Verse 21." which I sware," add, "unto their fathers." See LXX, Samaritan, and one MS. of Kennicott's.

Verse 23. This 23d verse is certainly misplaced. It interrupts the narration about the song. Besides the verb "gave," at the beginning of the verse, as it now stands, has no subject but Moses; whereas if this verse were placed at the end of the 15th, with which the matter of it is connected, the subject of the verb "gave" will be Jehovah, as it should be. For it is for Jehovah, not for Moses to say, what the giver of this charge says at the end of the verse, "thou shalt bring the children of Israel into the land which I sware unto them, and I will be with thee." If the verse be allowed to keep its present place, we must either read at the begin

אשר נשבע יהוה ning of the verse, or at the end of it The former emendation might להם והוא יהיה עמר

derive support from the Vulgate, and the latter from the LXX. But the verse being once removed from this place to the end of the 15th, no emendation of it will be necessary.

Verse 25.

note.

"the Levites. " See Houbigant's

CHAP. XXXII. Contents." Moses' song." This is

rather God's song, than Moses's. In the preceding chapter God commands him to write this song, and to teach it to the children of Israel, that it might be a witness against them. It seems therefore to have been a form of words dictated by God himself. The last words of Moses, which he uttered as a prophet, in his own person and in his own character, we have in chapter xxxiii.

Verse 2.-" as the small rain;" rather,

"As showers upon the grass,

As dew-drops upon the herbage."

Verse 4. "He is the Rock". This word occurs six times in this song as an appellation of the Deity, or something taken for a deity; namely, in this place, in verses 15 and 18, twice in verse 31, and once again in verse 37. In all these six places it is an appellation of the true God, except in the second place of verse 31, where it is applied to the Gods of the Gentiles. But in none of these six, either the LXX or the Vulgate express it by a word rendering a "Rock;" but the LXX express it by Oos, and the Vulgate by Deus. Aquila expressed it by στερεος, Symmachus and Theodotion by φύλαξ. See Hexapl. v. 31. Aquila's translation is the best,

as it gives the exact sense, without losing the image of the original word. The original word expresses, the immutability of purpose, the unassailable strength of power in God, and the stability of effect, under the image of the solidity of a rock. Queen Elizabeth's translators render it, in verse 15, "the strong God," in verse 31, simply "God," and in the three other places, "the mighty God." The English language has certainly no word that will clearly and adequately convey the same idea under the same image. The different expressions of "The Almighty," "The irresistible God," "The unchangeable God," "The Strength," may be used, as one or another of them may best suit the particular passage where the word occurs. Here,

The Almighty! his work is perfect.

Verse 5. Read with Samaritan, LXX, Houbigant, and Kennicott,

שחתו לא לו בני מום

"They are corrupted; they are not his; children of pollution."

Verse 6. Divide the two last lines, and place the stops thus,

"Is he not thy father? Thy owner he?

He made thee, and set thee in order."

The making and setting in order intended here, are the making of the Jewish nation, and the setting in order of their polity.

"When the Most High assigned the Heathen their inheritance,

When he separated the sons of Adam,

He set the bounds of his own people,

According to the number of the sons of Israel.

For the portion of Jehovah is Jacob,

The peoples are the measured lot of his [Israel's] inheritance."

I bring the word

from the 9th verse into the

place of "y in the 8th, and the word "y I carry into the 9th, but I place it after py".

I take the suffixed in, at the end of the last

line, as rehearsing " Jacob," not "Jehovah." And without altering a tittle of the Hebrew text, except in the transposition of "y and y, I bring out the sense expressed in this translation.

-"his inheritance," that is, Jacob's; according to the constant strain of prophecy, that ultimately Jacob is to inherit all the nations. Thus the passage describes the call of the Gentiles, as their incorporation with Israel, not without an implied allusion to the exaltation of the natural Israel, above all the nations of the earth in the last ages.

Verse 10. "He found him," &c. Read with Sa

ישמנהו and יאמצהו,maritan and Houbigant

"He sustained him in a desert land,

And in the howling waste he fed him plenteously with luscious food."

-"fed him plenteously with luscious food. " This, and nothing less, I take to be the force of the word "," saginavit eum."

Verses 11, 12. -" spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings; [so] the Lord alone did lead him."

-"taketh them, beareth them." The pronominal suffixes of the two verbs in the original are singular,