Deuteronomy 9:8

8 Even at Mount Sinai you made the LORD so angry he was ready to destroy you.

Deuteronomy 9:8 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 9:8

Also in Horeb ye provoked the Lord to wrath
The word "also" shows that they had provoked him before, but this instance is given as a very notorious one; here they made the golden calf and worshipped it, while Moses was on the mount with God, receiving instructions from him for their good. Near to this place a rock had been smitten for them, from whence flowed water for the refreshment of them and their cattle; here the Lord appeared in the glory of his majesty to them, and from hence, for it is the same mount with Sinai, the law was given to them in such an awful and terrible manner; and yet none of these things were sufficient to restrain them from provoking the Lord to wrath by their sins:

so that the Lord was angry with you, to have destroyed you;
so very angry with them, and so justly, that he proposed to Moses to destroy them, and make of him a great nation in their stead, ( Exodus 32:10 ) .

Deuteronomy 9:8 In-Context

6 You must recognize that the LORD your God is not giving you this good land because you are good, for you are not—you are a stubborn people.
7 “Remember and never forget how angry you made the LORD your God out in the wilderness. From the day you left Egypt until now, you have been constantly rebelling against him.
8 Even at Mount Sinai you made the LORD so angry he was ready to destroy you.
9 This happened when I was on the mountain receiving the tablets of stone inscribed with the words of the covenant that the LORD had made with you. I was there for forty days and forty nights, and all that time I ate no food and drank no water.
10 The LORD gave me the two tablets on which God had written with his own finger all the words he had spoken to you from the heart of the fire when you were assembled at the mountain.

Footnotes 1

  • [a]. Hebrew Horeb, another name for Sinai.
Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007, 2013 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.