Deuteronomy 4:37

37 quia dilexit patres tuos et elegit semen eorum post eos eduxitque te praecedens in virtute sua magna ex Aegypto

Deuteronomy 4:37 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 4:37

And because he loved thy fathers
Not their immediate fathers, whose carcasses fell in the wilderness, and entered not into the good land because of their unbelief, but their more remote fathers or ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who had some singular testimonies of the love of God to them, Abraham is called their friend of God, and Isaac was the son of promise in whom the seed was called; and Jacob is particularly said to be loved by God, when Esau was hated:

therefore he chose their seed after them;
not to eternal life and salvation, but to the enjoyment of external blessings and privileges, to be called by his name, and to set up his name and worship among them, and to be a special people to him above all people on the earth, as to outward favours, both civil and ecclesiastical:

and brought thee out in his sight with his mighty power out of Egypt;
which was done not only in the sight of the Egyptians openly, they not daring to hinder them, as the wonders wrought to oblige them to let them go out, done in the sight of the Israelites as before observed, but in the sight of God, he going before them in the pillar of cloud and fire, smiling upon them the Israelites, and looking with a frown upon the host of the Egyptians, and conducting the people by the angel of his presence.

Deuteronomy 4:37 In-Context

35 ut scires quoniam Dominus ipse est Deus et non est alius praeter unum
36 de caelo te fecit audire vocem suam ut doceret te et in terra ostendit tibi ignem suum maximum et audisti verba illius de medio ignis
37 quia dilexit patres tuos et elegit semen eorum post eos eduxitque te praecedens in virtute sua magna ex Aegypto
38 ut deleret nationes maximas et fortiores te in introitu tuo et introduceret te daretque tibi terram earum in possessionem sicut cernis in praesenti die
39 scito ergo hodie et cogitato in corde tuo quod Dominus ipse sit Deus in caelo sursum et in terra deorsum et non sit alius
The Latin Vulgate is in the public domain.