And Moses called all Israel, and said unto them, Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments which I speak in your ears this day, that ye may learn them, and keep, and do them.
Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments. Whether this rehearsal of the law was made in a solemn assembly, or, as some think, at a general meeting of the elders as representatives of the people, is of little moment; it was addressed either directly or indirectly to the Hebrew people as the principles of their special constitution as a nation; and hence, as has been well observed, 'the Jewish law has no obligation upon Christians, unless so much of it as given or commanded by Jesus Christ; because whatever in this law is conformable to the laws of nature obliges us, not as given by Moses, but by virtue of an antecedent law common to all rational beings' (Dr. Wilson).