (i. e. “the perverse and crooked generation”) “hath corrupted itself before Him (compare Isaiah 1:4); they are not His children, but their blemish:” i. e., the generation of evil-doers cannot be styled God’s children, but rather the shame and disgrace of God’s children. The other side of the picture is thus brought forward with a brevity and abruptness which strikingly enforces the contrast.

Deuteronomy 32:6

Hath bought thee - Rather perhaps, “hath acquired thee for His own,” or “possessed thee:” compare the expression “a peculiar people,” margin “a purchased people,” in 1 Peter 2:9.

Deuteronomy 32:8

That is, while nations were being constituted under God’s providence, and the bounds of their habitation determined under His government (compare Acts 17:26), He had even then in view the interests of His elect, and reserved a fitting inheritance “according to the number of the children of Israel;” i. e., proportionate to the wants of their population. Some texts of the Greek version have “according to the number of the Angels of God;” following apparently not a different reading, but the Jewish notion that the nations of the earth are seventy in number (compare Genesis 10:1 note), and that each has its own guardian Angel (compare Ecclus. 17:17). This was possibly suggested by an apprehension that the literal rendering might prove invidious to the many Gentiles who would read the Greek version.

Deuteronomy 32:9-14

These verses set forth in figurative language the helpless and hopeless state of the nation when God took pity on it, and the love and care which He bestowed on it.

Deuteronomy 32:10

In the waste howling wilderness - literally, “in a waste, the howling of a wilderness,” i. e., a wilderness in which wild beasts howl. The word for “waste” is that used in Genesis 1:2, and there rendered “without form.”

Deuteronomy 32:11

Compare Exodus 19:4. The “so,” which the King James Version supplies in the next verse, should he inserted before “spreadeth,” and omitted from Deuteronomy 32:12. The sense is, “so He spread out His wings, took them up,” etc.

Deuteronomy 32:12

With him - i. e., with God. The Lord alone delivered Israel; Israel therefore ought to have served none other but Him.

Deuteronomy 32:13

i. e., God gave Israel possession of those commanding positions which carry with them dominion over the whole land (compare Deuteronomy 33:29), and enabled him to draw the richest provision out of spots naturally unproductive.

Deuteronomy 32:14

Breed of Bashan - Bashan was famous for its cattle. Compare Psalms 22:12; Ezekiel 39:18.

Fat of kidneys of wheat - i. e., the finest and most nutritious wheat. The fat of the kidneys was regarded as being the finest and tenderest, and was therefore specified as a part of the sacrificial animals which was to be offered to the Lord: compare Exodus 29:13, etc.

The pure blood of the qrape - Render, the blood of the grape, even wine. The Hebrew word seems (compare Isaiah 27:2) a poetical term for wine.

Deuteronomy 32:15

Jesbarun - This word, found again only in Deuteronomy 33:5, Deuteronomy 33:26, and Isaiah 44:2, is not a diminutive but an appellative (containing an allusion to the root, “to be righteous”); and describes not the character which belonged to Israel in fact, but that to which Israel was called. Compare Numbers 23:21. The prefixing of this epithet to the description of Israel’s apostasy contained in the words next following is full of keen reproof.

Deuteronomy 32:16

They provoked him to jealousy - The language is borrowed from the matrimonial relationship, as in Deuteronomy 31:16.

Deuteronomy 32:17

Devils - Render, destroyers. The application of the word to the false gods points to the trait so deeply graven in all pagan worship, that of regarding the deities as malignant, and needing to be propitiated by human sufferings.

Not to God - Rather, “not God,” i. e., which were not God; see the margin and Deuteronomy 32:21. Compare Deuteronomy 13:7; Deuteronomy 29:25.

Deuteronomy 32:19

The anger of God at the apostasy of His people is stated in general terms in this verse; and the results of it are described, in words as of God Himself, in the next and following verses. These results consisted negatively in the withdrawal of God’s favor Deuteronomy 32:20, and positively in the infliction of a righteous retribution.

Daughters - The women had their full share in the sins of the people. Compare Isaiah 3:16 ff; Isaiah 32:9 ff; Jeremiah 7:18; Jeremiah 44:15 ff.

Deuteronomy 32:20

I will see what their end shall be - Compare the similar expression in Genesis 37:20.

Deuteronomy 32:21

God would mete out to them the same measure as they had done to Him. Through chosen by the one God to be His own, they had preferred idols, which were no gods. So therefore would He prefer to His people that which was no people. As they had angered Him with their vanities, so would He provoke them by adopting in their stead those whom they counted as nothing. The terms, “not a people,” and “a foolish nation,” mean such a people as, not being God’s, would not be accounted a people at all (compare Ephesians 2:12; 1 Peter 2:10), and such a nation as is destitute of that which alone can make a really “wise and understanding people” Deuteronomy 4:6, namely, the knowledge of the revealed word and will of God (compare 1 Corinthians 1:18-28).

Deuteronomy 32:24

Burning heat - i. e., the fear of a pestilential disease. On the “four sore judgments,” famine, plague, noisome beasts, the sword, compare Leviticus 26:22; Jeremiah 15:2; Ezekiel 5:17; Ezekiel 14:21.

Deuteronomy 32:26, Deuteronomy 32:27

Rather, I would utterly disperse them, etc., were it not that I apprehended the provocation of the enemy, i. e., that I should be provoked to wrath when the enemy ascribed the overthrow of Israel to his own prowess and not to my judgments. Compare Deuteronomy 9:28-29; Ezekiel 20:9, Ezekiel 20:14, Ezekiel 20:22.

Behave themselves strangely - Rather, misunderstand it, i. e., mistake the cause of Israel’s ruin.

Deuteronomy 32:30

The defeat of Israel would be due to the fact that God, their strength, had abandoned them because of their apostasy.

Deuteronomy 32:31

Our enemies - i. e., the enemies of Moses and the faithful Israelites; the pagan, more especially those with whom Israel was brought into collision, whom Israel was commissioned to “chase,” but to whom, as a punishment for faithlessness, Israel was “sold,” Deuteronomy 32:30. Moses leaves the decision, whether “their rock” (i. e. the false gods of the pagan to which the apostate Israelites had fallen away) or “our Rock” is superior, to be determined by the unbelievers themselves. For example, see Exodus 14:25; Numbers 23:0; Numbers 24:0; Joshua 2:9 ff; 1 Samuel 4:8; 1 Samuel 5:7 ff; 1 Kings 20:28. That the pagan should thus be constrained to bear witness to the supremacy of Israel’s God heightened the folly of Israel’s apostasy.

Deuteronomy 32:32

Their vine - i. e., the nature and character of Israel: compare for similar expressions Psalms 80:8, Psalms 80:14; Jeremiah 2:21; Hosea 10:1.

Sodom ... Gomorrah - Here, as elsewhere, and often in the prophets, emblems of utter depravity: compare Isaiah 1:10; Jeremiah 23:14,

Gall - Compare Deuteronomy 29:18 note.

Deuteronomy 32:35

Rather: “Vengeance is mine and recompence, at the time when their foot slideth.

Deuteronomy 32:36

Repent himself for - Rather, have compassion upon. The verse declares that God’s judgment of His people would issue at once in the punishment of the wicked, and in the comfort of the righteous.

None shut up, or left - A proverbial phrase (compare 1 Kings 14:10) meaning perhaps “married and single,” or “guarded and forsaken,” but signifying generally “all men of all sorts.”

Deuteronomy 32:40-42

Render: For I lift up my hand to heaven and say, As I live forever, if I whet, etc. On Deuteronomy 32:40, in which God is described as swearing by Himself, compare Isaiah 45:23; Jeremiah 22:5; Hebrews 6:17. The lifting up of the hand was a gesture used in making oath (compare Genesis 14:22; Revelation 10:5).

Deuteronomy 32:42

From the beginning of revenges upon the enemy - Render, (drunk with blood) from the head (i. e. the chief) of the princes of the enemy.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Deuteronomy 32:18. Of the Rock that begat thee — צור tsur, the first cause, the fountain of thy being. Deuteronomy 32:4.


 
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