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Words
Did you know, the Torah have 5 books (1st books of the Scripture), and Psalms also have 5 books (that are all put together as one book known as just “Psalms”).
The word “Deuteronomy” means “second law” or “repeated law” in Ancient Greek, which refers to the fifth book of the Torah (or Pentateuch) in both Jewish and Christian scriptures. The word Pentateuch is also Greek. Some have taken the words “second law” literally, while nowhere in Hebrew or in Scripture we find a reference to a second law. In this book, Moses will be reminding Israel of their history, of the laws, and the future, while also filling some gaps of the story that we didn’t get in the first 4 books.
The Hebrew name for this book is Devarim, which means “Words” H1697 – dāḇār. The reason it is called Words/Devarim is because of the first verse in Deuteronomy 1:1 “These are the words which Mosheh spoke to all Yisrael beyond the Yardĕn in the wilderness”.
Another old term used for Torah is the Mosaic Laws. The term “Mosaic Law” refers to the laws given by YHWH to the Israelites through Moses, as recorded in the first five books of the Hebrew Bible (Torah), and is named after Moses because he received and transmitted these laws from YHWH.
Obviously we know that when YHWH spoke and created Light, and the rest of Creation, He used Words. But the first time this word DABAR is used in Scripture is with the Tower of Babel. Genesis 11:1 “And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech (DABAR)”.
Where does all the Greek names come from? Around the time Yeshua was born, 3 to 1 BC, there were a lot of Greek Jews. They translated the Hebrew Scriptures to Greek, which is called the Septuagint, sometimes referred to LXX. This greek version, Septuagint, was then later adopted by the early Christian Churches. This is also why the new testament letters were all written in Greek. The only book or letter from the new testament that we have a Hebrew and Greek source is the Gospel of Matthew, which was well known among the Jewish community, even until the Middle Ages.
Looking back at a previous post in Numbers 11-13 (click here to see the post), I explained about the origin of the name Jesus, which is a Greek translation from Iesous. I used both the Hebrew and Greek LXX translation to prove where the name Jesus should be Yehoshua, which is found in both old and new testament (Iesous and Yehoshua).
Giants
Deut 1:11 “They were also reckoned as Rephaites H7497 – rᵊp̄ā’îm, like the Anaqim H6062 – ʿănāqîm, but the Moabites call them Emites H368 – ‘êmîm.” Some translations say something like this “Which also were accounted giants, as the Anakims; but the Moabites call them Emims.” Remember in Numbers 13 where the 12 spies came back, and 10 of them said, verse 33 Num 13:33 “And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak H6061 – ʿănāq, which come of the giants H5303 – nāp̄îl“.
In Deut 3:11 it says, “For only Og̅ sovereign of Bashan was left of the remnant of the Repha’ites. See, his bedstead was an iron bedstead. Is it not in Rabbah of the children of Ammon? Nine cubits is its length and four cubits its width, according to the cubit of a man.“ That is a bed of over 4 meters long! We read about the 12 spies in Numbers 13:21,23 “So they went up and spied out the land from the Wilderness of Tsin as far as Reḥoḇ, near the entrance of Ḥamath…And they came to the wadi Eshkol, and cut down from there a branch with one cluster of grapes. And they bore it between two of them on a pole, also of the pomegranates and of the figs.” Did you catch that? ONE CLUSTER OF GRAPES – they had to carry on a pole.. food for giants..
The first time we encountered giants was in Genesis before the flood, in Genesis 6:4 “There were giants H5303 in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.”
Let us do a break down of the names:
- REPHAIM (H7497 – rᵊp̄ā’îm) just mean GIANTS in general.
- Anakim (H6062 – ʿănāqîm) means long necked giants. The root word Anak (H6061 – ʿănāq) means neck.
- Emim (H368 – ‘êmîm) means terrors (ancient inhabitants of Moab)
- Nephilim (H5303 – nāp̄îl) giants from the Genesis story, where angels (disobedient/fallen) took the woman and their children were giants, called Nephilim. The root word Naphal (H5307 – nāp̄al) means cast down, falled, fall away, divided, inferior, lighted, lost.
The Anakim were descendants of a man name Anak, whom we are told had three sons, Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai (Joshua 15:14; Judges 1:10, 20). Joshua later devoted the Anakim to destruction, only leaving them in Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod (Joshua 11:21-22). (1 Samuel 17:4 says that Goliath was from Gath, leading us to conclude he was a descendant of Anak.) Caleb is said to have driven out the Anakim from Hebron (Joshua 14:12; 15:14; Judges 1:20), a city that was formerly called Kiriath-arba, named after Arba, who “was the greatest man among the Anakim” (Joshua 14:15; cf. Judges 1:10).
For many, Goliath is an amazing story about an unusually tall man who came out of nowhere. But the Bible has been setting us up to see him in the light of the Nephilim. He is a descendant of the giants, still present on the earth well after the flood. And believe it or not, even he is not the last of the giants. In the time of David, Israel went on to fight more giants in the land of the Philistines. In 2 Samuel 21 we read about a giant named Ishbi-benob, with a spear that weighed about half the amount of Goliath’s, with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot, set out to kill David during a war. However, one of David’s soldiers killed him first. In other wars the Israelites struck down a giant named Saph/Sippai and Goliath’s brother, Lahmi. And finally, a 12-fingered, 12-toed giant was also struck down in one of these wars.
Just to recap from the beginning:
Genesis 7 tells of a worldwide Flood that YHWH sent to destroy “all flesh” upon the earth (verse 21). However, some of the genes to produce giants survived through the wife of Ham, one of Noah’s sons. Therefore, a number of the sons of Canaan (one of Ham’s sons) were giants (Numbers 13:1-2, 32-33). There is no mention of giants in Scripture after the time of David.
Son
Deut 1:31 “and in the wilderness, where you saw how YHWH your Elohim has borne you, as a man bears his son, “. This verse takes you right back to the beginning where YHWH said to Pharaoh in Exodus 4:22, “‘Israel is My son, My firstborn. So I say to you, let My son go that he may serve Me.’”
What a beautiful picture that during this 40 years, YHWH carried them like His children. The word borne in verse 31, is NASA H5375 – nāśā‘, which means to carry, bear, lift up, obtain, take, and even forgive. The word son in Hebrew is Ben H1121 – bēn. The root word for Ben is BANA H1129 – bānâ, which means to build, set up or even repair.
IMPORTANT SCRIPTURES / PROPHECIES:
| Deut 1:9-17 – Judges – Appointing judges and leaders, need to be wise and understanding. Knowing their people well, but not showing partiality. Must judge righteously. |
| Deut 1:17 – Judges/Judgement – Do not fear those who must judge you, for the final right-ruling belongs to Elohim. |
