Neville Goddard on Deuteronomy 4:23-31 - Mystical Bible Interpretation

Read Deuteronomy 4 in context

Scripture Focus

23Take heed unto yourselves, lest ye forget the covenant of the LORD your God, which he made with you, and make you a graven image, or the likeness of any thing, which the LORD thy God hath forbidden thee.

24For the LORD thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God.

25When thou shalt beget children, and children's children, and ye shall have remained long in the land, and shall corrupt yourselves, and make a graven image, or the likeness of any thing, and shall do evil in the sight of the LORD thy God, to provoke him to anger:

26I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that ye shall soon utterly perish from off the land whereunto ye go over Jordan to possess it; ye shall not prolong your days upon it, but shall utterly be destroyed.

27And the LORD shall scatter you among the nations, and ye shall be left few in number among the heathen, whither the LORD shall lead you.

28And there ye shall serve gods, the work of men's hands, wood and stone, which neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell.

29But if from thence thou shalt seek the LORD thy God, thou shalt find him, if thou seek him with all thy heart and with all thy soul.

30When thou art in tribulation, and all these things are come upon thee, even in the latter days, if thou turn to the LORD thy God, and shalt be obedient unto his voice;

31(For the LORD thy God is a merciful God;) he will not forsake thee, neither destroy thee, nor forget the covenant of thy fathers which he sware unto them.

Deuteronomy 4:23-31

Biblical Context

The passage warns to remember the covenant and not form idols, threatens exile for turning away, but promises mercy to those who seek God with all their heart.

Neville's Inner Vision

These lines are not a history of a people, but a map of consciousness. The 'covenant' is your I AM awareness you affirm within the heart, and idols are any pictures you have trusted as separate from you. To forget the covenant is to scatter your attention into many images, to let your inner fire be cooled by the counterfeit of form. When the Lord is called a consuming fire, it is the burning certainty that you are, and you are not divided; jealousy is the natural demand of a single, undivided state. If you persist in the corruption of images—graven things—you weaken your land of perception and invite a sense of destruction; yet the mercy of God is your unalterable assumption, a promise that you will not be abandoned when you return to your true state. The path home is simple: seek the Lord with all your heart and all your soul, and you will find Him here, now, in your very consciousness. The latter days are the present moment when you turn to the I AM and obey its voice.

Practice This Now

Imaginative Act: Sit quietly and assume you are already keeping the covenant—in your heart, there is only I AM. Then revise a troubling image of separation by affirming your unity with the source, until the feeling of 'I am' fills you.