Essay for Deuteronomy 1:1

After the narrator’s brief introduction, which places the Israelites at the very borders of the Promised Land, Moshe’s words bring the Israelites from Sinai to Kadesh, in the southern part of the land. He begins with his own problem, the burden of leadership; but the bulk of the chapter functions to explain why the Israelites that came out of Egypt were not privileged to enter the land itself. Stylistically interesting is Moshe’s constant use of quotations—he cites God, himself, and the Israelites. The effect is to make the narrative vivid and also authoritative in tone (cf. Polzin 1980).