Skip to main content
Psalmlog Logo

Deuteronomy 29

Moses binds Israel to YHWH’s covenant and warns that presumed safety cannot shield those who abandon it.

Moses gathers all Israel in Moab to enter a covenant with YHWH, in addition to the covenant at Horeb. He recalls Egypt’s wonders, forty years of provision, and victories over two kings. The whole community stands before God, including children and foreigners. Moses warns that anyone who turns to other gods while claiming peace faces judgment. He describes a devastated land and an exiled people, then closes by distinguishing God’s secret things from his revealed law.

sermon or Bible study notesfear for the future
Read
1These are the words of the covenant which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, in addition to the covenant which he made with them in Horeb.
2Moses called to all Israel, and said to them: Your eyes have seen all that the LORD did in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh, and to all his servants, and to all his land;
3the great trials which your eyes saw, the signs, and those great wonders.
4But the LORD has not given you a heart to know, eyes to see, and ears to hear, to this day.
5I have led you forty years in the wilderness. Your clothes have not grown old on you, and your sandals have not grown old on your feet.
6You have not eaten bread, neither have you drunk wine or strong drink, that you may know that I am the LORD your God.
7When you came to this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon and Og the king of Bashan came out against us to battle, and we struck them.
8We took their land, and gave it for an inheritance to the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and to the half-tribe of the Manassites.
9Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do.
10All of you stand today in the presence of the LORD your God: your heads, your tribes, your elders, and your officers, even all the men of Israel,
11your little ones, your wives, and the foreigners who are in the middle of your camps, from the one who cuts your wood to the one who draws your water,
12that you may enter into the covenant of the LORD your God, and into his oath, which the LORD your God makes with you today,
13that he may establish you today as his people, and that he may be your God, as he spoke to you and as he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
14Neither do I make this covenant and this oath with you only,
15but with those who stand here with us today before the LORD our God, and also with those who are not here with us today
16(for you know how we lived in the land of Egypt, and how we came through the middle of the nations through which you passed;
17and you have seen their abominations and their idols of wood, stone, silver, and gold, which were among them);
18lest there should be among you man, woman, family, or tribe whose heart turns away today from the LORD our God, to go to serve the gods of those nations; lest there should be among you a root that produces bitter poison;
19and it happen, when he hears the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, “I shall have peace, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart,” to destroy the moist with the dry.
20The LORD will not pardon him, but then the LORD’s anger and his jealousy will smoke against that man, and all the curse that is written in this book will fall on him, and the LORD will blot out his name from under the sky.
21The LORD will set him apart for evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant written in this book of the law.
23that all of its land is sulfur, salt, and burning, that it is not sown, doesn’t produce, nor does any grass grow in it, like the overthrow of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger, and in his wrath.
24Even all the nations will say, “Why has the LORD done this to this land? What does the heat of this great anger mean?”
25Then men will say, “Because they abandoned the covenant of the LORD, the God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt,
26and went and served other gods and worshiped them, gods that they didn’t know and that he had not given to them.
27Therefore the LORD’s anger burned against this land, to bring on it all the curses that are written in this book.
28The LORD rooted them out of their land in anger, in wrath, and in great indignation, and thrust them into another land, as it is today.”
29The secret things belong to the LORD our God; but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.
World English BibleRead in NIV in Psalmlog →Highlighted verses are the most connected.
Key verses
Deuteronomy 29:4Israel has witnessed God’s wonders, yet Moses says the heart’s understanding remains a gift God has withheld.
Deuteronomy 29:9This command connects God’s past provision with Israel’s obligation to keep the covenant as they enter the land.
Deuteronomy 29:29The closing verse places hidden things under God’s authority and makes his revealed law the responsibility of successive generations.
Where this chapter reaches

Romans echoes Moses’ words about eyes that do not see and ears that do not hear in its discussion of Israel’s hardening. Jeremiah shares this chapter’s covenant warning: abandoning YHWH for other gods brings devastation to the land and exile to its people.

Deuteronomy 29's chapter linksAll strongest linksHover or tap a book
Notice

After reading the whole chapter

What stands out about who is included among those entering the covenant in verses 10–15?

Write on this

How does the closing distinction between secret and revealed things shape your response to the chapter’s warnings?

Write on this

Questions people ask about Deuteronomy 29

What are the secret things in Deuteronomy 29:29?

The verse does not identify each secret thing. It sets what belongs to God alongside what he has made known to Israel and its children. In context, the revealed things include the covenant’s commands and warnings. The stated purpose of that revelation is obedience to the law.

Why does Deuteronomy 29:4 say God had not given Israel a heart to understand?

Moses distinguishes witnessing God’s acts from understanding their significance. Israel had seen the wonders in Egypt and received wilderness provision, yet lacked the heart, eyes, and ears described here. The verse attributes such understanding to God’s gift. It does not explain all the reasons for God’s withholding it.

Does Deuteronomy 29:9 promise prosperity to everyone who obeys God?

Moses addresses Israel under the covenant being made in Moab. The promise concerns their life as God’s people, with the land and its covenant blessings and curses in view. The verse does not establish a guarantee that every obedient person in every setting will gain wealth or avoid hardship.

Read it. Now write it.

Start an entry on Deuteronomy 29. Your words go beside the text, and you get one next step for the week.

Deuteronomy · 34 chapters
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334
What the Bible says about fear →

Cross-reference data from OpenBible.info (CC BY). Scripture from the World English Bible (public domain). Arc diagram after Chris Harrison and Christoph Römhild (2007).