Deuteronomy 32:38

Green's Literal Translation

Who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let them rise up and help you; let it be a hiding place for you.

Parallel Translations

Legacy Standard Bible
Who ate the fat of their sacrifices,And drank the wine of their drink offering?Let them rise up and help you,Let them be your hiding place!

New American Standard Bible (1995)
'Who ate the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your hiding place!

Bishop's Bible (1568)
The fat of whose sacrifices they dyd eate, & dranke the wine of their drinke offerynges: let them ryse vp, and helpe you, and be your protection.

Easy-to-Read Version
Those false gods ate the fat of your sacrifices. And they drank the wine of your offerings. So let them get up and help you! Let them protect you!

Revised Standard Version
who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise up and help you, let them be your protection!

World English Bible
Which ate the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink-offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection.

King James Version (1611)
Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, & dranke the wine of their drinke offerings? Let them rise vp and helpe you, and be your protection.

King James Version
Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? let them rise up and help you, and be your protection.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Of whose sacrifices they ate ye fatt, and dranke the wyne of their drynkofferinges? Let them ryse vp and helpe you, and be youre proteccion.

American Standard Version
Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink-offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection.

Bible in Basic English
Who took the fat of their offerings, and the wine of their drink offering? Let them now come to your help, let them be your salvation.

Update Bible Version
Which ate the fat of their sacrifices, [And] drank the wine of their drink-offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection.

Webster's Bible Translation
Which ate the fat of their sacrifices, [and] drank the wine of their drink-offerings? let them rise up and help you, [and] be your protection.

New English Translation
who ate the best of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let them rise and help you; let them be your refuge!

New King James Version
Who ate the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise and help you, And be your refuge.

Contemporary English Version
You offered them wine and your best sacrifices. Can't those gods help you now or give you protection?

Complete Jewish Bible
Who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offering? Let him get up and help you, let him protect you!

Darby Translation
Who ate the fat of their sacrifices, [And] drank the wine of their drink-offering? Let them rise up and help you, That there may be a protection over you.

Geneva Bible (1587)
Which did eate the fat of their sacrifices, & did drinke the wine of their drinke offring? let them rise vp, & help you: let him be your refuge.

George Lamsa Translation
Who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let them now rise up and help you, let them be your protection.

Good News Translation
You fed them the fat of your sacrifices and offered them wine to drink. Let them come and help you now; let them run to your rescue.

Amplified Bible
'Who ate the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your hiding place!

Hebrew Names Version
Which ate the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink-offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
Who did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink-offering? let him rise up and help you, let him be your protection.

New Living Translation
Where now are those gods, who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their offerings? Let those gods arise and help you! Let them provide you with shelter!

New Life Bible
Who ate the fat of their burnt gifts and drank the wine of their drink gifts? Let them come and help you. Let them be your hiding place!

New Revised Standard
who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their libations? Let them rise up and help you, let them be your protection!

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
the fat of whose sacrifices ye ate, and ye drank the wine of their drink-offerings? let them arise and help you, and be your protectors.

English Revised Version
Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection.

Berean Standard Bible
which ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let them rise up and help you; let them give you shelter!

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Who used to eat the fat of their sacrifices, To drink the wine of their libations? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be over you for a coveting!

Douay-Rheims Bible
Of whose victims they ate the fat, and drank the wine of their drink offerings: let them arise and help you, and protect you in your distress.

Lexham English Bible
Who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their libations? Let them rise up, and let them help you; Let them be to you a refuge.

English Standard Version
who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise up and help you; let them be your protection!

New American Standard Bible
'Those who ate the fat of their sacrifices, And drank the wine of their drink offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection!

New Century Version
Who ate the fat from their sacrifices, and who drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let those gods come to help you! Let them protect you!

Christian Standard Bible®
Who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let them rise up and help you; let it be a shelter for you.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Of whos sacrifices thei eeten fatnessis, and drunkun the wyn of fletynge sacrifices, rise thei and helpe you, and defende thei you in nede.

Young's Literal Translation
Which the fat of their sacrifices do eat, They drink the wine of their libation! Let them arise and help you, Let it be for you a hiding-place!

Contextual Overview

²⁶ I said, I will dash them to pieces; I will make their memory cease from among men; ²⁷ saying , Were it not the provocation of an enemy I feared, that their foes should judge amiss, that they might not say, Our hand is high, and Jehovah has not done all this. ²⁸ For they are a nation void of counsel, and no understanding is in them. ²⁹ If they were wise, they would understand this; they would consider their latter end. ³⁰ How could one chase a thousand, and two put a myriad to flight, if it were not their Rock that sold them, and Jehovah had shut them up? ³¹ For their rock is not our Rock, even our enemies being judges. ³² For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and their grapes of the fields of Gomorrah, grapes of gall; they have bitter clusters. ³³ Their wine is the venom of serpents, and the cruel venom of asps. ³⁴ Is it not stored up with Me, sealed in My treasuries? ³⁵ Vengeance and retribution belong to Me; in due time their foot will slip; for the day of their calamity is near, and the things prepared are hurrying for them.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

eat the fat: Leviticus 21:21, Psalms 50:13, Ezekiel 16:18, Ezekiel 16:19, Hosea 2:8, Zephaniah 2:11

let them: Judges 10:14

your protection: Heb. an hiding for you

Reciprocal: Exodus 29:40 - a drink Leviticus 7:23 - fat Isaiah 57:6 - to them Jeremiah 7:18 - to pour Jeremiah 13:25 - trusted Daniel 1:8 - defile 1 Corinthians 10:21 - cannot drink

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, [and] drank the wine of their drink offerings,.... Alluding to the fat of the sacrifices under the law, which was claimed by the Lord as his, and represented as his food, Leviticus 3:11; and to the drink offerings of wine, which were of a sweet savour to God, and with respect to which wine is said to cheer him, Numbers 15:7. Now New Testament worship and services are here expressed in Old Testament language, which is not unusual; see Isaiah 56:7; and signify the best of the sacrifices and services of true believers in Christ, presenting their souls and bodies unto him as a holy, living, acceptable sacrifice, which is but their reasonable service; offering their sacrifices of prayer and praise unto him through Christ; doing all good works in his name and strength, and all acts of beneficence in love to him and his people, with which sacrifices he is well pleased; yea, cheerfully laying down their lives as victims in his cause, when called unto it. Now these words are a taunt at the Protestant doctrine of the acceptance of the service and sacrifices of believers in Christ, through him, and for his sake, and not for any merit or worthiness in them:

let them rise up and help you; their God and their rock, Jehovah the Father, their covenant God, and his Son the rock of their salvation, in whom they trust; and so they will arise and help them in this time of extreme distress; though they may seem as asleep, and to take no notice of the sad estate of saints, they will arise in wrath and indignation at their enemies, and deliver them out of their hands; the Spirit of life from God shall be sent to bring to life the slain witnesses, and Christ will rise up in the exertion of his kingly power; he will take to himself his great power, and reign, and destroy them that destroyeth the earth, Revelation 11:11;

[and] be your protection; or "let him be your hiding place" x; that is, the rock in whom they trusted, and so he is, and will be "an hiding place the wind, and a covert from the storm", Isaiah 32:2; not only from the wrath and justice of God, but from the rage and fury of men; Christ will protect and defend his people against all their enemies, and in his own time will deliver them from them; who, in answer to these taunts and derisions, rises up, and thus he says, as follows.

x סתרה "absconsio", Pagninus, Montanus; "latibulum", Tigurine version; "latebra", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.

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.