Deuteronomy 32:12

12 So the Lord only was his guide, no other god was with 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 came to him in the waste land, in the unpeopled waste of sand: putting his arms round him and caring for him, he kept him as the light of his eye.
11 As an eagle, teaching her young to make their flight, with her wings outstretched over them, takes them up on her strong feathers:
12 So the Lord only was his guide, no other god was with him.
13 He put him on the high places of the earth, his food was the increase of the field; honey he gave him out of the rock and oil out of the hard rock;
14 Butter from his cows and milk from his sheep, with fat of lambs and sheep of Bashan, and goats, and the heart of the grain; and for your drink, wine from the blood of the grape.
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