Two chapters on leadership. Israel will one day want a king “like all the nations,” and God allows it — but under conditions no ancient monarchy would have accepted, the strangest being that the king must hand-copy the entire law and read it every day of his life. And where the nations turn to mediums and diviners for guidance, Israel is promised something better: a Prophet like Moses, still to come.
A study in Deuteronomy 17-18 · Arthur Baldwin · StandUp4Jesus.Org · 8 min read
A King Like All The Nations
“And shalt say, I will set a king over me, like as all the nations that are about me; Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the LORD thy God shall choose… one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee.”
Deuteronomy 17:14-15
God sees the request coming, centuries early, and He hears the motive in it — “like all the nations,” the wish to look normal. He permits a monarchy but fences it: the king must be an Israelite, God’s choice, and — in the verses that follow — he must not multiply horses, or wives, or silver and gold. Every temptation of kingship is named and forbidden in advance.
He Shall Write Him A Copy Of This Law
“He shall write him a copy of this law in a book… And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life: that he may learn to fear the LORD his God… That his heart be not lifted up above his brethren.”
Deuteronomy 17:18-20
The most powerful man in the nation has to copy out the law by hand, from the priests’ own scroll, and read from it daily — so that he never forgets he is under the same word as the poorest Israelite. The purpose is stated: “that his heart be not lifted up above his brethren.” A ruler who lives in the Scriptures is a ruler with a ceiling over his pride.
Thou Shalt Be Perfect With The LORD Thy God
“Thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations. There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch… Thou shalt be perfect with the LORD thy God.”
Deuteronomy 18:9-10, 13
The nations reached for the future and the unseen through child sacrifice, fortune-telling, omens, spells and mediums. Israel is to have nothing to do with any of it. “Perfect with the LORD” here means wholly His — not consulting Him and hedging with the occult on the side. God does not hide guidance where it must be pried out by forbidden arts; He gives it openly.
A Prophet Like Unto Me
“The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken… and I will put my words in his mouth… And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.”
Deuteronomy 18:15, 18-19
In place of the diviner, God promises a Prophet from among their own people, carrying God’s own words, and to be obeyed on pain of judgement. Israel kept waiting for him; the Samaritan woman at the well had the verse ready (John 4:25), and Peter, preaching in Solomon’s porch, said flatly that the Prophet was Jesus (Acts 3:22-23). The line runs from Moses to Christ, and Christ is where it stops.
“Moses was a type of Christ. He himself had declared to Israel, ‘The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto Him ye shall hearken.’”
Ellen G. White · Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 480
