Moses' Final Words.
Having made his great oration Moses was now aware that his death was rapidly approaching, and he spoke even more earnestly in the light of it. And that approaching death could only increase his pessimism about the people.
His first words were to ‘all Israel', encouraging them to trust Yahweh (Deuteronomy 31:1-6), his next to Joshua in order to encourage him in what lay ahead (Deuteronomy 31:7-8), and then he spoke to the priests and elders for the preservation of the covenant (Deuteronomy 31:9-13). But then he entered into the secret counsels of Yahweh and his message was less encouraging, at least for the medium term (Deuteronomy 31:14 onwards). From that point on he was taking the longer view about Israel, and it was not very encouraging at all, so much so that Yahweh commissioned him to write a song in preparation for it, a song of Complaint.