Deuteronomy 6-25

Sometimes as I'm reading it seems the later books of Moses may have actually been written first.  I know I've already suggested that Exodus itself predated Genesis, and keeping in mind I'm not approaching this from a scholar's perspective.  These are the impressions I get from reading through the Bible.  Another observation is that these books of Moses may be comparable to the gospels of the New Testament, perhaps one or more of them independently composed (there may be a case to be made of a link between Exodus and Leviticus, like Luke and Acts).

Deuteronomy, meanwhile, makes strong Christian waves the further I read into it.  "Man does not live on bread alone," which is something Jesus says in Matthew, pops up.  Again, Christians seem concerned mostly with the big stories from the Old Testament, and then the later prophets, but there's a ton of material in the early books as well.  Deuteronomy is also where love is first referenced in relation to God, and of course that was another of Jesus's favorite edicts.

Another interesting phrase that has nothing to do with Christianity is, "since I am not speaking to your children who have not known or seen it," which is Moses speaking for God, very strongly suggesting the time in which the Moses chronicles began to be solidified out of oral tradition as being very much removed from the Moses experience itself, where there would be far less direct contact with God, when there was clearly plenty of it in the early books.  This is the first mark of distinction between the traditions the Moses books are meant to introduce and those who are later living them.  A lot of the talk about how God claims several generations (at least; because he proclaims as many as ten sometimes) are not allowed to come back into the faith for various offenses or statuses may also indicate how long from the origin point the stories become codified, because the contemporaries of the record will know exactly how long certain families have been excluded from the community.

And yes, I will go on record suggesting that there was a fair bit of interpreting and not strictly experienced material in these books.  The term "divinely inspired" is kicked around a lot by those who want you to believe everything, but even those who make that effort could not possibly translate what are clearly things relevant only to a specific and very much in the past living condition.  You should not read the Bible as if you need to take everything as if it really was and always will be that way.  Because you will probably not be a believer on the other side of the experience.  It's not a surprise that for a long time the actual reading of scripture was kept to a minimum, even considering basic literacy levels.  There's only so much interpreting that can be done.  You need to be able to think critically.  The material that has been included (and there are certain books that aren't in every version although I will be covering some of this apocrypha because it's in mine, and I love me some Tobit) has the greatest amount of religious significance.  By the time anyone realized how much duplicated material existed in the books of Moses, it was probably too late, the same way the gospels present similar biographies for Jesus but material that appears in one or two but not all of them.  Anyway, there's always the chance I will be smited, and so be considered officially sacrilegious.  But even material of this kind can be lost in the boundless sea that is the internet.  Even though it's apparently incredibly rare to actually read the whole Bible and notice these things, there's a very small chance someone else will stumble upon these thoughts and actually care.

The concept of a Hebrew king is referenced for the first time.

God seems to have remarked on a lot of cultures where the offspring are burned as part of a sacrificial offering.  I find this incredibly frightening.

God also doesn't take kindly to the magical arts.  I figure it's because of competition to miracles and such.  This comes up every now and then, although this is the first time it's gone into with any depth.  Normally it was just "they must be smited.  the end."  He then codifies the tradition of prophecy, and even warns against false prophets.  It seems to be implied that the work of prophets can probably be confirmed in a lifetime, something both Jews and Christians have a hard time considering.  Both are institutions that become as much a culture as a faith as time goes on.

The institution of the three path rule is pretty interesting, three cities on the outskirts of every settlement so that those guilty of accidental murder have a place to flee to (so those pursuing them can't guess right away where they went).  Although this is one of the ways where justice has a chance to flourish, God still seems to have a lot of reasons people need to be executed, mostly by stoning.  God, I ask, or Moses?  It's probably easy to assume the one goes hand-in-hand with the other, but that may not be necessarily so.  A little later, Moses talks about divorce, which Jesus specifically contradicts, saying Moses gave this rule as an appeasement to the people of his time.  There is also a contradiction in Deuteronomy to something said in an earlier book (I'm giving you homework to discover where and/or to confirm that I'm not misremembering) about the ability of a man to marry his brother's widow.  I'm pretty sure that it was stated previously that this is wrong, but here Moses says it's okay, that it preserves a family line already begun.  Family lines were incredibly important in Genesis, but not as much in the books of Moses, except to discuss the descendants of the twelve sons of Jacob, or in other words the twelve tribes.  Moses himself is descended from Levi, who was previously not significant in a positive way, and all Levites are made the first priestly class.

Finally, it's made official that usury is okay as long as it's with gentiles.  So that ensures Jews never have problems with their neighbors again!

Did I say "finally"?  Not really!  Because poor Balaam is referenced again, completely ignoring a whole narrative that paints him in incredibly honorable light and condemning him for Moses' misconception that results in an ignominious death.  Thus begins the full burial job that Revelation later echoes.  This may be another sign that the folks putting the Bible together either just didn't realize the Balaam narrative was there or didn't care to eliminate it.  Or perhaps to suggest Moses' imperfection.  But that still leaves the rest of us, because no one ever talks about Balaam, and certainly not as a wise prophet who greatly helped the exiled Hebrews.  If you want to remember the guy himself, please keep that in mind.  A forgotten hero of the faith.