ולא נתן ה' לכם לב לדעת, even though He had tried by means of His teachings and His miracles to give the people a knowing heart, as we know from Exodus 10,20ולמען תספר.....וידעתם כי אני ה', “and in order that you will tell…and be aware that I am the Lord,” the lesson had not taken hold due to your overwhelming quarrelsomeness.

ואולך אתכם, however, now that you have seen the vastness of His love for you and He has brought you to take possession of the lands of Sichon and Og, so that you are able to sustain yourselves by your own efforts, the time has come that you will finally possess the necessary sagacity, a heart which is knowledgeable.

ושמרתם את דברי הברית הזאת, the one you will accept at Mount Gerizim and Mount Eyval.

למען תשכילו את כל אשר תעשון, so that you will be successful both in your life on earth in all your undertakings, as well as achieving your goal to live on eternally in the world beyond physical death.

אתם נצבים...לפני ה' אלוקיכם , so that anyone who is capable of misleading me cannot mislead Him. You will accept this covenant in His presence, on His authority, not merely on mine.

ראשיכם שבטיכם זקניכם ושוטריכם, the people Moses describes as ראשיכם, are those who are heads of their tribes, elsewhere referred to as נשיאים, “princes. The term ראשalways includes the people who wield authority. זקניכם, your judges. ושוטריכם, the law enforcers empowered by the judges to enforce their judgments. Each one of these categories of people have the duty to teach the people (within the parameters of their special competence) how much better it is for them to accept Torah law than to defy it or neglect it.

(3) YOUR ELDERS. They are the judges.

(4) YOUR OFFICIALS. Who have the power to compel litigants. And the responsibility rests on all of these chiefs to instruct the multitudes as to what is good for them to accept on themselves or to eschew.

טפכם נשיכם, people who normally require the consent of their husbands or fathers to do what they do.

מחוטב עציך עד שואב מימיך, from the leader of the wood choppers to the most lowly of the water carriers. The construction here parallels comparisons as מעולל ועד יונק, “infants as well as sucklings,” (Samuel I 15,3) i.e. the highest ranking within its category to the lowliest ranking. Similar expressions are used when the Torah speaks of משור ועד שה, oxen as well as lambs, meaning the most expensive animals of your livestock to the least expensive. Similarly,מגמל ועד חמור, “from the camels down to the donkeys.”

לעברך בברית, you are all arranged in this order in order to signal your acceptance of the forthcoming covenant. It is clear from Moses’ addressing all the assembled, that they were of one mind at the time, all willing and eager to accept the covenant.

'אשר ה' אלוקיך כורת עמך היום, למען הקים אותך וגו, G’d’s objective in concluding this covenant with you this day is to reaffirm that you are His people and that He is your G’d. By entering into this covenant with Him you acquire eternal life, life beyond the death of your bodies. Seeing that the purpose of the covenant is of such importance, is of so elevated a nature, it is necessary that you embrace it wholeheartedly.

ואת אשר עמנו פה עמנו היום, a reference to future, as yet unborn generations. You will therefore have to explain to these unborn generations in due course that you yourselves only received this land on the understanding that subsequent generations of Jews would remain loyal to the terms of your acceptance. They will continue to inherit the land from you only on that basis.

כי אתם ידעתם את אשר ישבנו, and this is why you have to be concerned that there should not be among you איש או אשה, neither a man nor a woman who would seduce you to follow the vain pursuits of the nations with whom you will be living in close proximity, and who might be the cause that you would default on the undertakings in this covenant. This is the reason I have insisted that all of you be present at this ceremony, seeing that G’d examines hearts He will know who only pays lip service to this covenant and who is sincere about it. You will not be able to deceive Him.

איש או אשה, neither a man nor a woman who would seduce you to follow the vain pursuits of the nations with whom you will be living in close proximity, and who might be the cause that you would default on the undertakings in this covenant. This is the reason I have insisted that all of you be present at this ceremony, seeing that G’d examines hearts He will know who only pays lip service to this covenant and who is sincere about it. You will not be able to deceive Him.

פן יש בכם שורש פורה ראש ולענה, a simile for people planning to beguile the multitude to adopt their own idolatrous beliefs.

והתברך בלבבו, while accepting the covenant with his lips, he already resolves in his heart to honour it in the breach, comforting himself, thinking שלום יהיה לי כי בשרירות לבי אלך, “I will be alright even though I will do my own thing.” He considers that seeing that he already planned to breach the covenant at the very moment when he accepted it with his lips, the covenant is not binding upon him.

The only reason he had mouthed acceptance of the covenant was to become at one and the same time a beneficiary of the overwhelming number of people for whose sake G’d was going to bestow so many blessings on His people. This is the meaning of the words שלום יהיה לי כי בשרירות לבי אלך למען ספות הרוה את הצמאה; he knows full well that the holy community of the Jewish people, his brethren, have attained that status by resisting the lures of the evil urge instead of succumbing to it. This is why they will benefit from G’d’s largesse in such abundant manner. He therefore decided to have the best of both worlds by at least paying lip service to a covenant he knows he will not live by.

לא יאבה ה' סלוח לו, when he will violate the covenant which he accepted as a sacred oath with his lips, although he had mentally had his reservations at the very time when he confirmed the covenant with his mouth.

'גפרית ומלח....במהפכת סדום אשר הפך ה, the people seeing this know full well that this was not something accidental but that it is a finger of G’d. The comparison is based on Sodom seeing that its destruction had both been predicted to Avraham and confirmed by Lot and his daughters who were survivors of that event.

ואמרו כל הגויים, when they are faced with these incontrovertible facts.

אלוהים אשר לא ידעום, they did not even know of such a deity’s existence. For such unproven and almost anonymous deities they abandoned their G’d, the One Who had been proven as true, powerful, through all the miracles He had performed for them.

ולא חלק להם, a deity, be it a horoscope or whatever which He had not assigned to them. The reason G’d had never assigned such a horoscope to them had been to show them that they did not need it, as did the other nations. Moses had mentioned in Deut. 4,19-20 that G’d had assigned such intermediaries to the gentile nations.

הנסתרות לה' אלוקינו, even though I have said that all of you are standing in the presence of the Lord whom it is impossible to mislead and deceive, so that He will collect His dues from everyone who owes him, G’d collects directly only from those whom it is not possible for His appointed representatives, i.e. a legally constituted judiciary to bring to justice.

והנגלות לנו ולבננו עד עולם, however, any sins committed publicly must be dealt with by this judiciary, forever, [I suppose the words עד עולם mean that there is no statute of limitations as in gentile countries. Ed.] לעשות את כל דברי התורה הזאת, to avenge G’d‘s having been slighted by the public commission of violations of Torah law, especially those affecting other people directly.