"For the LORD’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance."

When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided all mankind, he set up boundaries for the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel.
For the LORD’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance.
-Deuteronomy 32:8-9



Hang on, now!!!!!

"For the LORD’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance."
If the LORD's portion is his people, and Jacob his "allotted" inheritance... then... who allotted this to the LORD?

Who is "the Most High"?
And who is the LORD who's allotted inheritance was Jacob?
They cant be the same.

Surely, the LORD who had inherit or be allotted something...
cant be the same as the "Most High" who gave "inheritance" to somebody else...

Maybe I'm stupid...

But I'm not getting your logic if there is any...

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations: ask thy father, and he will shew thee; thy elders, and they will tell thee.

8 When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.

9 For the LORD's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.

10 He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.

YHVH is Lord in the Bible. In Genesis 1, it is plural Elohim. After Genesis 1, it is LORD. Genesis 2 is the 2nd creation by material reality. Genesis 1 is the image production of creation by pattern. YHVH is literally translated as "Behold the hand, behold the nail." The most high and Lord are likely the same person referred to by Moses. Jesus referred to God the Father. There are the nations, often referred to as the sea, and there is THE nation that is set aside as the Lords. The Lord is ultimately seen in the body and person of Christ. All the words of the NT and OT are Jesus speaking. Take this a step further and see Adam as the first born of the first born. The last Adam is Jesus. After this point in history, the dead in Christ raise to new life. When the Lord returns (3rd day / Day of the Lord / 1000 years of peace), then the enemies are made his footstool. The first step is to turn the tables of the money changers. Do you see it happening today? March 30 is a day to watch in Israel.

reply to post by SwissMarked


Read the biblical quote again.

The LORD seems to be "inheriting" something.

When you inherit something... its usually from someone higher than you.... or you are given something that you did not own before.

a very common theme in the bible, starting with book 1
there is a god and lord god..a most high and a lord

aka, there are 2
a sort of overall king, and a local duke (or lord).

I suspect, based on literal translations, logic in the non literal guff we have today, and the overwhelming evidence that there are indeed 2 very distinct beings.

Some say this is Father God and Jesus of course...but I don't think jesus is playing a role in the older stuff...I think Jesus, in order to be a man, was conceived properly..aka, spawned into existence verses always been and had attained a merge through blessings.

just my perspective on that last bit

Frankly, it wouldn't surprise me at all to find all the gods in the bible (yes, there were many named) were in fact various demi-gods (employees?) and such under the main king god (or...as ancient aliens believe...many soldiers under the commander of the fleet)

reply to post by EnochWasRight

The most high and Lord are likely the same person referred to by Moses.

Read again.
According to that verse...the LORD who had inherited or was allotted something...cant be the same as the "Most High" who gave "inheritance" to somebody else.

If I say "I inherited a mansion", you know the mansion never belonged to me earlier, but I inherited it.
If I say "I was allotted X" you know X was "allotted to me" by somebody else.
In both cases, there was somebody else involved.

So since the verse says Jacob was the LORD'S allotted inheritance.... who did the allotting?
Who is the Most High who allotted Jacob to the LORD.?

reply to post by sk0rpi0n

The other day, I prepared a chicken to eat. When it was done, I allotted myself the drumsticks.

For Himself, the Most High consecrated a people to carry on His name.

The verse isn't illogical. You're being belligerent.

reply to post by HeFrippedMeOff

The other day, I prepared a chicken to eat. When it was done, I allotted myself the drumsticks

Cute.
Would you also say you "inherited" the drumsticks as well?

If I tell you I "inherited" a mansion, would you ask me if I owned it before I "inherited" it?

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


Perhaps more signs that of the "God" of the bible is one of many... And not the One True God...

"the Most High" is indeed the god of Israel, YHWH, the Lord God, the Lord. Whatever you want to call him.

I'm glad you brought this scripture up.

Here, in Duet. 32:8-9 and throughout all of Dueteronomy, you see alot of "El" (mighty one "El"-ohym) epithets. If you're familiar with the divine council material, you would have no problem discerning that the Most High is just another title. Unfortunately most people are not. The title "the Most High" occurs much less than "God" and "Lord", that is because of the timespan of translations and the infusion of Levanite influences on the texts.

Check out Psalms 97:9, it clarifies that "the Most High" and "God" are one in the same.

Here are some other translations of Duet. 32:9 (Which is a parallel of Genesis 10:32)

American King James Version
For the LORD's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.

New American Standard Bible (©1995)
"For the LORD'S portion is His people; Jacob is the allotment of His inheritance.

New Living Translation (©2007)
"For the people of Israel belong to the LORD; Jacob is his special possession.

In the Masoretic version of the Bible, allotment is used, which means basically a region. The text just reaffirms itself.

EDIT: What translation are you using? "sons of Israel" should read "sons of God"

reply to post by sk0rpi0n

There is no point in getting too literalistic about the word "inheritance", because "inheriting" normally means that somebody has died, and nobody here is dying.
I agree with an earlier poster; The Lord, who is also the Most High, divided up the nations, and kept one to be "his own" in a more special sense.
(If the rest of the Old Testament doesn't make a distinction between the Lord and the Most High, why create one on the basis of one verse?)

reply to post by sk0rpi0n

When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided all mankind, he set up boundaries for the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel.
For the LORD’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance.
-Deuteronomy 32:8-9

Hang on, now!!!!!

"For the LORD’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance."
If the LORD's portion is his people, and Jacob his "allotted" inheritance... then... who allotted this to the LORD?

Hey, S&F.
I think there's perhaps some distinction between "The Most High" and "the LORD".
As I read it, the Most High (God) allotted the Jacob people to the LORD (Jesus).

He was, in fact, only preaching to the Israelites.

It was Paul who later decided to build the franchise in an "empire-kinda-way," moving outside the Israelites and going all the way to Rome, finding recruits and all that (among the wealthy, who could afford to provide the place, etc).

Anyway, there's my comment.

reply to post by CaptainNemo


AHA. I knew it. I knew there had to be a reason every other region had there own gods to believe in. Who do you think the Lord gave Rome to? Satan maybe? I heard Rome didn't really have a deity until they conquered the Greek's.

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


Anytime you read "LORD" in all caps in the OT, the Hebrew text says YHWH.

You can't get any higher on the totem pole than Him.

Originally posted by sk0rpi0n
reply to post by SwissMarked

 

Read the biblical quote again.

The LORD seems to be "inheriting" something.

When you inherit something... its usually from someone higher than you.... or you are given something that you did not own before.

The Hebrew is more like "possession/property", than an inheritance as we'd understand it today in our modern vernacular.

Blue Letter Bible w/ Greek and Hebrew Lexicon

Whenever something stumps you in the Bible the next step is to do a word study, roll your sleeves up and jump into the original languages with a good Lexicon or two. The Hebrew and Greek are faaaar more richer languages than English is. English is super fuzzy, Greek absurdly rigid, and Hebrew even more so.

Amplified Bible is a great tool also whenever you are a tad confused about a passage or word.

Amplified Bible

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
reply to post by sk0rpi0n

 

Anytime you read "LORD" in all caps in the OT, the Hebrew text says YHWH.

You can't get any higher on the totem pole than Him.

Alot of people have the tendency to forget because they're reading it in english that it originated in hebrew/aramaic. Thats one of God's pet peeves at the jews, they stopped calling him by his name that he gave to Abraham and started calling him things like Adonai amoung other titles. The ones who went back into "Egypt" he forbade to ever call him by his name ever again and he told them that they who went into Egypt would die there and never come out again. The jews are still in Egypt today and they still will not call on his name.

Originally posted by vaelamin
reply to post by CaptainNemo

 

AHA. I knew it. I knew there had to be a reason every other region had there own gods to believe in. Who do you think the Lord gave Rome to? Satan maybe? I heard Rome didn't really have a deity until they conquered the Greek's.

Genesis 10 lists all of the patriarchal fathers descendant of Noah's 3 sons: Ham, Shem and Japepth. At the end of genesis 10 (10:32), it says the nations of the Earth after the flood were divided. Dueteronomy 32:8-9 is the farewell message of Moses to God's people. Moses and his people knew and recognized the existence of other gods, he never said that God is the only god, he said that God should be the only one to be worshiped.

Since many critical scholars believe that the laws banning the worship of other gods really do go back to Moses, but that the denial of the existence of other gods does not, they conclude that Moses only taught monolatry, not monotheism. And since historical books such as Judges and Kings state that the Israelites continued to worship other gods throughout their history, these scholars conclude that even the requirement of monolatry was not widely accepted in Israel until shortly before the Babylonian exile, or even later. The doctrine of monotheism is thought by these scholars to have originated long after Moses, perhaps as late as the seventh century B.C.E. when it was emphasized by Deuteronomy and the prophets.

He so very wisely says:

"Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations: ask they father, and he will shew thee; thy elders, and they will thee."

He tells them to ask their elders about how the most High divided up the nations and chose Israel to be his nation. The apple of his eye. He didn't tell them to go read their torah, because the people had no torah. They shared their amazing history through word of mouth. The generation of exodus is so key, because this is the beginning of Judaism;

"...he gave the nations to the sons of God"

Ask yourself, does sons of Israel (human beings) really fit here?

The referent of the number seventy, the "sons of Israel" (in MT), initially seemed understandable enough, for both Gen 46:27 and Exo. 1:5 state that 70 members of Jacob's family went down to Egypt in the days of Joseph.9 Little thought was given, however, to the logic of the correlation: How is it that the number of the pagan nations was determined in relation to an entity (Israel) or individuals (Jacob and his household) that did not yet exist? Even if one contends that the correlation was in the mind of God prior to Israel's existence and only recorded much later, what possible point would there be behind connecting the pagan Gentile nations numerically with the children of promise? On the other hand, what could possibly be meant by the textual option that created a correspondence between the number of the nations in Genesis 10-11 and heavenly beings?

www.thedivinecouncil.com...

The nations were given to the sons of God, divine beings. It doesn't say what their names are or what nations they were given. God is the almighty, the most powerful, and the father of the gods. None of their power even comes close to his, but I do think the gods took similar approaches to establishing their nations like their father. Throughout all of the ancient world, the polytheistic beliefs were almost unanimously centered around the patron-god concept. City-states and settlements usually had 1 main temple dedicated to 1 god. At home, the people dedicated almost all of their worship to one god with their graven images and altars. Not all pagan beliefs were based on myths. It is entirely possible that civilizations like the Egyptians, Incans, Nubians, Mayans and Sumerians had real gods. Gods that gave them technology. Like how the previous divine beings (the watchers) had given to man before the flood.

Identifying the nations is an incomplete task. It ultimately may never be completed because at the end of the day, we weren't there.

the Table of Nations: Origins of man

Originally posted by sk0rpi0n
reply to post by HeFrippedMeOff

 

The other day, I prepared a chicken to eat. When it was done, I allotted myself the drumsticks

Cute.
Would you also say you "inherited" the drumsticks as well?

If I tell you I "inherited" a mansion, would you ask me if I owned it before I "inherited" it?

If I were creator of all, then yes perhaps I could say that those chickens I made to be good would be my inheritance out of all I made on this earth while those destined for fertilizer remain as such and not the inheritance I created for myself unto life.

Although each and every one has my grace to become good chickens until the day I decide grace is over and justice will be served.

If you don't accept this then perhaps listen to Moses as He bows to God in Exodus 34:9 saying, "...If now I have found grace in thy sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray thee, go among us; for it [is] a stiffnecked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thine inheritance."

reply to post by CaptainNemo

The text does very clearly say "Sons of Israel"
As you can see from the Concordance for Deut 32:8, it says "ben israel".

Originally posted by babloyi
reply to post by CaptainNemo

 

The text does very clearly say "Sons of Israel"
As you can see from the Concordance for Deut 32:8, it says "ben israel".

The text there is a rendering of the Masoretic text, no harm there, but it's an incorrect translation. Sons of God is supported by the dead sea scrolls and Septuagint translations.

Deut. 32:8 is a parallel to Genesis 10:32. Moses tells the people don't forget about the time when God divided the nations up after the flood. He's talking about the table of nations in Genesis 10, the patriarchal fathers. Why would god assign the nations to the sons of Israel, when all of those 70 nations were gentiles? Only 1 of them was a forefather of Jacob, Terah. Sons of Israel is of course a reference to Jacob, and the 70 members of his family that went down to Egypt but that doesn't make sense because they didn't exist right after the flood.

Understanding how sons of God fits, is a bit more complicated. It deals with presupposing certain words and closely examining Deuteronomy. Sons of Israel is most likely a product of parablesis or scribes editing the text to protect the theology of God.

The ESV supports this translation:

"When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God."

I wrote a paper on the matter, it might help you understand the importance of Deut. 32:8. I can share it if you would like.