4:44-49 - This is the law Moses set before the Israelites. These are the stipulations, decrees and laws Moses gave them when they came out of Egypt and were in the valley near Beth Peor east of the Jordan, in the land of Sihon king of the Amorites, who reigned in Heshbon and was defeated by Moses and the Israelites as they came out of Egypt. They took possession of his land and the land of Og king of Bashan, the two Amorite kings east of the Jordan. This land extended from Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Gorge to Mount Siyon (that is, Hermon), and included all the Arabah east of the Jordan, as far as the Sea of the Arabah, below the slopes of Pisgah.

This second remark is most often understood as introducing Moses' second address in Chap.5-26.1 Others see them as superfluous. A popular approach theorizes that these verses served as the introductory superscription to an original Deuteronomy, which consisted only of Chap.5-26. The affixation of the other chapters (1-4 & 27-34) at a later date resulted in these verses being made redundant.2 Rhetorically, however, this remark forms an inclusio with 1:1-5, that serves thus to frame the material between as a literary unit, to highlight its function as a prologue to the entire book:

J. R. Lundbom notes how key words and phrase in 1:1-5 and in these verses are inverted, and argues that, though the content is not precisely the same in each, it is similar enough to see that 4:44-49 is a summary of Chaps.2-3, and that it prepares the audience for what lies ahead no more or less than 1:1-5.3 Additionally, or alternatively, the remark here serves (also) to reorient the reader by restating the nature of the book after the long retrospective excursion begun in 1:6.4

As it stands, this remark anchors Moses' speeches—the first address retrospectively, and the second anticipatively—to a specific moment and place in a manner similar to 1:1-5, while also setting them within the larger context of Israel's salvation history; they were given "when they came out of Egypt" and when they are already in possession of land:

Z. Israel on the Boundary of Promise Fulfilment: The cities of refuge stamp the Transjordan land as Israel's possession, vv.41-43.

Aa. Affirmation: This is the law Moses set before the Israelites, v.44.

Ab. Affirmation: These are the stipulations, decrees, and laws Moses gave the Israelites, v.45.

B. Time: when they came out of Egypt, v.45.

Ca. Place: on the other side of the Jordan, v.46.

Cb. Place: in the valley near Beth Peor, v.46.

Cc. Place: in the land of Sihon king of the Amorites . . . v.46.

B'. Time: when they came out of Egypt, v.46.

Z'. Israel on the Boundary of Promise Fulfilment: The Transjordan land possessed by Israel, vv.47-49.

Here GenB is addressed not only as a people freed from slavery, but also as a people already propertied with the promise of God. This suggests that the narrator has a more clearly theological intention than is often acknowledged. This is further seen in the manner in which the details regarding the land conquered east of the Jordan in vv.47-49 (#Z) mirror the thought in vv.41-43 (#Z'), and together they sandwich the place and time of Moses' delivery of the torah. While the gift of the land may be a blessing, the voices of the Old Testament prophets and historians also make it abundantly clear that it was always also a temptation.5 This is already evident, for example, in the constant warnings within the book of Deuteronomy about forgetting Yahweh when "you have eaten and are satisfied" (see, e.g., 6:11f.; 8:10ff.; 11:15f.). On the plains of Moab, Israel was already in possession of land. Here Israel stood on the verge of promise fulfilment, but also on the edge of great temptation. We do not know when the narrator lived. Whether it was soon after Israel's entry into Canaan, or at a later era when times were good, he reminds his audience that, just as Israel needed so urgently to hear the word of the law when she stood on the eve of promise fulfilment, now was the time to hear the torah and to decide in its favour. Or he might have lived in the days of Assyrian and Babylonian hegemony, when Israel was threatened with the possibility of land loss. As prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah would similarly urge with such great pains upon Judah, against such a calamity, says the narrator, there is only one antidote: hear the torah and to obey.