The Book of Deuteronomy

The Book of Deuteronomy closes the Pentateuch, the five books of Moses, and stands on the threshold of the promised land. After forty years in the desert, Israel waits at the Jordan. Before he dies, Moses speaks to the people as a father, recalling what God has done, repeating the Law and binding them to it by covenant. Every chapter below opens on its own page, with St Jerome's Latin Vulgate beside the Douay-Rheims.

The name Deuteronomy: a "second law"

The name comes through the Greek and Latin (Deuteronomium) and means "second law." Bishop Challoner's note at the head of the book in the Douay-Rheims explains it: "This Book is called Deuteronomy, which signifies a second law, because it repeats and inculcates the ordinances formerly given on mount Sinai, with other precepts not expressed before." The word itself occurs in the text, where the future king "shall copy out to himself the Deuteronomy of this law in a volume" (Deuteronomy 17:18), and Josue later "wrote upon stones the Deuteronomy of the law of Moses" (Josue 8:32). The Catholic Encyclopedia notes that the underlying Hebrew rather means a "copy" of the Law. The Hebrews name the book from its first words, Elle haddebarim, "These are the words."

Moses, the author of Deuteronomy

The Church has received Deuteronomy, with the whole Pentateuch, as the work of Moses. The book says so more plainly than any other of the five: "Moses wrote this law, and delivered it to the priests the sons of Levi" (Deuteronomy 31:9), and "after Moses had wrote the words of this law in a volume, and finished it," he commanded the Levites to lay it beside the Ark of the Covenant as a testimony (31:24–26). Our Lord ascribes the Law to Moses throughout the Gospels ("he wrote of me," John 5:46), and the Fathers, from Clement of Rome, Justin and Irenaeus to Tertullian and Origen, bear the same tradition.

The Pontifical Biblical Commission, in its response of 27 June 1906, confirmed the Mosaic authenticity of the Pentateuch. It added that Moses need not have written every word with his own hand: he may have entrusted the writing to others under his approval, used earlier documents, and the text may have received later inspired additions without losing its substantial integrity.

The final chapter, which tells of Moses' death and burial, is the classic case. Challoner notes on chapter 34: "This last chapter of Deuteronomy, in which the death of Moses is related, was written by Josue, or by some of the prophets."

Many modern scholars hold instead that the book took shape centuries later, often linking its core to "the book of the law" found in the Temple under King Josias (4 Kings 22). Yet Scripture says the high priest Helcias "found the book of the law in the house of the Lord" (22:8): it was found, not composed, and the Church's traditional teaching remains as set out above.

The date of the discourses

The book dates itself precisely. Moses began to speak "in the fortieth year, the eleventh month, the first day of the month" after the Exodus, "beyond the Jordan in the land of Moab" (Deuteronomy 1:3–5). Scripture places the Exodus four hundred and eighty years before Solomon began the Temple (3 Kings 6:1), which is why traditional chronologies set these discourses in the fifteenth century before Christ, at the end of the desert wanderings recounted in the Book of Numbers.

Summary of Deuteronomy, part by part

Deuteronomy is less a new history than a sermon on the history and Law given in Exodus and Leviticus. Its 34 chapters fall into six parts.

The first discourse: forty years remembered (chapters 1–4)

In chapters 1–4 Moses reviews the road from Horeb (Sinai): the spies and the refusal to enter the land at Cades, the forty years of wandering, and the victories over Sehon and Og. He recalls that God refused him entry into the land (chapter 3) and closes: "the Lord he is God in heaven above, and in the earth beneath, and there is no other" (4:39).

The second discourse: the Decalogue and the great commandment (chapters 5–11)

From "This is the law, that Moses set before the children of Israel" (4:44), Moses repeats the Ten Commandments (chapter 5) and then gives the heart of the whole Law, the Shema: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength" (6:4–5). Chapters 7–11 warn against the idols of Chanaan, recall the manna and the golden calf (chapter 9), and ask: "what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but that thou fear the Lord thy God, and walk in his ways, and love him" (10:12).

The statutes and judgments (chapters 12–26)

The central code opens in chapter 12 with the one place of sacrifice that God will choose. It then orders the life of the nation: the clean and unclean meats and the tithes (chapter 14), the year of remission (chapter 15), the three pilgrim feasts of the Phase (Passover), Weeks and Tabernacles (chapter 16), judges, kings, priests and prophets (chapters 17–18), cities of refuge and witnesses (chapter 19), the conduct of war (chapter 20), and laws on family, property and mercy to the stranger, the widow and the fatherless (chapters 21–25). It ends with the offering of first-fruits (chapter 26).

Blessings, curses and the covenant in Moab (chapters 27–30)

Israel is to write the Law on plastered stones beyond the Jordan and proclaim the curses from Mount Hebal (chapter 27). Chapter 28 sets out the blessings of obedience and, at much greater length, the curses of apostasy, ending in siege and exile. Chapters 29–30 renew the covenant "beside that covenant which he made with them in Horeb" (29:1) and end in the great choice: "I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Choose therefore life" (30:19).

Josue, the Canticle and the Blessing of Moses (chapters 31–33)

Moses hands the leadership to Josue and commits the written Law to the Levites (chapter 31). He then sings the Canticle "Hear, O ye heavens" (chapter 32), a prophetic song of God's faithfulness and Israel's ingratitude, and blesses each tribe in turn, as Jacob had done at the end of Genesis (chapter 33).

The death of Moses (chapter 34)

From Mount Nebo, on the top of Phasga, the Lord shows Moses the whole land: "Thou hast seen it with thy eyes, and shalt not pass over to it." He dies "by the commandment of the Lord," a hundred and twenty years old, "his eye was not dim," and "no man hath known of his sepulchre until this present day" (chapter 34). The book ends: "there arose no more a prophet in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face." The story continues in the Book of Josue.

The main message of Deuteronomy and its Catholic reading

St Jerome called Deuteronomy "the second law" and "the foreshadowing of the law of the gospel" (Letter 53). The Church reads it in that light.

One God, loved with the whole heart. The Shema is the first commandment of all. When asked which is the greatest commandment, Our Lord answered from Deuteronomy 6 (Mark 12:29–30; Matthew 22:37), joining to it the love of neighbour from Leviticus 19:18. We treat it in how to love God. Deuteronomy already asks for more than outward observance: "Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart" (10:16), and God promises that he "will circumcise thy heart" (30:6), a promise kept by grace.

The Decalogue binds Christians. The Ten Commandments given in Exodus 20 are repeated here in chapter 5, and the Council of Trent condemned anyone who says "that the ten commandments nowise appertain to Christians" (Session VI, canon 19). See our guide to the Ten Commandments for the Catholic numbering.

The Prophet like Moses. "The Lord thy God will raise up to thee a PROPHET of thy nation and of thy brethren like unto me: him thou shalt hear" (18:15). St Peter preached this verse as fulfilled in Christ (Acts 3:22), and St Stephen did the same (Acts 7:37).

Christ, made a curse for us. "He is accursed of God that hangeth on a tree" (21:23). St Paul writes: "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us" (Galatians 3:13). Against the Manichee Faustus, who took the verse as an insult to Christ, St Augustine answered: "Confess then that Christ died, and you may confess that He bore the curse for us" (Contra Faustum XIV, 7).

The weapons of the Lord in temptation. Tempted in the desert, Our Lord answered the devil three times from Deuteronomy: "Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God" (8:3), "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God" (6:16), and "The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and him only shalt thou serve" (6:13), as St Matthew records them (Matthew 4). The Church reads this Gospel on the first Sunday of Lent; we draw out its lesson in what God says about temptation.

Moses and Josue. Moses, the lawgiver, sees the land but cannot enter it; Josue, whose name in Greek and Latin is Jesus, leads the people across the Jordan: "if Jesus had given them rest he would never have afterwards spoken of another day" (Hebrews 4:8). The Fathers, Origen above all in his Homilies on Josue, saw here the Law bringing us to the border and Christ alone bringing us into the inheritance.

Authority to judge. Hard cases go to the Levitical priests, who "shall shew thee the truth of the judgment" (17:8–9). Challoner comments that if God gave such authority to "the church guides of the Old Testament," "surely he has not done less for the church guides of the New Testament."

Famous verses and chapters of Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy 6:4–9, the Shema, joins the confession "the Lord our God is one Lord" to the command to teach these words to one's children and write them "on the doors of thy house" (chapter 6). Deuteronomy 8:3, "not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God," is said of the manna (chapter 8).

Deuteronomy 14:8: "The swine also, because it divideth the hoof, but cheweth not the cud, shall be unclean" (chapter 14). These ceremonial food laws bound Israel only and are lifted in the New Testament (Acts 10; Mark 7:19). The same chapter commands the tithe for the Levite, the stranger, the fatherless and the widow (14:28–29), treated in what the Bible says about tithing.

Deuteronomy 18:18–19: "I will put my words in his mouth... And he that will not hear his words, which he shall speak in my name, I will be the revenger" (chapter 18). The same chapter forbids soothsayers, wizards and anyone "that seeketh the truth from the dead."

Deuteronomy 22:5: "A woman shall not be clothed with man's apparel, neither shall a man use woman's apparel: for he that doth these things is abominable before God" (chapter 22).

Deuteronomy 24:1, the bill of divorce (chapter 24). Our Lord explains that Moses permitted it "by reason of the hardness of your heart: but from the beginning it was not so" (Matthew 19:8), and restored marriage to its first indissolubility, as we show in what the Bible says about divorce. Deuteronomy 25:4, "Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out thy corn," St Paul applies to the support of the Church's ministers (1 Corinthians 9:9).

Deuteronomy 28, the blessings and curses, is the longest chapter (chapter 28). Challoner notes that the Old Law promised temporal goods, "heaven not being opened as yet," while the New promises goods "spiritual and eternal."

Deuteronomy 30:19, "Choose therefore life" (chapter 30); St Paul reads 30:14, "the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth and in thy heart," as "the word of faith, which we preach" (Romans 10:8). Deuteronomy 31:6: "the Lord thy God he himself is thy leader, and will not leave thee nor forsake thee" (chapter 31).

Deuteronomy in the canon and in the liturgy

Deuteronomy is the fifth book of the Old Testament in every Bible, Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant and Jewish, and has always been counted among the books of the Law. The Council of Trent, defining the canon in Session IV (1546), begins its list with "the five books of Moses, to wit, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy." The Douay text is translated from the Latin Vulgate, which explains its wording and its proper names (Josue, Chanaan, Phase); on the two versions see the Douay-Rheims Bible and the Latin Vulgate Bible.

In the 1962 Missal, the last of the four prophecies of the Easter Vigil is Deuteronomy 31:22–30, followed by the tract Attende caelum from the Canticle of Moses (32:1–4). The Ember Saturday of Lent reads Deuteronomy 26:12–19 and 11:22–25, and the Ember Saturday of Pentecost reads from chapter 26 among its lessons. In the Roman Breviary, the Canticle of Moses from chapter 32 is sung at Saturday Lauds in the second scheme, used on penitential days.

How to read Deuteronomy

Read it as Moses' last words, aloud if possible: it was written to be heard. Begin with chapters 1–11 and 27–34, the discourses and the farewell; then take the code of chapters 12–26 a chapter at a time, asking what each law teaches of God's holiness and His mercy to the weak. Keep Numbers at hand for the events Moses recalls, and the Gospels for the verses Our Lord made His own. The rest of Scripture is open in our Douay-Rheims and Vulgate Bible.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who wrote the Book of Deuteronomy?

The Church has always received Moses as the author of Deuteronomy, as of the whole Pentateuch. The book says that "Moses wrote this law" and delivered it to the Levites (Deuteronomy 31:9, 24), and Our Lord and the Fathers speak of the Law as his. The Pontifical Biblical Commission (1906) upheld this, allowing that Moses may have used secretaries.

Did Moses write about his own death in Deuteronomy?

The account of his death in chapter 34 is commonly ascribed to another hand. Challoner's Douay-Rheims note on 34:5 says it "was written by Josue, or by some of the prophets." Josephus and Philo, on the other hand, held that Moses wrote it himself by prophecy.

When was the Book of Deuteronomy written?

Its discourses are dated to the eleventh month of the fortieth year after the Exodus, on the plains of Moab, in the last weeks of Moses' life (Deuteronomy 1:3). Traditional chronology, built on 3 Kings 6:1, places this in the fifteenth century before Christ. Many modern scholars propose a later date.

What is the Book of Deuteronomy about?

Deuteronomy is Moses' farewell to Israel before they enter the promised land. He recalls the forty years in the desert, repeats the Ten Commandments and the Law, renews the covenant, appoints Josue, blesses the tribes and dies on Mount Nebo. Its main message is to love the one true God with the whole heart and choose life by keeping His commandments.

How many chapters are in the Book of Deuteronomy?

Deuteronomy has 34 chapters, the same number in Catholic and Protestant Bibles. The longest is chapter 28, the blessings and curses, with 68 verses; the shortest is the last, the death of Moses.

Who is speaking in the Book of Deuteronomy?

Almost the entire book is spoken by Moses, addressing "all Israel beyond the Jordan." A narrator introduces the discourses and tells of Moses' death in the last chapter.

How does the Book of Deuteronomy end?

It ends with the death of Moses on Mount Nebo, after God has shown him the whole promised land, which he was not allowed to enter. No man knows his sepulchre, and no prophet arose like him, "whom the Lord knew face to face." The history continues in the Book of Josue.

Is the Douay-Rheims Deuteronomy different from the KJV or NIV?

The book and its 34 chapters are the same. The Douay-Rheims translates St Jerome's Latin Vulgate, which the Council of Trent declared authentic, so its wording and names differ from versions made from the Hebrew, such as the KJV and NIV: Josue for Joshua, Chanaan for Canaan, the Phase for the Passover.

Read the whole Book of Deuteronomy verse by verse, in Latin and English side by side, in the Iter Fidei Catholic Bible app.

Sources. Holy Scripture, Douay-Rheims (Challoner) and Latin Vulgate: Deuteronomy 1–34; Josue 8:32; 3 Kings 6:1; 4 Kings 22:8; Matthew 4, 19, 22; Mark 12:29–30; John 5:46; Acts 3:22, 7:37; Romans 10:8; 1 Corinthians 9:9; Galatians 3:13; Hebrews 4:8. Bishop Challoner, introduction and annotations to Deuteronomy (17:8, 28:2, 34:5). St Jerome, Letter 53 to Paulinus, 8. St Augustine, Contra Faustum XIV, 7. Origen, Homilies on Josue. Council of Trent, Session IV (1546), Decree on the Canonical Scriptures; Session VI, canon 19. Pontifical Biblical Commission, On the Mosaic Authenticity of the Pentateuch (27 June 1906). Catholic Encyclopedia (1908–1913), "Deuteronomy" (A. J. Maas) and "Pentateuch." Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews IV; Philo, On the Life of Moses II. Missale Romanum (1962): Easter Vigil, Ember Saturdays of Lent and Pentecost. Breviarium Romanum (1960 rubrics): Saturday Lauds II.