Deuteronomy 11:8-17, The Land of Milk and Honey

Our view, as we have said, is that Deuteronomy is a statement of the covenant between God and Israel as they prepare to enter the land.  Worth noting are some special descriptions of this “land of milk and honey” contained in the book.  In the first post on Deuteronomy we noted Dt. 1:7-8 and provided a diagram to help visualize the layout.  Israel was and is a land of significant variety: coastal plain, steep mountains, the desert, the mountains in the north, and the Jordan Rift from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea to Eilat.  Here are some other descriptions.

·       Deut. 3:8-10: This describes the territory east of the Jordan where the 2 1/2 tribes settled.  Mt. Hermon sat and sits today in three nations: Lebanon (Mt. Sirion, or Sion in 4:48), Syria (Mt. Senir) and Israel.  The area east of the Jordan ran from Mt. Hermon in the north (on the map it is west and slightly south of Damascus, north of the Sea of Galilee) to the River Arnon (the river that runs from the east into the middle of the Dead Sea).  Dt. 3:12-17 gives more detail.

·       Deut. 8:7-9: I love this description.  Many people think of Israel as a lot of desert, by which they often mean useless land.  This is wrong on both fronts, and this description is clearly evident as you travel around Israel today.  From Hermon to Eilat you see the brooks, fountains and springs.  There are no huge rivers (not even the "mighty" Jordan) but there is water everywhere.  Then there are the seven “fruits” of v8; these foods are real blessings.  And then it mentions iron and copper (e.g. the copper mines of Timna Park just north of Eilat), not to mention the numerous minerals found in the Dead Sea (check out this article: Dead Sea 21 Minerals (pure-deadsea.com)).

·       Deut. 11:10-12: And pardon the redundancy, but I love this description.  Again, you see it all over.  It’s not a land like Egypt, who bragged about the Nile and the fertile farming associated with it.  Rather, Israel had these steep hills and valleys, so that the small land mass actually had a lot more ground that could soak up the rain, and then distribute it throughout the country, even down into the desert and Arabah.  We have included some water photos, but only a sampling.

The land was given to Israel because God promised Abraham, Isaac and Jacob that the land would be theirs and their descendant's.  Israel’s right to the land is by promise, not by obedience to the Law of Moses.  However, the keeping of the law related to Israel’s actual possession of the land (11:8), Israel’s staying in the land (11:9), Israel’s prosperity in the land (11:13-15), and Israel’s ruling the land (11:22-25).  Even today, we need to be mindful of this.  Overall, today, Israel is not the “saved” nation God has promised she will be.  Thus, the future holds a time of “Jacob’s trouble.”  But it will be followed by the glorious earthly Kingdom of Messiah, headquartered in the earthly Jerusalem.

Mt. Hermon taken from Mt. Bental in Golan Heights.

Mt. Hermon from Dado Lookout at Metula.

Tenur Falls, south of Metula.

Dan River at Tel Dan, near the source.

EnGedi, west of the Dead Sea.

Harod (Gideon's) Spring, west of Beth Shean.

Banias Stream, at it's source at Caesarea Philippi.