Deuteronomy 7:1-10

Warnings

1 "1When the LORD your God brings you into the land where * you are entering to possess it, and clears away many nations before * you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, 2seven nations greater and stronger than you,
2 and when the LORD your God delivers them before you and you defeat them, 3then you shall utterly destroy them. 4You shall make no covenant with them 5and show no favor to them.
3 "Furthermore, 6you shall not intermarry with them; you shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor shall you take their daughters for your sons.
4 "For they will turn your sons away from following Me to serve other gods; then the anger of the LORD will be kindled against you and 7He will quickly destroy you.
5 "But thus you shall do to them: 8you shall tear down their altars, and smash their sacred pillars, and hew down their Asherim, and burn their graven images with fire.
6 "For you are 9a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be 10a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.
7 "11The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples,
8 but because the LORD loved you and kept the 12oath which He swore to your forefathers, 13the LORD brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
9 "Know therefore that the LORD your God, 14He is God, 15the faithful God, 16who keeps His covenant and His lovingkindness to a thousandth generation with those who 17love Him and keep His commandments;
10 but 18repays those who hate Him to their faces, to destroy them; He will not delay with him who hates Him, He will repay him to his face.

Deuteronomy 7:1-10 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO DEUTERONOMY 7

In this chapter the Israelites are exhorted to destroy the seven nations of the land of Canaan, when they entered into it, and to make no alliances with them of any kind, nor suffer any remains of idolatry to continue, De 7:1-5 to observe which, and other commands of God, they are urged from the consideration of their being freely chosen of God above all other people, and of their being redeemed out of the house of bondage, and of the Lord's being a covenant keeping God to them, De 7:6-11 and it is promised them, for their further encouragement to keep the commands of God, that they should have an increase of all temporal good things, and no evils and calamities should come upon them, De 6:12-16, and, lest they should be disheartened at the numbers and might of their enemies, they are put in mind of what God had done for them in Egypt, and of what he had promised to do for them now, De 7:17-20 and they are assured that the nations should be cast out before them by little and little, until they were utterly destroyed, De 7:21-24 and the chapter is concluded with an exhortation to destroy their images, and not admit anything of that sort to be brought into their houses, De 7:25,26.

Cross References 18

  • 1. Deuteronomy 20:16-18
  • 2. Acts 13:19
  • 3. Numbers 31:17; Joshua 11:11
  • 4. Exodus 23:32
  • 5. Deuteronomy 7:16; Deuteronomy 13:8
  • 6. Exodus 34:15, 16; Joshua 23:12; Ezra 9:2
  • 7. Deuteronomy 4:26
  • 8. Exodus 23:24; Exodus 34:13; Deuteronomy 12:3
  • 9. Exodus 19:6; Deuteronomy 14:2, 21; Psalms 50:5; Jeremiah 2:3
  • 10. Exodus 19:5; Deuteronomy 4:20; Deuteronomy 14:2; Deuteronomy 26:18; Psalms 135:4; Titus 2:14; 1 Peter 2:9
  • 11. Deuteronomy 4:37
  • 12. Exodus 32:13
  • 13. Exodus 13:3
  • 14. Deuteronomy 4:35, 39
  • 15. Isaiah 49:7; 1 Corinthians 1:9; 1 Thessalonians 5:24; 2 Timothy 2:13
  • 16. Exodus 20:6; Daniel 9:4
  • 17. Deuteronomy 5:10
  • 18. Isaiah 59:18; Nahum 1:2

Footnotes 18

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