provides us with important insights into understanding why both Judaism and Christianity have found their faith to be focussed upon a literature of sacred writings. They are both religions of a book, and it is Deuteronomy which most distinctively established the pattern for such a book-oriented spirituality. A Note about Commentaries Deuteronomy has been the subject of several excellent commentaries in recent years of which the most notable for English readers are those by G. von Rad and A.D.H. Mayes.