Deuteronomy 4:44-49

Introduction (or Introductions) to the following Discourses and Laws (5 26)

The appearance of a fresh heading at this point between the two distinct sets of discourses Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40 and Deuteronomy 5-11, which are further separated by the historical fragment, Deuteronomy 4:41-43 raises questions at the heart of the problem of the structure of the book of Deuteronomy. Does it signify that once the book began here and consisted only of the discourses 5 11 and the laws 12 26; Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40 having been prefixed later? So Graf, Kue., Wellh., König, etc. Or is the appearance of the heading just here compatible with the theory that the whole of 1 26 is the work of one author? So Dillm. and Driver on the ground that a new title would not be unnatural where the actual exposition of the law at last begins (Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40 having been mainly historical). Other alternatives arise from the structure of the heading. Like that in Deuteronomy 1:1-5 it is apparently composite. Deuteronomy 4:44 seem two independent titles; Deuteronomy 4:46 not only accumulate details after the manner of some other titles in the O.T. but contain a slight difference of style: in 47 D's towards the sunrising, but in 49 P's shorter form of the same (see on Deuteronomy 4:41 and the notes below). Other non-deuteronomic phrases are set beforeand children of Israel, thrice (see below on Deuteronomy 4:44); but both the contents, and with one exception the language, of 46 49 closely recall parts of chs. 2 and 3. Recently there has been a general disposition to break up the heading. Steuernagel supposes 44 and 45 to be respectively the titles of the two documents, in the Sg. and in the Pl. form of address, which he traces throughout chs. 5 ff.; Bertholet takes 44 as the transition from the first introductory address, 1 3, to the legislation proper, 12 26; and 45 49 as an introduction to ch. 5; Cullen takes 44 with 45 c, 46 aas the title to the original environment of the Law code or -Torah," but 45 ab, 46 bcas that of the first combined edition of the -Miṣwah" and -Torah" (see Introd. § 1). The variety of these hypotheses alone shows their precariousness; and there is this further objection to finding in the double title, 44 and 45, headings to the original documents of D, viz. that even in these verses non-deuteronomic phrases occur. The wholepassage looks editorial: one piece (Dillmann) in the cumulative style beloved by later scribes rather than a growth from an original nucleus (Driver). Why then was it inserted just here? Dillm."s and Driver's answer, because at last with ch. 5 begins the actual exposition of the law, is hardly relevant; because in that case Deuteronomy 4:44 or Deuteronomy 4:45 would have contained some such verb as the expoundwhich we find in the title Deuteronomy 1:5. Indeed, that title is more suitable here than where it stands, for it describes better the expository and hortatory character of 5 ff. than the prevailing historical style of Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40. On a review of the data and these arguments it seems to the present writer more possible, and even probable, that part of Deuteronomy 1:1-5 (and more particularly 5) originally formed the introduction to the combined discourses and laws, 5 26; that it was divorced from these by the prefixing to them of Deuteronomy 1:6 to Deuteronomy 4:40; and that when the whole book 1 26 was thus constituted, it was found convenient for its practical use to supply a new heading to chs. 5 ff. (Deuteronomy 5:1 being too slight for the purpose), which should at once indicate that a new set of discourses begins here, and at the same time furnish a summary of the historical situation in which the discourses and legislation were delivered as described in chs. 2, 3. Such a suggestion is at least suitable to the salient features of Deuteronomy 4:45-49: that the language is partly post-deuteronomic and that part of the substance is based on chs. 2, 3.