Armenia in comments -- Book: Deuteronomy (tDeut) Երկրորդ Օրէնք
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tDeut 26:5 A Syrian ready to perish was my father - This passage has been variously understood, both by the ancient versions and by modern commentators. The Vulgate renders it thus: Syrus persequebatur patrem meum, "A Syrian persecuted my father." The Septuagint thus: Συριαν απεβαλεν ὁ πατηρ μου, "My father abandoned Syria." The Targum thus: לבן ארמאה בעא לאובדא ית אבא Laban arammaah bea leobada yath abba, "Laban the Syrian endeavored to destroy my father." The Syriac: "My father was led out of Syria into Egypt." The Arabic: "Surely, Laban the Syrian had almost destroyed my father." The Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziel: "Our father Jacob went at first into Syria of Mesopotamia, and Laban sought to destroy him."
Father Houbigant dissents from all, and renders the original thus: Fames urgebat patrem meum, qui in Aegyptum descendit, "Famine oppressed my father, who went down into Egypt." This interpretation Houbigant gives the text, by taking the י yod from the word ארמי arammi, which signifies an Aramite or Syrian, and joining it to יאבד yeabud, the future for the perfect, which is common enough in Hebrew, and which may signify constrained; and seeking for the meaning of ארם aram in the Arabic arama, which signifies famine, dearth, etc., he thus makes out his version, and this version he defends at large in his notes. It is pretty evident, from the text, that by a Syrian we are to understand Jacob, so called from his long residence in Syria with his father-in-law Laban. And his being ready to perish may signify the hard usage and severe labor he had in Laban's service, by which, as his health was much impaired, so his life might have often been in imminent danger. Deuteronomy 26:8
tDeut 26:5 A Syrian ready to perish was my father - The reference is shown by the context to be to Jacob, as the ancestor in whom particularly the family of Abraham began to develop into a nation (compare Isa 43:22, Isa 43:28, etc.). Jacob is called a Syrian (literally, Aramaean), not only because of his own long residence in Syria with Laban Gen. 29-31, as our Lord was called a Nazarene because of his residence at Nazareth Mat 2:23, but because he there married and had his children (compare Hos 12:12); and might be said accordingly to belong to that more than to any other land. Deuteronomy 26:12
tDeut 26:1 To the exposition of the commandments and rights of Israel Moses adds, in closing, another ordinance respecting those gifts, which were most intimately connected with social and domestic life, viz., the first-fruits and second tithes, for the purpose of giving the proper consecration to the attitude of the nation towards its Lord and God.
Deu 26:1-4
Of the first of the fruit of the ground, which was presented from the land received from the Lord, the Israelites was to take a portion (מראשׁית with מן partitive), and bring it in a basket to the place of the sanctuary, and give it to the priest who should be there, with the words, "I have made known to-day to the Lord thy God, that I have come into the land which the Lord swore to our fathers to give us," upon which the priest should take the basket and put it down before the altar of Jehovah (Deu 26:1-4). From the partitive מראשׁית we cannot infer, as Schultz supposes, that the first-fruits were not to be all delivered at the sanctuary, any more than this can be inferred from Exo 23:19 (see the explanation of this passage). All that is implied is, that, for the purpose described afterwards, it was not necessary to put all the offerings of first-fruits into a basket and set them down before the altar. טנא (Deu 26:2, Deu 26:4, and Deu 28:5, Deu 28:17) is a basket of wicker-work, and not, as Knobel maintains, the Deuteronomist's word for צנצנת rof (Exo 16:33. "The priest" is not the high priest, but the priest who had to attend to the altar-service and receive the sacrificial gifts. - The words, "I have to-day made known to the Lord thy God," refer to the practical confession which was made by the presentation of the first-fruits. The fruit was the tangible proof that they were in possession of the land, and the presentation of the first of this fruit the practical confession that they were indebted to the Lord for the land. This confession the offerer was also to embody in a prayer of thanksgiving, after the basket had been received by the priest, in which he confessed that he and his people owed their existence and welfare to the grace of God, manifested in the miraculous redemption of Israel out of the oppression of Egypt and their guidance into Canaan.
Deu 26:5-9
אבי אבד ארמּי, "a lost (perishing) Aramaean was my father" (not the Aramaean, Laban, wanted to destroy my father, Jacob, as the Chald., Arab., Luther, and others render it). אבד signifies not only going astray, wandering, but perishing, in danger of perishing, as in Job 29:13; Pro 31:6, etc. Jacob is referred to, for it was he who went down to Egypt in few men. He is mentioned as the tribe-father of the nation, because the nation was directly descended from his sons, and also derived its name of Israel from him. Jacob is called in Aramaean, not only because of his long sojourn in Aramaea (Gen 29-31), but also because he got his wives and children there (cf. Hos 12:13); and the relatives of the patriarchs had accompanied Abraham from Chaldaea to Mesopotamia (Aram; see Gen 11:30). מעט בּמתי, consisting of few men (בּ, the so-called beth essent., as in Deu 10:22; Exo 6:3, etc.; vid., Ewald, 299, q.). Compare Gen 34:30, where Jacob himself describes his family as "few in number." On the number in the family that migrated into Egypt, reckoned at seventy souls, see the explanation at Gen 46:27. On the multiplication in Egypt into a great and strong people, see Exo 1:7, Exo 1:9; and on the oppression endured there, Exo 1:11-22, and Exo 2:23. - The guidance out of Egypt amidst great signs (Deu 26:8), as in Deu 4:34.
Deu 26:10
"So shalt thou set it down (the basket with the first-fruits) before Jehovah." These words are not to be understood, as Clericus, Knobel, and others suppose, in direct opposition to Deu 26:4 and Deu 26:5, as implying that the offerer had held the basket in his hand during the prayer, but simply as a remark which closes the instructions.
Deu 26:11
Rejoicing in all the good, etc., points to the joy connected with the sacrificial meal, which followed the act of worship (as in Deu 12:12). The presentation of the first-fruits took place, no doubt, on their pilgrimages to the sanctuary at the three yearly festivals (ch. 16); but it is quite without ground that Riehm restricts these words to the sacrificial meals to be prepared from the tithes, as if they had been the only sacrificial meals (see at Deu 18:3). Deuteronomy 26:12
tDeut 26:1 Here is, I. A good work ordered to be done, and that is the presenting of a basket of their first-fruits to God every year, Deu 26:1, Deu 26:2. Besides the sheaf of first-fruits, which was offered for the whole land, on the morrow after the passover (Lev 23:10), every man was to bring for himself a basket of first-fruits at the feast of pentecost, when the harvest was ended, which is therefore called the feast of first-fruits (Exo 34:22), and is said to be kept with a tribute of free-will-offering, Deu 16:10. But the Jews say, "The first-fruits, if not brought then, might be brought any time after, between that and winter." When a man went into the field or vineyard at the time when the fruits were ripening, he was to mark that which he observed most forward, and to lay it by for first-fruits, wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates, some of each sort must be put in the same basket, with leaves between them, and presented to God in the place which he should choose. Now from this law we may learn, 1. To acknowledge God as the giver of all those good things which are the support and comfort of our natural life, and therefore to serve and honour him with them. 2. To deny ourselves. What is first ripe we are most fond of; those that are nice and curious expect to be served with each fruit at its first coming in. My soul desired the first ripe fruits, Mic 7:1. When therefore God appointed them to lay those by for him he taught them to prefer the glorifying of his name before the gratifying of their own appetites and desires. 3. To give to God the first and best we have, as those that believe him to be the first and best of beings. Those that consecrate the days of their youth, and the prime of their time, to the service and honour of God, bring him their first-fruits, and with such offerings he is well pleased. I remember the kindness of thy youth.
II. Good words put into their mouths to be said in the doing of this good work, as an explication of the meaning of this ceremony, that it might be a reasonable service. The offerer must begin his acknowledgment before he delivered his basket to the priest, and then must go on with it, when the priest had set down the basket before the altar, as a present to God their great landlord, Deu 26:3, Deu 26:4.
1. He must begin with a receipt in full for the good land which God had given them (Deu 26:3): I profess that I have come now at last, after forty years' wandering, unto the country which the Lord swore to give us. This was most proper to be said when they came first into Canaan; probably when they had been long settled there they varied from this form. Note, When God has made good his promises to us he expects that we should own it, to the honour of his faithfulness; this is like giving up the bond, as Solomon does, Kg1 8:56, There has not failed one word of all his good promise. And our creature-comforts are doubly sweet to us when we see them flowing from the fountain of the promise.
2. He must remember and own the mean origin of that nation of which he was a member. How great soever they were now, and he himself with them, their beginning was very small, which ought thus to be kept in mind throughout all the ages of their church by this public confession, that they might not be proud of their privileges and advantages, but might for ever be thankful to that God whose grace chose them when they were so low and raised them so high. Two things they must own for this purpose: - (1.) The meanness of their common ancestor: A Syrian ready to perish was my father, Deu 26:5. Jacob is here called an Aramite, or Syrian, because he lived twenty years in Padan-Aram; his wives were of that country, and his children were all born there, except Benjamin; and perhaps the confessor means not Jacob himself, but that son of Jacob who was the father of his tribe. However it be, both father and sons were more than once ready to perish, by Laban's severity, Esau's cruelty, and the famine in the land, which last was the occasion of their going down into Egypt. Laban the Syrian sought to destroy my father (so the Chaldee), had almost destroyed him, so the Arabic. (2.) The miserable condition of their nation in its infancy. They sojourned in Egypt as strangers, they served there as slaves (Deu 26:6), and that a great while: as their father was called a Syrian, they might be called Egyptians; so that their possession of Canaan being so long discontinued they could not pretend any tenant-right to it. A poor, despised, oppressed people they were in Egypt, and therefore, though now rich and great, had no reason to be proud, or secure, or forgetful of God.
3. He must thankfully acknowledge God's great goodness, not only to himself in particular, but to Israel in general. (1.) In bringing them out of Egypt, Deu 26:7, Deu 26:8. It is spoken of here as an act of pity - he looked on our affliction; and an act of power - he brought us forth with a mighty hand. This was a great salvation, fit to be remembered upon all occasions, and particularly upon this; they need not grudge to bring a basket of first-fruits to God, for to him they owed it that they were not now bringing in the tale of bricks to their cruel task-masters. (2.) In settling them in Canaan: He hath given us this land, Deu 26:9. Observe, He must not only give thanks for his own lot, but for the land in general which was given to Israel; not only for this year's profits, but for the ground itself which produced them, which God had graciously granted to his ancestors and entailed upon his posterity. Note, The comfort we have in particular enjoyments should lead us to be thankful for our share in public peace and plenty; and with present mercies we should bless God for the former mercies we remember and the further mercies we expect and hope for.
4. He must offer to God his basket of first-fruits (Deu 26:10): "I have brought the first-fruits of the land (like a pepper-corn) as a quit-rent for the land which thou hast given me." Note, Whatever we give to God, it is but of his own that we give him, Ch1 29:14. And it becomes us, who receive so much from him, to study what we shall render to him. The basket he set before God; and the priests, as God's receivers, had the first-fruits, as perquisites of their place and fees for attending, Num 18:12.
III. The offerer is here appointed, when he has finished the service, 1. To give glory to God: Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God. His first-fruits were not accepted without further acts of adoration. A humble, reverent, thankful heart is that which God looks at and requires, and, without this, all we can put in a basket will not avail. If a man would give all the substance of his house to be excused from this, or in lieu of it, it would utterly be contemned. 2. To take the comfort of it to himself and family: Thou shalt rejoice in every good thing, Deu 26:11. It is the will of God that we should be cheerful, not only in our attendance upon his holy ordinances, but in our enjoyments of the gifts of his providence. Whatever good thing God gives us, it is his will that we should make the most comfortable use we can of it, yet still tracing the streams to the fountain of all comfort and consolation. Deuteronomy 26:12
tDeut 26:5 A Syrian: Jacob being called a Syrian from his long residence in Padan-aram. Gen 24:4, Gen 25:20, Gen 28:5, Gen 31:20, Gen 31:24; Hos 12:12
ready: Gen 27:41, Gen 31:40, Gen 43:1, Gen 43:2, Gen 43:12, Gen 45:7, Gen 45:11; Isa 51:1, Isa 51:2
he went down: Gen 46:1-7; Psa 105:23, Psa 105:24; Act 7:15
a few: Deu 7:7; Gen 46:27; Exo 1:5
became: Deu 10:22; Gen 47:27; Exo 1:7, Exo 1:12 Deuteronomy 26:6