Deuteronomy is a book of and for the heart. The word “heart” appears thirty-one times in its thirty-four chapters. Deuteronomy means “second law” and was most likely the book found in the temple during King Josiah’s reign (641-609 BCE). To an extraordinary extent, the heart of the king toward God, certainly after David, who loved the Lord with all his heart, was the litmus test of the state of the covenant between God and Israel. If the king loved the Lord and was faithful to the covenant, all went relatively well, with the people seeming to follow suit. But if the heart of the king strayed to worshiping other gods – make that being adulterous toward the God of Israel – so also did the hearts of the people.
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