Deuteronomy 7

WHen the LORD thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and has cast out many nations before thee, the Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven Nations There were ten in Gen. 15. 19. But this being some hundreds of years after that it is not strange if three of them were either destroyed by Forreign or Domestick wars, or by... tion and marriage united with, and swallowed up in some of the rest, greater and mightier than thou:

And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee, thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them, thou shalt make no covenant with them To spare them, or permit them to dwell with thee in the land. Other Nations had more favour, but these were for their great wickedness, and for the good of Israel devoted to utter destruction., nor show mercy unto them.

Neither shalt thou make marriages with them, thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter thou shalt not take to thy son.

For they will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods i. e. There is manifest danger of Apostacy and Idolatry from such matches. Which reason does both limit the Law to such of these as were unconverted, otherwise Salmon marryed. Mat. 1. 5. and enlarge it to other Idolatrous Nations, as appears from 1 King. 11. 2. Ezra. 9. 2. Neb. 13. 23.: so will the anger of the LORD be kindled against you, and destroy thee suddenly.

But thus shall ye deal with them; ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves Which Idolaters planted about the Temples and Altars of their Gods. Hereby God designed to take away whatsoever might bring their Idolatry to remembrance, or occasion the reviving of it., and burn their graven images with fire.

For thou art a holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God has chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all the people that are upon the face of the earth.

The LORD did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were moe in number than any people: (for ye were the sewest of all people To wit, at that time when God first declared his love to you, and choice of you for his people, which was done to Abraham For had but one Son concerned in this choice and covenant, to wit, and that was in his hundredth year; and was 60 years old ere he had a Child and then had only two Children; and though Jacob had 12 Sons, yet it was a long time ere they made any considerable increase. Nor do we read of any great multiplication of them till after death, Exod. 1. 6,.....)

But because the LORD loved you i. e. Because it pleased him to love you it was his free choice, without any cause or motive on your part. Compare Deut. 10. 15. 1 Sam. 12. 22.. 44. 3., and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, has the LORD brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh King of Egypt.

Know therefore that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God True to his word, and constant in performing all his promises., which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him, and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations:

And repayeth them that hate him Not only those who hate him directly and properly, (for so did few or none of the to whom he here speaks,) but those who hate him by construction and consequence, those who hate and oppose his People, and Word, and Image, those who presumptuously and wilfully persist in the breach of Gods Commandements, as appears from v. 9. where the love of God, to which this hatred is opposite, is described and expressed by the keeping of his commandements., to their face i. e. Openly, and so as they shall see it, and not be able to avoid it., to destroy them: he will not be slack To wit, so as some slackness, 2 Pet. 3. 9. so as to delay it beyond the fit time or season for vengeance, yet withal he is long-suffering, and slow to anger, as that and other places inform us. to him that hateth him, he will repay him to his face.

Thou shalt therefore keep the commandments, and the statutes, and the judgments which I command thee this day, to do them.

Wherefore it shall come to pass, if ye hearken to these judgments, and keep and do them, that the LORD thy God shall keep unto thee the covenant and the mercy i. e. The Covenant of Mercy or Grace, which he out of his own mere grace made with them. A figure called. which he sware unto thy fathers.

And he will love thee He will continue to love thee, and to manifest his love to thee, he will not repent of his love to thee., and bless thee, and multiply thee, he will also bless the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy land, thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oyl, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep, in the land which he sware unto thy fathers to give thee.

Thou shalt be blessed above all people: there shall not be male or female barren among you, or among your cattel.

And the LORD will take away from thee all sickness, and will put none of the evil diseases of Egypt Such as the Aegyptians were infested with, either commonly, as that, Deut. 28. 2.... or miraculously and extraordinarily from the hand of the Lord, as Exod. 9. 10, 15. Compare Exod. 23. 25. Psal. 105. 37., (which thou knowest) upon thee, but will lay them all upon them that hate thee.

And thou shalt consume all the people which the LORD thy God shall deliver thee, thine eye shall have no pity upon them, neither shalt thou serve their Gods, for that will be a snare unto thee.

If thou shalt say in thine heart, These nation are more than I, how can I dispossess them?

Thou shalt not be afraid of them: but shalt well remember Heb. i..... remember it frequently,,, and for thy encouragement, for men are said to forget those things which they do not remember to good purpose. what the LORD thy God did unto Pharaoh, and unto all Egypt;

The great temptations The Tryals and Exercises of thy Faith and Obedience to my call and commands. which thine eyes saw, and the signs, and the wonders, and the mighty hand, and the stretched-out arm, whereby the LORD thy God brought thee out: so shall the LORD thy God do unto all the people of whom thou art afraid So as he did to and his people, mentioned,.... 1....

Moreover, the LORD thy God will send the hornet Of which see on Exod. 23. 28. among them, until they that are lest and hide themselves from thee, be destroyed.

Thou shalt not be affrighted at them: for the LORD thy God is among you, a mighty God, and terrible.

And the LORD thy God will put out those nations before thee by little and little: thou mayest not consume them at once Or, Thou shalt not be able to conf... e them at once, i. e. in an instant. I will not assist thee with my omnipotency, to crush them in a moment, but will bless thee in the use of ordinary and destroy them successively by several battles., lest the beast of the field increase upon thee.

But the LORD thy God shall deliver them unto thee, and shall destroy them with a mighty destruction, until they be destroyed.

And he shall deliver their Kings into thi... e hand, and thou shalt destroy their name from under heaven: there shall no man be able to stand before thee, until thou have destroyed them This promise is made upon condition of their performance of their duty, which they neglecting, they justly lose the benefit of it, as we see, Iudg. 2. 1, 2, 3..

The graven images of their gods shall ye burn with fire: thou shalt not desire the silver or gold that is on them Wherewith the Idols are covered or a lorned, nor conse... other their ornaments. This he commands to sh... his of Idol... ry, and to cut off all occasions of i...., nor take it unto thee, lest thou be snared therein: for it is an abomination to the LORD thy God.

Neither shalt thou bring an abomination into thine house, lest thou be a cursed thing i. e. to, as that was. See Ios. 7., like it: but thou shalt utterly detest it, and thou shalt utterly ab... or it: for it is a cursed thing.