Deuteronomy 34:1-8

DEATH AND BURIAL OF MOSES, Deuteronomy 34:1-8.

Jehovah had said unto Moses, Behold, thy days approach that thou must die. Deuteronomy 31:14. Joshua was summoned to the tabernacle with Moses, and formally appointed his successor. The official life of the great leader and lawgiver closes. Another is to lead the people to their further victories; another is to cause them to possess the land. Moses completes the writing of the law and passes it to the Levites to be put within the ark of the covenant. Then the people assemble to hear the words of that matchless song of history, instruction, and warning, which forms so fitting a close to his ministry. On that same day Jehovah said to him, “Get thee up into this mountain Abarim, unto Mount Nebo,… and die in the mount.” Deuteronomy 32:49-50. He gives his farewell to the tribes, closing with the blessing, “Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord!” Deuteronomy 33:29.

Moses leaves the camp, he ascends the mountain and looks over the goodly land which is to be the future home of his people. The writer of this supplementary chapter gives no details of the parting with the elders, with his successor, Joshua, nor with the people he had so long directed and so long loved. His farewell had been given in the blessing upon the tribes. Josephus, however, furnishes an account which does not seem improbable. “Amid the tears of the people, the women beating their breasts, and the children giving way to uncontrolled wailing, he withdrew. At a certain point in his ascent he made a sign to the weeping multitude to advance no further, taking with him only the elders, the high-priest, Eliezer, and the general, Joshua. At the top of the mountain he dismissed the elders, and then, as he was embracing Eliezer and Joshua, and still speaking to them, a cloud suddenly stood over him, and he vanished in a deep valley.”