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Most of this chapter (vv.1-49) is a stage-by-stage description of Israel’s itinerary from the departure from Egypt to the plains of Moab. Some forty sites are mentioned, and about forty years of history are summarized via geography. It is told in the third person plural rather than the first person plural, as if Moses were distancing himself from the group about whom he is writing.
Everything surrounding ch. 33 is oriented to the future and the second generation (e.g., the Transjordanian settlement [ch. 32]), and the boundaries of the Promised Land not yet reached [ch. 34]). Here is one chapter devoted exclusively to the past with the appearance of a travelogue or a geographical diary.
There is a playoff within this chapter between the “they” of the past (vv.1-49) and the “you” of the present and future (vv.50-56). If vv.1-49 are annalistic, vv.50-56 are exhortational. Moses changes roles from historian to preacher. Compromise worked well in ch. 32, but there is no room for compromise in 33:50-56. Internal differences need to be ironed out, but the inhabitants of Canaan need to be expelled and their icons destroyed. The God who guided the first generation will guide the second generation, too, but this was not intended to encourage complacency among the people.
The numerous sites listed ad seriatim indirectly make the point that Israel did not make her way through the wilderness haphazardly. The successful, albeit detoured, journey from Rameses to the plains of Moab is scarcely a delightful serendipity. It testifies to God’s specific leadership of his people.
Several of the names recall a place at which God did something sensational (Rameses, Marah, Kibroth Hattaavah, the Desert of Sinai, etc.). Others are but atlas entries. The twelve sites in vv.18b-30a are unknown. Alush, Rithmah, and Rissah are not memorable, but God was there, too, leading and directing his own.