In context it's pretty clear that throughout the Tanakh God has two hands that are treated anthropomorphically. When his right hand is raised to heaven (as all righteous flesh raised from the grave rise to heaven) it's clear that it's the anthropomorphism of his hand that says "I live forever." Very little knowledge of scripture and sound exegesis is required to understand this truism.
Unfortunately for Jewish orthodoxy, treating the text here faithfully leads to another truism concerning the nature of proper exegesis and interpretation. Hebrew root words, usually three consonants, function different than most other written words. Almost every three-consonant word in biblical Hebrew has an incredible interpretive flexibility that those coming to the Hebrew from another script, or language, find difficult to fathom. Which lends itself to the Masoretic interpreter's passing off their traditional interpretation as though it's far more set in stone, so to say, than it actually is.
Once we accept the legitimate interpretation of the passage above, i.e., that God's anthropomorphized hand is revealing that when it's lifted (from the grave) to rise to heaven, it (now) lives forever, we have cause to use that correction as the contextual authority to retroactively re-evaluate, and re-interpret, the verse that comes before it.
Without distorting the legitimate flexibility of the Hebrew script, words, verse 39 of Deuteronomy 32 gives us the reason why the right hand of God needs to be raised (from the grave) and why it's being raised to heaven (where all righteous flesh is raised), and why ---now---none can escape its grasp:
I will die, and I will live [again]; I'm wounded [Isaiah 53:10], and I will be healed [Isaiah 53:11]. But none can be delivered out of my hand [now]. For God lifted [me], his right hand [from the grave] to heaven above, so that I can proclaim I live forever.
Deuteronomy 32:39-40.
John
