Learning to Trust in the Wilderness: Lessons in Faith from Deuteronomy 2

we marched back into the wilderness by the way of the Sea of Reeds, as GOD had spoken to me, and skirted the hill country of Seir a long time. Then GOD said to me: You have been skirting this hill country long enough; now turn north. And charge the people as follows: You will be passing through the territory of your kin, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. Though they will be afraid of you, be very careful not to provoke them. For I will not give you of their land so much as a foot can tread on; I have given the hill country of Seir as a possession to Esau. What food you eat you shall obtain from them for money; even the water you drink you shall procure from them for money. Indeed, the ETERNAL your God has blessed you in all your undertakings, watching over your wanderings through this great wilderness; the ETERNAL your God has been with you these past forty years: you have lacked nothing. We then moved on, away from our kin, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir, away from the road of the Arabah, away from Elath and Ezion-geber; and we marched on in the direction of the wilderness of Moab. And GOD said to me: Do not harass the Moabites or provoke them to war. For I will not give you any of their land as a possession; I have assigned Ar as a possession to the descendants of Lot.— It was formerly inhabited by the Emim, a people great and numerous, and as tall as the Anakites. Like the Anakites, they are counted as Rephaim; but the Moabites call them Emim. Similarly, Seir was formerly inhabited by the Horites; but the descendants of Esau dispossessed them, wiping them out and settling in their place, just as Israel did in the land they were to possess, which GOD had given to them.— Up now! Cross the wadi Zered!So we crossed the wadi Zered. The time that we spent in travel from Kadesh-barnea until we crossed the wadi Zered was thirty-eight years, until that whole generation of warriors had perished from the camp, as GOD had sworn concerning them. Indeed, GOD’s hand struck them, to root them out from the camp until they were finished off. When all the warriors among the people had died off, GOD spoke to me, saying: You are now passing through the territory of Moab, through Ar. You will then be close to the Ammonites; do not harass them or start a fight with them. For I will not give any part of the land of the Ammonites to you as a possession; I have assigned it as a possession to the descendants of Lot.— It, too, is counted as Rephaim country. It was formerly inhabited by Rephaim, whom the Ammonites call Zamzummim, a people great and numerous and as tall as the Anakites. GOD wiped them out, so that [the Ammonites] dispossessed them and settled in their place, as [GOD] did for the descendants of Esau who live in Seir, by wiping out the Horites before them, so that they dispossessed them and settled in their place, as is still the case. So, too, with the Avvim who dwelt in villages in the vicinity of Gaza: the Caphtorim, who came from Crete, wiped them out and settled in their place.— Up! Set out across the wadi Arnon! See, I give into your power Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land. Begin the occupation: engage him in battle. This day I begin to put the dread and fear of you upon the peoples everywhere under heaven, so that they shall tremble and quake because of you whenever they hear you mentioned. Then I sent messengers from the wilderness of Kedemoth to King Sihon of Heshbon with an offer of peace, as follows, “Let me pass through your country. I will keep strictly to the highway, turning off neither to the right nor to the left. What food I eat you will supply for money, and what water I drink you will furnish for money; just let me pass through— as the descendants of Esau who dwell in Seir did for me, and the Moabites who dwell in Ar—that I may cross the Jordan into the land that the ETERNAL our God is giving us.” But King Sihon of Heshbon refused to let us pass through, because GOD had stiffened his will and hardened his heart in order to deliver him into your power—as is now the case. And GOD said to me: See, I begin by placing Sihon and his land at your disposal. Begin the occupation; take possession of his land. Sihon with all his troops took the field against us at Jahaz, and the ETERNAL our God delivered him to us and we defeated him and his sons and all his troops. At that time we captured all his towns, and we doomed, which meant the annihilation of the population. Cf. note at Num. 21.2; Josh. 6.24. every town—men, women, and children—leaving no survivor. We retained as booty only the cattle and the spoil of the cities that we captured. From Aroer on the edge of the Arnon valley, including the town uncertain. in the valley itself, to Gilead, not a city was too mighty for us; the ETERNAL our God delivered everything to us. But you did not encroach upon the land of the Ammonites, all along the wadi Jabbok and the towns of the hill country, just as the ETERNAL our God

Deuteronomy 2:1-20 records the end of thirty-eight years of wilderness wandering. God instructs Israel to skirt Edom's hill country and not provoke Moab, even though those lands were not theirs to take. The text underscores that the journey, the boundaries, and the provisions are all in God's hands.