Deuteronomy 31:3
The Lord thy God then will pass over before thee: he will destroy all these nations in thy sight, and thou shalt possess them: and this Josue shall go over before thee, as the Lord hath spoken.
Open Deuteronomy 31:3 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Dominus ergo Deus tuus transibit ante te : ipse delebit omnes gentes has in conspectu tuo, et possidebis eas : et Josue iste transibit ante te, sicut locutus est Dominus.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- Κύριος ὁ θεός σου ὁ προπορευόμενος πρὸ προσώπου σου· οὗτος ἐξολεθρεύσει τὰ ἔθνη ταῦτα ἀπὸ προσώπου σου, καὶ κατακληρονομήσεις αὐτούς· καὶ Ἰησοῦς ὁ προπορευόμενος πρὸ προσώπου σου, καθὰ ἐλάλησεν Κύριος.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- יְהוָ֨ה אֱלֹהֶ֜יךָ ה֣וּא עֹבֵ֣ר לְפָנֶ֗יךָ הֽוּא יַשְׁמִ֞יד אֶת הַגּוֹיִ֥ם הָאֵ֛לֶּה מִלְּפָנֶ֖יךָ וִֽירִשְׁתָּ֑ם יְהוֹשֻׁ֗עַ ה֚וּא עֹבֵ֣ר לְפָנֶ֔יךָ כַּאֲשֶׁ֖ר דִּבֶּ֥ר יְהוָֽה
Haydock's commentary
Then. This word is not in Hebrew or the Septuagint; neither does Moses mean to insinuate, that God would take his place in conducting the people; but only that after he should be no more, the divine Providence would no less watch over his people, and direct the councils of Josue, who stood beside him. (Haydock)
The ark preceded the army, (Josue iii.) and God invisibly put the enemies of Israel to flight. (Menochius)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Augustine A Treatise on the Spirit and the Letter, The Occasion of Writing This Work; A Thing May Be Capable of Being Done, and Yet May Never Be Done
After reading the short treatises which I lately drew up for you, my beloved son Marcellinus, about the baptism of infants, and the perfection of man’s righteousness, how that no one in this life seems either to have attained or to be likely to attain to it, except only the Mediator, who bore humanity in the likeness of sinful flesh, without any sin whatever, you wrote me in answer that you were embarrassed by the point which I advanced in the second book, that it was possible for a man to be without sin, if he wanted not the will, and was assisted by the aid of God; and yet that except One in whom “all shall be made alive,” no one has ever lived or will live by whom this perfection has been attained whilst living here. …
St Augustine A Treatise on the Spirit and the Letter, He Returns to the Question Which Marcellinus Had Proposed to Him
But I beg of you to advert to the question which you proposed to me, and to what we have made out of it in the lengthy process of this discussion. You were perplexed how I could have said that it was possible for a man to be without sin, if his will were not wanting, by the help of God’s aid, although no man in the present life had ever lived, was living, or would live, of such perfect righteousness. Now, in the books which I formerly addressed to you, I set forth this very question. …