Deuteronomy 32:12

12 The LORD alone led him; no foreign god was with him.

Deuteronomy 32:12 in Other Translations

KJV
12 So the LORD alone did lead him, and there was no strange god with him.
ESV
12 the LORD alone guided him, no foreign god was with him.
NLT
12 The LORD alone guided them; they followed no foreign gods.
MSG
12 God alone led him; there was not a foreign god in sight.
CSB
12 The Lord alone led him, with no help from a foreign god.

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 In a desert land he found him, in a barren and howling waste. He shielded him and cared for him; he guarded him as the apple of his eye,
11 like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them aloft.
12 The LORD alone led him; no foreign god was with him.
13 He made him ride on the heights of the land and fed him with the fruit of the fields. He nourished him with honey from the rock, and with oil from the flinty crag,
14 with curds and milk from herd and flock and with fattened lambs and goats, with choice rams of Bashan and the finest kernels of wheat. You drank the foaming blood of the grape.

Cross References 3

  • 1. Psalms 106:9; Isaiah 63:13; Jeremiah 31:32
  • 2. Deuteronomy 4:35
  • 3. ver 39; Judges 2:12; Psalms 18:31; Psalms 81:9; Isaiah 43:12; Isaiah 45:5
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