Covenant Structure of Deuteronomy

The Covenant structure of Deuteronomy

Preamble 1:1-5
Historical Prologue 1:6-3:29
Stipulations 4-26
Witnesses 30:19; 31:19-22
Curses and Blessings 30:19; 31:19-22



As Yahweh brought His people to the verge of nationhood, as they prepared to enter into the Lords Sabbath rest by way of the promise-kingdom land of Canaan. Their Great King who delivered them from the yoke of Egypt renews the Covenant with a fresh generation of His vassal people.

This covenant renewal document comes to us bridgeing the past history of the Israelites to the future in their typological consumated kingdom of the promised land, in the form patterened after the culture and structure of nearby polical treaties.

The comparisons between the last book of the Torah and those found to the north, in the land of the Hittites as well as other ANE documents are helpful for the Christian in several ways.


1) Often times, scholars are helped by extra-biblical works that are authored in an ancient Semitic language. The language of the Hebrews is related to other surrounding languages and by comparing words from one text that the meaning is unclear, to another that the meaning from the text is clear. Several Hebrew words only appear in the Torah on a limited scale so the meanings are vague and unknown. The same word or variant of the word may be used in larger numbers from a surrounding civilations records (i.e. Ugarit Tablets) giving us the meaning by way of a great pool of contexts to decipher the true intent of a word.

2) The German higher critics that erupted into Christendom in the early 18th century rejected the authorship of the Torah as written by Moses as constructed what came to be known later as the Documentary Hypothesis. Many theories were formed mostly after the Jewish philosopher, Benedict (how fitting) Spinoza rejected Mosaic authorship and proposed Ezra as the original writer and the result was a 200 year long emphasis on scholarship to adopt a methodology of skeptism to the date and authorship of the Pentateuch. If fact, in 1891 S.R Drive established the DH as the standard approach to scholarship. (The main point of the theory is to show a much later date of compilation of multiple documents to form the Torah by priests in exile in Babylon some 600-800 years or so after Moses was said to have authored it.) The success of this theory has shaken the mainline churches from the Church of Rome to most major modern day protestant churches, all of whom teach the DH as the only way to approach the Pentateuch. In fact, one of the Professors as Midwestern Baptist Seminary related a story that happened in the not so distant past about a professor who, during the first day of class stood and tossed his Bible across the room and into the trash can. His remarks to the students were that by the end of the semester, each student would be able to do the same. This occurred when the Co-op was seeking to be more main stream. Thank God for His work through the men who brought us back to a belief and love for God’s Word as inerrant. I mention this to show that this is indeed relevant for God’s workmen to be aware of, not only to guard against but to learn how to counter it in defending the faith against people who have this Wellhausian Hypothesis as their main presupposition. Most seminaries teach this form of the DH developed in 1883 by Julius Wellhausen, and it’s easy to see the result theologically as their denominations crumble into liberalism. In fact I have listened to several debates between theists and atheists and have detected hints of the DH coming out in atheist argumentation yet the points were left untouched by the theist (perhaps it was his presup as well).

On to the point concerning the Ancient Near Eastern documents, and the covenantal Suzerain structure of Deuteronomy. This alone is not a definitive argument as it concentrates on the date not author, but will help when coupled with other points of contention against those who teach the DH.

The ANE documents that are reflected in the structure of the Torah link the Pentateuch to the time frame of said ANE cultures. The specific time, Late Bronze Age has within itself the proper context to show a second millennium dating of the first five books of Moses thus showing the continuity with it and the surrounding atmosphere of the world that then was.


It should be mentioned that as the structure is well recognizable, the theological content of the documents are vastly different. God’s relationship with His people mimics that of an ancient king and his subjects. God demands complete loyalty and devotion by His vassals, requiring no other allegiances to other nations, rulers or gods.
This emphasized Yahwehs desire to be served as the monotheistic God of creation by His people. As well, the documents laid out His divine interaction within His covenant as vowing certain things as He obligates Himself to His people. There was no doubt in the minds of the people that they were vassels of the Great King.

By and large, the extra biblical evidences lend credence too and give us a deeper insight to the Lord who we are covenanted into by His everlasting blood.

Luke 8:12 Closed Case Against Calvinism?

The following question arose from a call into the conversation between Brother Body and Dustin Seagers in a debate on monergism vs synergism that aired on Gene’s Cooks Narrow Mind broadcast this past Tuesday night. (www.unchainedradio.com)

After listening to the mp3 on Wedesday, I posed the following for review in Gene’s forums.

The question was posed to Dustin, who was in affirmation of God’s acting alone (monergism) in the Salvation of sinners.

Here is the question posed by the caller:

“When someone is not regenerated and the Word of God is preached to him, do they have the ability to respond to that in a positive way?”

The answer given by Pastor Seagers was “no”.

The caller read the verse Luke 8:12

“Those beside the road are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart, so that they will not believe and be saved."

and asked: “If somebody is in such a state of depravity that they would never respond positively to the Word, why would it be necessary for the enemy to come and take the word out of their heart, lest they should believe and be saved?.”

His point was; why would the devil have to take something that really wasn’t there since the hearer did not have the natural ability needed for the word to be in his heart.

In the callers view, the devil snatched away the word from the hearers' heart and since it was there to snatch, the hearer indeed had the ability to choose.
It was there, so he must have had the ability to do so, naturally.
Therefore, according to the caller, TULIP's "P" must go.

But I believe his understanding of the verse presents a major problem that can be seen with one question. My question from the above dialog would simply be:

If the devil has the ability to prevent salvation, why does he not prevent all salvation?



The way I see it, there are only three possibilities:

1) No salvation for any. This doesn’t hold water as the remainder of the passage explains otherwise.

2) Satan has motives unknown to us, stealing away the Word from some but not others, but this gives him sovereignty over mans salvation and must be rejected as well.

3) God prevents Satan from stealing the Word from the hearts of some, thereby bringing us back to a proper understanding of Biblical Christianity as God exercises His sovereign rite to bring in all those whom He has giving to the Son.


What do you think?

In the Beginning..............of my blog

I have made the plunge into the depths of Blogging. Surprising enough, it only took about 15 seconds! Now I just have to think up something to say!

I have enjoyed my time making new friends and studying others perspectives of things related to Scripture on the various blogs I read. My only hope from this endeavor is to be closer to my Creator, and a respectful handler of His Word.

My prayer is to exhort faithfulness to the people of the one who is Faithful. May God grant His mercy and Grace upon me, as I comment upon things that pertain to His sacred Word.

The title of my blog:
>>Vassal of the Great King<< comes from the study of the similarities found with in the Ancient Near Eastern texts (Ugaritic ect.) and the structure of the Scriptures, specifically the Pentateuch, but found through out the entire Cannon and is indeed an over arching pattern of God's dealings with mankind. Within the ANE (Ancient Near East), the pattern of dealings between two parties always included the distinction of each members status. Meaning, basically that the parties were of unequal strength. If I were to need protection, I would make covenant with some one of greater strength than myself. Now, if I were representative of a people by way of a political-militarily headship, I act in covenant for the sake of the people I represent. Whether the lesser (vassal) or the greater (Suzerain king) of the two parties, a covenant would be formed using a pattern that for the greater part, are the same (with minor differences) from one culture or tradition to another within the ANE, including the ancient Semite Abram, called from the land of Ur and Moses who documented the paths of the patriarch.

The following is a brief synopsis of the structure of ANE covenants.

1) Preamble
The Suzerain King over the berith (covenant) gives his credentials and attributes as the one with authority.

2) Historical prologue
Here, the past relationships that have lead them to this agreement are given. The Suzerain states his past acts on behalf of the vassal to show him the need for his obedience.

3) Stipulations
I will do ‘this’, and you will abide in ‘that’
Among the Hittite treaties, the vassal would be required to pledge his allegiance to the Suzerain and a prohibition of any allegiances with outside nations. Also, a yearly visit in person to the Suzerain of the covenant was required to show loyalty.

4) Provision of document deposit
Document was to be kept in a safe place with periodic reading to those involved. This would be necessary to the entire people the vassal represented. The vassal nation would deposit this document, protected by the deity in their temple and was considered a sacred object thereby a breaching of the covenant would as well invoke the protector-deity as well.

5) List of witnesses
In the ANE, the gods were summoned to witness the agreement (either/or Hittite specific gods or those specificly of the vassal nation). They (gods) could be the deified mountain(s), Heaven and Earth or rivers and clouds.

6) Curses & Blessings
This section outlines the consequences for covenant breakers and rewards for the covenant keepers. Within the Hittite structure, the great army was used as the source of the divine will of the gods as their hand in judgment for those who broke covenant.


I would presume that much of what I have described has a few bells ringing as the similarities to the way in which God revealed Himself to His chosen people, and the culture that the ancients were a part of, should be glaring. We will get into that as we go, but for now it shall serve as an explanation of the title “Vassal of the Great King”.