Deuteronomy 2:7

For the Lord thy God hath blessed thee Another formula recurrent in D.

in all the work of thy hand Some Heb. MSS, LXX, Sam., hands: another recurrent phrase.

he hath known thy walking Rather hath cared for. The Heb. verb to knowmeans frequently, especially in a religious connection, to put the mind to, attend to, regard; cp. Genesis 39:6: Potiphar had no thoughtor care, about anything in Joseph's charge, 1 Samuel 2:12; Proverbs 9:13; Proverbs 27:23; Job 35:15. See Book of the Twelve Pr., i. 321 f. But LXX read the verb here as imperative, consider thy walking.

these forty years So exactly Deuteronomy 8:2; Deuteronomy 8:4, also in the Sg. address. The tradition that the time of the wandering was 40 years, stated by Amos 2:10; Amos 5:25, is common to D and P (Deuteronomy 1:3; Numbers 14:33; Numbers 32:13; cp. Numbers 33:38), also in editorial passages in JE, Joshua 5:6; Joshua 16:10. The Semites frequently reckoned by multiples of 4 and 40: the latter express many round numbers in O.T. chronology. Forty yearsseems to have been equivalent to a generation. That Israel was 40 years in the wilderness agrees with the tradition that a generation died out there. For the same equation in Babylonian chronology see Modern Criticism and the Preaching of the O.T., 90 f., n. 1.

This verse is the third in the Sg. address. Note that in harmony with other Sg. passages it affirms the well-being of Israel during the 40 years, while the Pl. passages emphasise their dangers and losses. It is not necessary to the context, and therefore regarded as a later insertion. Yet it would not be unnatural for the same writer to change from Pl. to Sg. when taking a conjunctview of Israel's experience.