Deuteronomy 12:4

_YE SHALL NOT DO SO UNTO THE LORD YOUR GOD._ No JFB commentary on this verse....

4_Ye shall not do so unto the Lord your God. _The principal distinction, as far as regards the external exercises of devotion, is here laid down between the legitimate worship of God, and all the fictitious rites which the Gentiles have invented; viz., that God would have but one sanctuary and one altar, which might be a symbol of the difference between Himself and all idols; and thus that true religion should have no affinity to superstitions. To this refers the prohibition, that the Israelites should not conduct themselves towards God as the Gentiles did towards their idols; but that a barrier should be raised, which would separate (103) them from the whole world. The whole external profession of God’s worship is fitly annexed to the Second Commandment, because upon that it depends, and has no other object than its due observation. But when I begin to speak of the tabernacle, the pries...

1-4 Moses comes to the statutes he had to give in charge to Israel; and begins with such as relate to the worship of God. The Israelites are charged not to bring the rites and usages of idolaters into the worship of God; not under colour of making it better. We cannot serve God and mammon; nor worship the true God and idols; nor depend upon Christ Jesus and upon superstitious or self-righteous confidences....

i. e., “The idolaters set up their altars and images on any high hill, and under every green tree at their pleasure, but ye shall not do so; the Lord Himself shall determine the spot for your worship, and there only shall ye seek Him.” The religion of the Canaanites was human; its modes of worship were of man’s devising. It fixed its holy places on the hills in the vain thought of being nearer heaven, or in deep groves where the silence and gloom might overawe the worshipper. But such superstitious appliances were not worthy of the true religion. God had revealed Himself to people in it, and manifested among them His immediate presence and power. He would Himself assign the sanctuary and the ritual of His own service....

EXPOSITION ANNOUNCEMENT OF PARTICULAR LAWS. CHAPTERS 12-26. Moses, having in his first address cast a glance at the events which had transpired between Sinai and the plains of Moab, and in his second recapitulated what had happened at Sinai, repeated the Decalogue, and urgently counseled the people to be obedient to the Divine commandment, and steadfast in their adherence to Jehovah as their God and King; proceeds now to set forth certain laws which it specially behooved them to observe. These are for the most part the same as those already recorded in the previous books; but a few are new, and are to be found only here. No special order or plan of exposition is here observed; the speaker uses that freedom of discourse which was fitting in a popular address. One or two historical narratives are interpolated; but the address as a whole is hortatory, and is designed to dir

YE SHALL NOT DO SO UNTO THE LORD YOUR GOD. Not sacrifice to him on hills and mountains, and under green trees; though the Jews commonly refer this to the destruction of the names of God, and of any thing appertaining to the temple; that though the temples and the altars of the Heathens were to be overthrown, yet not a stone was to be taken from the house of God, or that belonged to it, nor any of his names to be blotted out; so the Targum of Jonathan and Maimonides z, who also observes a, that whoever removes a stone by way of destruction from the altar, or from the temple, or from the court, is to be beaten; so he that burns the holy wood. z Yesode Hattorah, c. 6. sect. 7, 9. a Ibid. sect. 8....

8. THE PLACE OF WORSHIP CHAPTER 12 _ 1. The overthrow of false worship (Deuteronomy 12:1)_ 2. The true place of worship (Deuteronomy 12:5) 3. Concerning eating and the blood (Deuteronomy 12:15) 4. Warning against the abominations of idolatry (Deuteronomy 12:29) The law, and love as the fulfilment of that law, was the main subject of the words of Moses up to the close of the eleventh chapter. The Chapter s which follow also contain expositions of the different statutes, as well as exhortations to obedience and warnings against departure from Jehovah. How s

THE LAW OF ONE SANCTUARY. The local sanctuaries (originally Canaanite) with everything belonging to them, are to be destroyed, and all sacrifices are to be offered at the place which Yahweh should choose. Yet (Deuteronomy 12:15 f.) animals intended for food alone may be killed and eaten locally. Though the name Jerusalem does not occur in D, it is fairly evident that no other place can be intended by the place which Yahweh. shall choose, etc., though A. Duff holds that the Deut. code originated in the Northern Kingdom before its fall, and that it aimed at making Shechem the one worship centre for both kingdoms (see his _OT Theology_, ii. 24ff.). Jer. and Dt. have so much in common (see Introd.) that one may be used to interpret the other. In Jeremiah 7:4;...

First Statement of the Law of the One Altar In the Pl. address, with one later insertion, Deuteronomy 12:3, and possibly another Deuteronomy 12:5 _b_; the rest is a unity. It appropriately opens with the command to destroy all the places at which the nations worship, whom Israel is about to dispossess; for it was the use of these sanctuaries for the worship of Jehovah and the consequent confusion of Him with the Canaanite deities that produced the evils from which the only practical escape was by concentrating His worship. The preface to this first form of the law differs from that to the second which is also Pl. Deuteronomy 12:2. _surely destroy_ A form of the vb. used only with Pl. addr

_VER._ 4. _YE SHALL NOT DO SO UNTO THE LORD YOUR GOD_— That is, "Ye shall not adore him _upon mountains, upon hills,_ and _under every green tree;_ but you shall serve him publicly in one place which he shall choose." That this is the sense, appears from the following verse. Notwithstanding this prohibition, the sacred history shews us how prone the Israelites were to choose mountains and groves for the places of their worship, and therein to set up images, after the example of their heathen neighbours. 2 Kings 17:10.Ezekiel 20:28. Hosea 4:13....