Deuteronomy 4:3

Deu 4:3 Your eyes have seen what the LORD did because of Baalpeor: for all the men that followed Baalpeor, the LORD thy God hath destroyed them from among you.

Ver. 3. Destroyed them.] Hanging them up in gibbets, as it were, before your eyes, to warn you.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Deu 4:3-4. Are alive every one of you this day — A singular providence watched over them, to preserve them in such good healthy that not one of so many thousands was dead since that time. Nor, in the war with the Midianites, did they lose so much as one man, Num 31:7-49.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

4:3 Baal was the Canaanite god associated with the fertility of the soil and of human and animal life. Local pagan worship centers linked Baal with their own shrines and cultic rituals, as with the god of Peor (see 3:29).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

God’s judgments executed upon other idolaters ought to serve for our instruction, read Num. 25:3,4.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Your eyes have seen what the Lord did because of Baal-peor . . . the Lord thy God hath destroyed them from among you--It appears that the pestilence and the sword of justice overtook only the guilty in that affair (Num 25:1-9) while the rest of the people were spared. The allusion to that recent and appalling judgment was seasonably made as a powerful dissuasive against idolatry, and the fact mentioned was calculated to make a deep impression on people who knew and felt the truth of it.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

(3) Your eyes have seen.—Literally, your eyes are they that see—i.e., you are witnesses of these things. The men who perished by the plague because of the iniquity of Beth peor—to the number of 24,000—seem to have been all members of the younger generation; for they had already passed the brook Zered. (See on Deu_2:13.)

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

3. Your eyes have seen] Cp. Deu_3:21.

because of Baal-peor] Heb. in Ba‘al-Pe‘or (= in Beth-Ba‘al-Pe‘or), a place-name as in Hos_9:10; cp. Deu_3:29. The sin and its punishment are related by JE, Num_25:1-5; then follows, 6–16, a similar story about Israel and Midianite seductions, from P. Ba‘al of Pe‘or was a local deity, otherwise unknown to us. Driver (Deut. 63 f.) questions the usual opinion that he was a priapic deity, yet the close association of the charge of worshipping him with that of illicit intercourse with the daughters of Moab, combined with the notorious impurity of the Syrian religions, appears to confirm the opinion.

thy God … from the midst of thee] Note the change to the Sg. here from the Pl. in the beginning of the verse. Sam. and LXX, probably less originally, give Pl. throughout. For similar changes see Deu_4:25; Deu_4:29; Deu_4:34; Deu_11:13-14.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Your eyes have seen what the Lord did because of Baalpeor,.... Because of the idolatry the people of Israel fell into by worshipping that idol, being drawn into it by the daughters of Moab and Midian, through the counsel of Balaam, with whom they committed fornication; which led them to the other sin, and both highly provoking to God. The Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan are,"what the Word of the Lord has done to the worshippers of the idol Peor;"

for all the men that followed Baalpeor, the Lord thy God hath destroyed them from among you; 24,000 persons died on that account; which being a recent thing, fresh in memory, and what they were eyewitnesses of, was a caution to them to avoid the same sins, as it is to us on whom the ends of the world are come, Num 23:9.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Among you, when the guilty Israelites and the Madianites were slain, Numbers xxv., and xxxi.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

3. Of Baal-peor — Moses refers to that recent judgment of God upon the sins of the people when twenty-four thousand were slain. Num_25:1-9.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Vers. 3, 4. The people had had personal experience of the danger, on the one hand, of transgressing, and the benefit, on the other, of keeping God"s Law; they had seen how those who sinned in worshipping Baal-peer were destroyed, (Num_25:3, Num_25:9) whilst those who remained faithful to the Lord were kept alive. This experience the people had had only lately before, so that a reference to it would be all the more impressive. Baalpeor, the idol whose cultus was observed at Peor. Baal (Bal, Be"cf., Bel, Lord) was the common name of the supreme deity among the northern of the Semitic-speaking people, the Canaanites, the Phoenicians, the Aramaeans, and the Assyrians. There were thus many Baals. Followed: walked after; a common Biblical expression for religious adherence and service (cf. Jer_8:2 Jer_9:14; and with a different formula, Num_32:12; Deu_1:36; Jos_14:8; Jud_1:2:12, etc.) Ye that did cleave unto Jehovah your God. "To cleave unto one" is expressive of the closest, most intimate attachment and communion (Gen_2:24; Isa_14:1) The phrase is frequently used of devotion to the service and worship of the true God (cf. Jos_22:5 Jos_23:8; Act_2:23, etc.) here it expresses the contrast between the conduct of those who remained faithful to Jehovah and those who forsook him to worship Baal. Are alive every one of you this day. "Thus they that keep themselves pure in general defections, are saved from the common destruction (Eze_9:4-6; Rev_20:4) (Ainsworth).

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

General Information:

Moses continues speaking to the people of Israel.

Your eyes have seen

Here "eyes" refers to the people of Israel. AT: "You saw" (See: Synecdoche)

because of Baal Peor

The full meaning of this statement can be made clear. AT: "because of the sins you committed at Baal Peor" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

Peor

See how you translated this in Deuteronomy 3:29.

Yahweh your God has destroyed them from among you

Moses speaks to the people of Israel as though they were one person, so "your" and "you" are singular. (See: Pronouns)

you who clung to Yahweh

The writer speaks as if trusting in Yahweh and obeying him were like physically holding on to a person. AT: "you who were careful to obey Yahweh" (See: Metaphor)

translationWords

Yahweh

Baal

God

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

YOUR EYES HAVE SEEN. Now Moses comes to forewarn on the details of the commandments, and he begins with [the prohibition against] idolatry which is the root of all [the commandments].

Ramban (Nachmanides) on the Tanakh — English translation: “Commentary on the Torah by Ramban (Nachmanides). Translated and annotated by Charles B. Chavel. New York, Shilo Pub. House, 1971-1976” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.