LXX Deuteronomy 32:8

Septuagint

4 God—his works are genuine, and all his ways are justice. A faithful god, and there is no injustice, aa righteous and holy Lord; 5 blemished children, not his, have sinned, a generation, crooked and perverse. 6 Do you thus repay the Lord these things, O people, foolish and not wise? Did not he himself, your father, acquire you and make you and create you? 7 Remember days of old; consider years of a generation of generations; ask your father, and he will inform you, your elders, and they will tell you. 8 When the Most High was apportioning nations, as he scattered Adam’s sons, he fixed boundaries of nations according to the number of divine sons, 9 and his people Iakob became the Lord’s portion, Israel a measured part of his inheritance.

1 Clement 29:2

First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians
Patristic

1 Let us therefore approach Him in holiness of soul, lifting up pure and undefiled hands unto Him, with love towards our gentle and compassionate Father who made us an elect portion unto Himself. 2 For thus it is written: When the Most High divided the nations, when He dispersed the sons of Adam, He fixed the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the angels of God. His people Jacob became the portion of the Lord, and Israel the measurement of His inheritance.

 Notes and References

"... In the course of Clement’s impassioned plea for an end to division and discord and the return to peace and order at the church in Corinth, a special emphasis is placed on the notion that it is the Christian people who now constitute God’s “chosen portion.” It is they whom he has taken for himself from among all the other nations. In perfect continuity with the Jewish backdrop that informs his intervention, Clement thus argues that since the followers of Christ now constitute a “holy” people, they must act and conduct themselves accordingly. This he grounds on the authority of Deuteronomy 32:8–9 in the Septuagint version. “And so,” he writes, “we should approach him with devout souls, raising pure and undefiled hands to him and loving our gentle and kind-hearted Father who made us his own chosen portion. For so it is written: ‘When the Most High divided the nations and scattered the descendants of Adam, he established the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the angels of God. His people, Jacob, became the portion of the Lord; Israel became the allotment of his inheritance.’” Not without a certain inconsistency, Clement maintains that it is even through “righteous deeds”— and not through “mere words”— that the holy people should acquire and preserve their holiness. In this respect, and in contrast to the “idle” and the “slovenly,” they should model themselves on the example of the host of heavenly angels ..."

Heron, Nicholas Liturgical Power: Between Economic and Political Theology (p. 66) Fordham University Press, 2018

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