Deuteronomy 18:10-20

10 There shall not be found among you anyone ¹who burns his son or his daughter as an offering,^[a] anyone who ²practices divination or ³tells fortunes or interprets omens, or ⁴a sorcerer

11 or a charmer or ⁵a medium or a necromancer or ⁶one who inquires of the dead,

12 ⁷for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD. And ⁸because of these abominations the LORD your God is driving them out before you.

13 You shall be blameless before the LORD your God,

14 for these nations, which you are about to dispossess, listen to fortune-tellers and to diviners. But as for you, the LORD your God has not allowed you to do this.

A New Prophet like Moses

15 ⁹"The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers--it is to him you shall listen--

16 just as you desired of the LORD your God at Horeb ¹⁰on the day of the assembly, when you said, ¹¹'Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.'

17 And the LORD said to me, ¹²'They are right in what they have spoken.

18 ¹³I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. ¹⁴And I will put my words in his mouth, and ¹⁵he shall speak to them all that I command him.

19 ¹⁶And whoever will ¹⁷not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him.

20 ¹⁸But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or^[b] who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.'

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Deuteronomy 18:10-20 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO DEUTERONOMY 18

This chapter gives an account of the provision made for the priests and Levites, with the reason of it, De 18:1-5, of allowance of a country Levite to minister at Jerusalem, and take his portion with the rest, De 18:6-8, and of several persons of bad practices not to be suffered among the people of Israel, De 18:9-14, and of an extraordinary prophet that should be raised up among them, to whom they should hearken, or it would be the worse for them, De 18:15-19, but a false prophet was to be put to death, of whom a sign is given by which he might be known, De 18:20-22.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

Cross References 18

1. See Leviticus 18:21
2. 2 Kings 17:17
3. See Leviticus 19:26
4. [Exodus 22:18]
5. See Leviticus 19:31
6. [1 Samuel 28:7]
7. Deuteronomy 22:5; Deuteronomy 25:16
8. See Deuteronomy 9:4
9. John 1:21, 25, 45; Cited Acts 3:22; Acts 7:37
10. See Deuteronomy 9:10
11. See Exodus 20:19
12. Deuteronomy 5:28
13. [See ver. 15 above]
14. Jeremiah 1:9; Jeremiah 5:14; [John 17:8]
15. [John 4:25; John 8:28; John 12:49, 50]
16. [Acts 3:23]
17. Jeremiah 29:19; Jeremiah 35:13
18. See Deuteronomy 13:5

Footnotes 2

[a]. Hebrew makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire
[b]. Or and

The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.