Zusammenfassung / Summary
In its official documents, the Second Vatican Council uses “people of God” as a leading metaphor or topos for “Church”. This topos, however, does not include Israel although its biblical application refers to the Jewish existence as the enduringly chosen people of God. This contribution presents the loosely systematized “ecclesiological” terminology of the Book of Deuteronomy, which constitutes the most important Old Testament theology of the people of God. It explores the terms “people of YHWH”, “people of inheritance”, “a people specially his own”, “holy people”, “assembly”, together with “assemble” and “assembly of the Lord”, and finally “all Israel”, which is the real addressee of Moses’s discourses and thus contains all of the above designations. Israel’s covenant with its God assures it of its especial dignity as the “people of YHWH”.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.23769/thph-95-2020-006