(8) To give unto them.--Note that the land is promised to Abraham, and to Isaac, and to Jacob, not only to their seed. The promise is not forgotten, though the three patriarchs are in another world. (Comp. Acts 7:5, and Hebrews 11:16. See also Note. on Deuteronomy 11:21.)

Verse 8. - Behold, I have set the land before you: literally, have given the land before you, i.e. have made it over to you, that you may go and take possession of it. The Lord had placed this land in the power of the Israelites, had given it up to them to possess and use it, according as he had sworn to their fathers, the patriarchs, to give it to them and their seed (comp. Genesis 12:7; Genesis 13:15; Genesis 15:18, etc.; Genesis 22:16). At Horeb, therefore, they received the charter of their inheritance, and might have gone on at once to take possession of the land. The delay that had occurred had arisen solely from their own waywardness and perversity, not from anything on the part of God.

1:1-8 Moses spake to the people all the Lord had given him in commandment. Horeb was but eleven days distant from Kadesh-barnea. This was to remind them that their own bad conduct had occasioned their tedious wanderings; that they might the more readily understand the advantages of obedience. They must now go forward. Though God brings his people into trouble and affliction, he knows when they have been tried long enough. When God commands us to go forward in our Christian course, he sets the heavenly Canaan before us for our encouragement.Behold, I have set the land before you,.... Described it to them, and set its bounds, as well as had given them a grant of it:

go in and possess the land, which the Lord sware unto your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give unto them and their seed after them: and which being thus made sure unto them, they had nothing more to do than to go and take possession of it.