Rise up, take your journey, and pass over the river Arnon. Behold, I have given into thy hand Sihon the king of Heshbon, the Amorite, and his land begin, take possession, and engage with him in battle.
Israel had just been told to leave Edom, Moab and Ammon alone. Now, at the Arnon, the same voice tells them to attack. Commentators point out that the difference lies entirely in what God said, not in what Israel judged for itself.
In all these different instructions to Israel, the great principle is this: God's word must settle everything for His people. It was not for Israel to ask why they should leave the lands of Esau and Lot untouched, and take those of Sihon. They were simply to do what they were told. God can do as He pleases. He has His eye upon the whole scene. He sees it all.
The chapter trains the people in restraint before it calls them to act.
Verse 24 matches verse 13. In both it is the LORD, not Moses, who commands them to "rise up." Now comes another promise: "Behold," He says, "I have given into your hand Sihon the Amorite." Here then they are called to action. Notice that first of all in this chapter it was not activity but subjection. It may well have been hard for Israel to bear the unfriendliness of the Edomites, Ammonites and Moabites in silence. But whatever the provocation, however much these nations insulted them (and they did), Israel must not lift a hand against their brothers. The LORD reminds them of the connection, and gives those nations the closest name possible — their brothers. They were unfeeling and ready to harm Israel. Still God would train His people to remember every natural bond. If blows came, God would not forget the offender.
God announces what He has done before He tells Israel what to do. Verse 24 says the land is already given; verse 31 says He has begun to give it. (The ESV reads "Begin to take possession" where these writers quote "Begin to possess.")
Verses 24 and 31 deserve special notice. First comes the divine act: "I have given," or, "I have begun to give." Then comes the call to the people: "Begin to possess." God deals with us in grace along the same lines today, as we see in the New Testament letters. First He unfolds what He has given us in Christ. Then come the exhortations. We are to begin to possess in experience all that He has given, in the power of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.
Verse 24 says the land is already handed over; verse 31 says God has only begun to give it. The sequence looks backwards, and one writer argues it is exactly right.
So two things are quite definite. First, God had given. Second, He had also begun to give. A superficial reader might object to this, and demand that if both statements are to stand, they must come in reverse order: first He began to give; second, He had fully given. The scriptural order is, however, the right one. First He gives, so that the title deeds are ours. Then He begins to give practically and in detail, as we begin to possess.
That second half matters, because Israel had once tried the opposite. Forty years earlier they had pushed forward without it.
In Numbers 14 God spoke of Israel's unbelief. Because of it, He would not begin to give them the land for another forty years. Nevertheless the people insisted that they would begin to possess. "Look, we are here, and we will go up," they said. Moses answered, "Do not go up, for the LORD is not among you." Yet they would not listen. They presumed to go up, and were utterly struck down. The title deeds were already theirs. But God had not "begun to give" them the inheritance, so their effort to "begin to possess" came to nothing.
"Contend with him in battle" is a command to fight, yet the fighting starts with Sihon's refusal. Writers draw a line here between defending a God-given claim and picking a fight.
We meet people we do not wish to fight, but they will not let us pass peaceably. Our warfare is with those who hold our inheritance beyond the Jordan. If we are attacked, we must defend ourselves; but we are not to be the aggressors. Israel wants to pass through the land of the Amorites in peace. The Amorites refuse, and so they suffer the results of the war they themselves sought against the people of God. Israel takes their cities. Even on this side of the Jordan, Israel begins to enjoy the promised possession ahead of time.
Why record an old border war at all? Commentators read these nations as a picture of the opposition a believer meets now.
These Canaanite nations surely stand for the "spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places." The book of Joshua shows this in detail. They are the enemies we are in conflict with now.
A gift can still be left unused.
Has God given us these wonderful things so that we may misuse them? Or so that we leave them unused, like a dress hidden away in a drawer until the age to come dawns? To ask such a question is to answer it. God has given the things to us; but we are to begin to possess them.
- Given — God speaks first: the land is already handed over before a sword is drawn. The title deeds come before the campaign.
- Bounded — the same God who gave Sihon's land forbade touching Edom, Moab and Ammon. His word, not Israel's appetite, decided where they could go.
- Timed — Numbers 14 shows the reverse order failing. What God has given, He must also have begun to give. Move before that, and you move without Him.
- Contested — the gift comes through conflict, but Israel did not start it. The Amorites would not let them pass.
- Possessed — a gift left unused is like a dress hidden in a drawer. God has given; we are to begin to take hold.
This day will I begin to put the dread of thee and the fear of thee upon the peoples under the whole heaven; who will hear report of thee, and will tremble, and quake because of thee.
Moses looks back at the day God told Israel to cross the Arnon and take Sihon's land. God tied a promise to that first battle: from that day, the mere report of Israel would do the work an army usually has to do. Why would God spread terror among nations that had never met Israel, and what made that dread just?
The word "begin" ties this promise to the command just before it. God acts first. Then He tells the people to move into what He has already handed over.
Notice verses 24 and 31 in Deuteronomy 2. First comes the Divine act: "I have given," or, "I have begun to give." Then comes the call to the people, "Begin to possess." God deals with us today along the same lines, as we see in the New Testament letters. First He unfolds what He has given us in Christ. Then come the calls to begin to take hold, in real experience, of all that He has given, in the power of the Holy Spirit, who lives in us.
Israel's weapon here is news. The nations hear, and by the time the spies reach Jericho the report has already done its work. That left Israel's earlier refusal to advance without excuse.
First, there are the bolts and bars on the gates of Jericho and the witness of Rahab: "I know that the LORD has given you the land, and that the fear of you has fallen upon us … for we have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea before you, when you came out of Egypt … And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted." That was a rebuke to the Israelites for not going up the first time, as if God, when He gives a command, does not set things in motion to fulfil it. This woman points to the crossing of the Red Sea, forty years earlier, as what filled the Canaanite nations with terror. From the first, the way into the land was open.
The sweep of the phrase has been read in more than one way. One reading takes it as a figure of speech; another sees a reach that runs far past Moses' day.
Some have taken the statement in verse 25, "I will begin to put the dread and fear of you on the peoples who are under the whole heaven," as an overstatement. But it also has a prophetic meaning. The Gentiles fear the Jews and the nations stand in dread of them. Some day the Jewish race will be the head of the nations of the world.
The nations trembling here were not innocent bystanders. Their fall had been waiting a long time.
This is a day of judgment on these nations. So was the day of Noah on the world before the flood, the day of Lot on the cities of the plain, and the day of Moses on the land of Egypt. Read Joshua's sword as a judge's sword, not a conqueror's. Giving the children of Abraham their inheritance may look like the main cause of this great action. But the real ground is this: the sin of the Amorites was now full.
To read such orders rightly, one writer insists on a distinction that changes everything:
We must accurately distinguish between grace and government. When we consider God in government, we see Him displaying His power in the way of righteousness, punishing evildoers, pouring out vengeance upon His enemies, overthrowing empires, upturning thrones, destroying cities, sweeping away nations, tribes and peoples.
God did not flatter the people He was making feared. His severity ran hardest against His own.
Is this not very notable? Here was the thorough sifting and scrutiny of God — with whom most? With the enemies? Not at all, but His own people. In His dealings with them He applied a higher standard, and far more severity. The judgment on the children of Israel was far stricter than on all their enemies put together. Not one man of the congregation of the LORD who left Egypt entered the holy land, except two men. From the very first, those two had identified themselves by faith with the glory of the LORD.
The same melting heart that ruined Jericho's defenders saved one woman in it.
But the word of God comes to her: "We have heard," she said to the spies. It was a word that promised grace and deliverance to some, and judgment to others. Her faith in this word puts her conscience at once under the weight of that judgment. "As soon as we heard it our hearts melted." Like her people, she is full of fear. But they had lost all courage, while for her this very fear is the beginning of wisdom. It is the fear of the Lord, a fear that makes her look to God.
- Begin — God gives first, then commands. "I have given" comes before "begin to possess," and He deals with believers today in the same order.
- Report — the dread spreads by hearing, not by fighting. News of the Red Sea had opened the land forty years before Israel drew a sword.
- Reach — some read "under the whole heaven" as an overstatement. It also carries a promise: the nations will yet stand in dread.
- Judgment — the terror was deserved. The sin of the Amorites was full, and the sword that fell was a judge's sword, not a conqueror's.
- Response — the same report that melted Jericho's soldiers turned Rahab to God. Fear becomes the beginning of wisdom when it drives a person to Him.
And I sent messengers out of the wilderness of Kedemoth unto Sihon the king of Heshbon with words of peace, saying,
Israel is camped east of the Arnon river, and God has already handed Sihon's land to them. Yet Moses' first move is to send messengers, not soldiers. Why offer peace to a king whose land is already promised away?
Two things about Sihon shaped what came next: where his people came from, and the fact that Israel had asked another nation the same favour before.
Sihon was an Amorite. This race descended from Ham through Canaan (Genesis 10:15-16). Moses sent messengers to Sihon with a peaceful intention. He asked to pass through his land, keeping only to the highway, and offered to pay for food and water (verses 26-27). They had done the same in regard to Edom, but this time the results were different. The Amorite was not their brother as was Esau.
The message carried no threat and no bribe.
Let us see the principles of the Lord's discipline here. Did He authorise Israel to force Sihon with threats of vengeance, or to win him by flattery? Did He offer him the book of the law with one hand and the sword with the other? Nothing of the sort... Israel kept the path of right and courtesy. Sihon rushed on them to his own ruin; and only so did Israel strike down and dispossess the king of Heshbon.
Just before this, God had told Israel to leave the lands of Esau and Lot alone. Why spare those and take Sihon's? The answer lay in God's word, not in Israel's own judgement.
In all these different instructions to Israel, the great principle is this: God's word must settle everything for His people. Israel was not to ask why they must leave the possessions of Esau and Lot untouched and take those of Sihon. They were simply to do what they were told. God can do as He pleases. He has His eye upon the whole scene. He sees it all.
God sent words of peace to an enemy king. With His own people He was far stricter.
"So I sent messengers from the wilderness of Kedemoth to Sihon the king of Heshbon, with words of peace." Is this not very notable? What a difference between God's conduct of His people, and man's corruption of it!... There was the thorough sifting and scrutiny of God — with whom most? With the enemies? Not at all, but His own people. God judged the children of Israel far more strictly — beyond all comparison — than He judged all their enemies put together.
What Moses did at Kedemoth was no one-off act of politeness. God made it the rule for Israel's later wars: before attacking a city, they had to offer it peace.
There is beautiful consideration on His part for the enemy. When they came near a city under threat, they were first called to proclaim peace to it. It was a strange way of making war, but worthy of God. He took no pleasure in war. He would train His people to go out, even to fight, remembering that their own feet were fitted with "the readiness given by the gospel of peace," if I may put it that way... God then deals with them just as seriously, in keeping with how real the earlier offer of peace was.
Sihon said no. His refusal looks like one king's choice, but something stood behind it. The refusal did not spoil the offer of peace. It brought to a head the guilt of a nation whose time was up.
What Moses emphasises here, as it suits his purpose, is that God gave him into their hand. Even the stubbornness that refused to let the advancing army pass came from Him. The guilt of the Amorites was now full, and their sentence of destruction is stressed too: Israel became simply the executioners of God's judgment. Neither greed for land nor love of destruction in Israel brought this merciless rooting out on Sihon and his people. The mercy was for the world, in rooting out of it a deadly evil... The carrying out of God's sentence, put into Israel's hand, was well fitted to impress them with a sense of God's holiness that should not leave them.
- Peace first. Before anyone drew a sword, messengers went out with words of peace — a strange way of making war, but worthy of God.
- Terms, not tricks. No threats and no flattery — only an offer to keep to the highway and pay for food and water.
- God's word, not appetite. Israel left the lands of Esau and Lot untouched and took Sihon's. They did what God told them, and no more.
- Refusal exposed. Sihon's stubbornness was itself of God, because the guilt of the Amorites was now full.
- Judgment as mercy. Israel carried out God's sentence. The mercy in it was for the world — and the mark it left on Israel was a sense of God's holiness.
Let me pass through thy land by the highway alone will I go; I will neither turn to the right hand nor to the left.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
Thou shalt sell me food for money that I may eat; and thou shalt give me water for money that I may drink; I will only pass through on my feet,
Moses recalls the message he once sent to Sihon, king of Heshbon: give us the road through your country, and we will pay for every meal and every drink. Sihon said no, and war followed — so why did a nation with God's promise behind it ask permission at all?
Israel came to Sihon as buyers, not as conquerors. One writer asks whether God told Israel to use threats, flattery, or the sword.
In this case let us see the principles of Jehovah's discipline. Did He authorise Israel to force Sihon with threats of vengeance, or to win him by flattery? Did He offer him the book of the law with one hand and the sword with the other? Nothing of the sort. Look at the way Jehovah treated even these enemies of Israel. "Let me pass through your land. I will go only by the road… You shall sell me food for money, that I may eat, and give me water for money, that I may drink. Only let me pass through on foot." … Israel kept the path of right and courtesy. Sihon rushed on them to his own ruin.
Israel had already travelled past Esau's people on these terms. God had given them their land, so Israel bought what it used.
God takes an interest in the affairs of nations. He gives kingdoms, provinces and lands as He sees fit… God will never surrender His rights in this respect. He would not allow Israel to touch a single scrap of Esau's property. They were, to use a modern phrase, to pay ready cash for whatever they needed, and go quietly on their way. Indiscriminate slaughter and plunder were not to be thought of by the people of God.
Sihon got the same courteous offer Edom had. The difference lay in who received it.
Sihon was an Amorite. This race descended from Ham through Canaan (Gen. 10:15-16). Moses sent messengers to Sihon with a peaceful intention, asking to pass through his land strictly by the highway, offering to pay for food and water (vv. 26-27). They had done the same in regard to Edom, but this time the results were different. The Amorite was not their brother as Esau was.
The outcome of the two refusals also differed. Edom's "no" turned Israel aside; Sihon's "no" opened the first conquest.
In both cases they were refused permission to pass. In the case of Edom, Israel turned away from them and went around that land. But God hardened the spirit of Sihon with the object of delivering him into Israel's hand (v. 30).
If the terms were fair, why did war follow? One writer points to the guilt of the Amorites, and says plainly what did not drive Israel.
What is emphasised here, as suited to Moses' purpose, is that God gave him into their hand. Even the stubbornness that refused passage to the advancing host was of Him. The guilt of the Amorites was now full, so Israel became simply the executioners of God's judgment. On Israel's part it was neither lust of possession nor passion for destroying that brought this merciless removal on Sihon and his people. The mercy was for the world, in rooting out of it a virulent evil.
Deuteronomy 2 sorts the nations into two groups. That sorting carries a lesson for the reader today.
The path itself is barely touched on. What we have instead is Israel's different relation to the different nations they pass — Edom, Moab and Ammon on the one hand, and the Amorites on the other. Israel is strictly forbidden to meddle with the first group. They are told to make war on the Amorites, and that land becomes Israel's first possession. So we can be sure of this: as we travel on, it is important to know what to fight and what simply to pass by.
The same distinction applies on our own journey:
With the men of the flesh, the children of this world, we may trade as we travel on toward heaven. We must not fight with them. Their land is not ours. Our possessions are elsewhere — a good land, which forbids coveting any other.
- Pass through. Israel asked for a road, not a country. The message to Sihon sounds like someone on his way elsewhere.
- Pay for it. Israel paid ready cash for food and water and took no plunder. God had given that land to another, and He keeps His rights.
- Ask courteously. No threats, no flattery, no law in one hand and a sword in the other. Israel kept the path of right and courtesy.
- Refusal hardens. Sihon heard the same peaceful terms Edom had heard. God hardened his spirit, and that stubbornness delivered him into Israel's hand.
- Possess what is given. The road he blocked became Israel's first possession. Know what to fight and what to walk past.
-- as the children of Esau who dwell in Seir, and the Moabites who dwell in Ar, did to me, -- until I shall pass over the Jordan into the land which Jehovah our God giveth us.
Moses is recalling his message to Sihon, king of Heshbon: let Israel pass through, and they will pay for their food and water. Esau's descendants and the Moabites had allowed this, so why did the same polite message end in war, and why pay at all?
Israel came to Sihon's border with God's promise of the land behind them. Yet Moses sent no threat. One writer asks what God allowed Israel to do:
Did He authorise Israel to force Sihon with threats of vengeance, or to win him by flattery? Did He offer him the book of the law with one hand and the sword with the other? Nothing of the sort... Israel kept the path of right and courtesy. Sihon rushed on them to his own ruin; and only so did Israel strike down and dispossess the king of Heshbon.
The offer to buy food and water rested on God's own ruling about who owns what. He had already settled that question over Edom's land:
They forget that God takes an interest in the affairs of nations; that He hands out kingdoms, provinces and lands as He sees fit... They do not understand the meaning and force of this simple sentence, "I have given Mount Seir to Esau for a possession." God will never give up His rights in this matter. He would not allow Israel to touch a single scrap of Esau's property. They were, to use a modern phrase, to pay ready cash for whatever they needed, and go quietly on their way. The people of God were not to think of indiscriminate slaughter and plunder... God was going to give them the land of Canaan, as He had promised Abraham. But the same hand that was giving them Canaan had given Mount Seir to Esau.
God had carried Israel for forty years. One writer shows why that left them no reason to covet:
"You shall buy food from them for money, so that you may eat. You shall also buy water from them for money, so that you may drink. For the LORD your God has blessed you in all the work of your hand. He knows your walking through this great wilderness. These forty years the LORD your God has been with you. You have lacked nothing." Why should they covet? They had to learn not to seek what God would not give them. That is the point — to do God's will.
Moses points to Esau's descendants as a people who let Israel by. One writer notes that the record tells a harder story:
Yet they were not to meddle with Edom, for God had given it as a possession to Esau. They would be permitted to buy food and water from them. The historical record does not say that they bought anything from Edom, however, for Edom strongly refused to allow them passage through their land.
Commentators differ here. Kelly sees courtesy; another writer draws a line between Edom's land and land God had already given to Israel:
The land of Edom and of Moab formed no part of Israel's promised possession; it was God's command that they should not be dispossessed. The land of the Amorite was given. Was it of faith to ask merely to pass through it? The request did bring out their hatred, and their attempt to hinder Israel. Their destruction was the result. But the question remains — ought not Israel to have taken possession at once?
The message looks past Sihon's land to the Jordan and to the land God is giving. One writer finds the same pattern in the Christian life:
First comes the divine act: "I have given," or, "I have begun to give." Then comes the call to the people, "Begin to possess." God's gracious dealings with us today run along similar lines... First, the unfolding of what He has given us in Christ. Then, the call that we should begin to possess in experience all that is given, in the power of the Holy Spirit, who lives in us.
- Given — God hands out lands as He sees fit. "I have given Mount Seir to Esau" settled it, and Israel could not touch a scrap.
- Supplied — Forty years of lacking nothing left no excuse to covet. A people carried by God can afford to pay their way.
- Courteous — No threats, no flattery, no law in one hand and sword in the other. Israel kept the path of right and courtesy.
- Questioned — Writers differ: was it faith to ask permission to cross land God had already given?
- Onward — The whole request aimed at the Jordan: what God gives first, His people then begin to possess.
But Sihon the king of Heshbon would not let us pass by him; for Jehovah thy God hardened his spirit, and made his heart obdurate, that he might give him into thy hand, as it is this day.
Israel asked Sihon for nothing but safe passage, and the king refused. Moses traces that refusal back to God, which raises the hardest question in the chapter: if God hardened Sihon, how was Sihon guilty?
The fighting did not start with Israel:
In this case let us see the principles of Jehovah's discipline. Did He authorise Israel to force Sihon with threats of vengeance, or to win him over by flattery? Did He offer him the book of the law with one hand and the sword with the other? Nothing of the sort… Israel kept the path of right and courtesy. Sihon rushed on them to his own ruin; and only so did Israel strike down and dispossess the king of Heshbon.
Writers here draw a sharp line between two very different acts of God:
There is a hardening in certain cases. God cannot make a person wicked, or tempt him to be wicked. But He can harden a sinner, and in judgment give him up to blindness… In all this history, notice that God does not make man wicked. He only gives man up to what he is.
That giving-up has a visible result. The man stops seeing where he is heading:
Jehovah did not make them wicked. But it was from Jehovah that these men, already wicked and careless about His will and His warnings, should not now believe their danger — that they should dare on blindly to their own destruction. God never makes a person a sinner. But when men are wicked and are following their own lusts or passions, He may close and seal their eyes. Then they no longer see the folly of what they are doing, or the danger they are running into.
Hardening is never where God starts:
This hardening comes before destruction. But it comes after man has ripened his own iniquity… "Whom He will He hardens" is true. Yet He chooses to show His wrath this way, by hardening, only in the case of those He has borne with in much patience.
This timing changes what Israel's army was that day:
What Moses stresses here is that God gave Sihon into their hand. Even the stubbornness that refused passage to the advancing army came from Him. The iniquity of the Amorites was now full, so the sentence of destruction laid on them is dwelt on too. By it Israel became only the executioners of God's judgment. Neither greed for land nor a passion for destroying drove them to wipe out Sihon and his people so mercilessly. The mercy was for the world, in rooting out of it a virulent evil.
It had happened before, to Pharaoh:
Sihon's measure of wickedness and cruelty was full. God hardened his spirit as He had Pharaoh's, and Israel overthrew him and his kingdom completely.
Writers use different words for this. Some say sovereignty. Others say government — God dealing with a man by what that man has done:
Pharaoh was already resisting God. He was already acting with cruel brutality toward the people of God. So the hardening of his heart was governmental, and deserved, not an arbitrary use of sovereignty. On top of that, we find Pharaoh hardening his own heart again and again. What fault can anyone find with God doing to him what he chose to do for himself?
The verse states God's aim: to give Sihon into Israel's hand. The verses around it show the order God works in:
First comes the Divine act: "I have given," or, "I have begun to give." Then comes the call to the people, "Begin to take possession." God deals with us in the same way today… First, He unfolds what He has given us in Christ. Then come the calls to begin taking hold, in real experience, of all He has given, in the power of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.
- Ripened. Hardening never starts the story. It falls only on a man whose sin God has already borne with in long patience.
- Given up. God does not make anyone wicked. He gives a wicked man over to what he already is, and seals his eyes to his own danger.
- Answerable. Sihon still chose to attack. Israel asked only for passage and kept the path of right and courtesy; the aggression was his.
- Executioners. The guilt of the Amorites was full. So Israel's sword was a judge's sword, not a robber's — and rooting out that evil was mercy to the whole world.
- Given, then taken. God said "I have begun to give" before He said "Begin to take possession." He works the same way now: He hands us what is ours in Christ, then calls us to make it our own.