Deuteronomy 28

1 "If you obey the Lord your God and faithfully keep all his commands that I am giving you today, he will make you greater than any other nation on earth. ¹

2 Obey the Lord your God and all these blessings will be yours:

3 "The Lord will bless your towns and your fields.

4 "The Lord will bless you with many children, with abundant crops, and with many cattle and sheep.

5 "The Lord will bless your grain crops and the food you prepare from them.

6 "The Lord will bless everything you do.

7 "The Lord will defeat your enemies when they attack you. They will attack from one direction, but they will run from you in all directions.

8 "The Lord your God will bless your work and fill your barns with grain. He will bless you in the land that he is giving you.

9 "If you obey the Lord your God and do everything he commands, he will make you his own people, as he has promised.

10 Then all the peoples on earth will see that the Lord has chosen you to be his own people, and they will be afraid of you.

11 The Lord will give you many children, many cattle, and abundant crops in the land that he promised your ancestors to give you.

12 He will send rain in season from his rich storehouse in the sky and bless all your work, so that you will lend to many nations, but you will not have to borrow from any.

13 The Lord your God will make you the leader among the nations and not a follower; you will always prosper and never fail if you obey faithfully all his commands that I am giving you today.

14 But you must never disobey them in any way, or worship and serve other gods.

15 "But if you disobey the Lord your God and do not faithfully keep all his commands and laws that I am giving you today, all these evil things will happen to you:

16 "The Lord will curse your towns and your fields.

17 "The Lord will curse your grain crops and the food you prepare from them.

18 "The Lord will curse you by giving you only a few children, poor crops, and few cattle and sheep.

19 "The Lord will curse everything you do.

20 "If you do evil and reject the Lord, he will bring on you disaster, confusion, and trouble in everything you do, until you are quickly and completely destroyed.

21 He will send disease after disease on you until there is not one of you left in the land that you are about to occupy.

22 The Lord will strike you with infectious diseases, with swelling and fever; he will send drought and scorching winds to destroy your crops. These disasters will be with you until you die.

23 No rain will fall, and your ground will become as hard as iron.

24 Instead of rain, the Lord will send down duststorms and sandstorms until you are destroyed.

25 "The Lord will give your enemies victory over you. You will attack them from one direction, but you will run from them in all directions, and all the people on earth will be terrified when they see what happens to you.

26 When you die, birds and wild animals will come and eat your bodies, and there will be no one to scare them off.

27 The Lord will send boils on you, as he did on the Egyptians. He will make your bodies break out with sores. You will be covered with scabs, and you will itch, but there will be no cure.

28 The Lord will make you lose your mind; he will strike you with blindness and confusion.

29 You will grope about in broad daylight like someone blind, and you will not be able to find your way. You will not prosper in anything you do. You will be constantly oppressed and robbed, and there will be no one to help you.

30 "You will be engaged to a young woman - but someone else will marry her. You will build a house - but never live in it. You will plant a vineyard - but never eat its grapes.

31 Your cattle will be butchered before your very eyes, but you will not eat any of the meat. Your donkeys will be dragged away while you look on, and they will not be given back to you. Your sheep will be given to your enemies, and there will be no one to help you.

32 Your sons and daughters will be given as slaves to foreigners while you look on. Every day you will strain your eyes, looking in vain for your children to return.

33 A foreign nation will take all the crops that you have worked so hard to grow, while you receive nothing but constant oppression and harsh treatment.

34 Your sufferings will make you lose your mind.

35 The Lord will cover your legs with incurable, painful sores; boils will cover you from head to foot.

36 "The Lord will take you and your king away to a foreign land, where neither you nor your ancestors ever lived before; there you will serve gods made of wood and stone.

37 In the countries to which the Lord will scatter you, the people will be shocked at what has happened to you; they will make fun of you and ridicule you.

38 "You will plant plenty of seed, but reap only a small harvest, because the locusts will eat your crops.

39 You will plant vineyards and take care of them, but you will not gather their grapes or drink wine from them, because worms will eat the vines.

40 Olive trees will grow everywhere in your land, but you will not have any olive oil, because the olives will drop off.

41 You will have sons and daughters, but you will lose them, because they will be taken away as prisoners of war.

42 All your trees and crops will be devoured by insects.

43 "Foreigners who live in your land will gain more and more power, while you gradually lose yours.

44 They will have money to lend you, but you will have none to lend them. In the end they will be your rulers.

45 "All these disasters will come on you, and they will be with you until you are destroyed, because you did not obey the Lord your God and keep all the laws that he gave you.

46 They will be the evidence of God's judgment on you and your descendants forever.

47 The Lord blessed you in every way, but you would not serve him with glad and joyful hearts.

48 So then, you will serve the enemies that the Lord is going to send against you. You will be hungry, thirsty, and naked - in need of everything. The Lord will oppress you harshly until you are destroyed.

49 The Lord will bring against you a nation from the ends of the earth, a nation whose language you do not know. They will swoop down on you like an eagle.

50 They will be ruthless and show no mercy to anyone, young or old.

51 They will eat your livestock and your crops, and you will starve to death. They will not leave you any grain, wine, olive oil, cattle, or sheep; and you will die.

52 They will attack every town in the land that the Lord your God is giving you, and the high, fortified walls in which you trust will fall.

53 "When your enemies are besieging your towns, you will become so desperate for food that you will even eat the children that the Lord your God has given you.

54 Even the most refined man of noble birth will become so desperate during the siege that he will eat some of his own children because he has no other food. He will not even give any to his brother or to the wife he loves or to any of his children who are left.

56 Even the most refined woman of noble birth, so rich that she has never had to walk anywhere, will behave in the same way. When the enemy besieges her town, she will become so desperate for food that she will secretly eat her newborn child and the afterbirth as well. She will not share them with the husband she loves or with any of her children. ²

58 "If you do not obey faithfully all of God's teachings that are written in this book and if you do not honor the wonderful and awesome name of the Lord your God,

59 he will send on you and on your descendants incurable diseases and horrible epidemics that can never be stopped.

60 He will bring on you once again all the dreadful diseases you experienced in Egypt, and you will never recover.

61 He will also send all kinds of diseases and epidemics that are not mentioned in this book of God's laws and teachings, and you will be destroyed.

62 Although you become as numerous as the stars in the sky, only a few of you will survive, because you did not obey the Lord your God.

63 Just as the Lord took delight in making you prosper and in making you increase in number, so he will take delight in destroying you and in bringing ruin on you. You will be uprooted from the land that you are about to occupy.

64 "The Lord will scatter you among all the nations, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you will serve gods made of wood and stone, gods that neither you nor your ancestors have ever worshiped before.

65 You will find no peace anywhere, no place to call your own; the Lord will overwhelm you with anxiety, hopelessness, and despair.

66 Your life will always be in danger. Day and night you will be filled with terror, and you will live in constant fear of death.

67 Your hearts will pound with fear at everything you see. Every morning you will wish for evening; every evening you will wish for morning.

68 The Lord will send you back to Egypt in ships, even though he said that you would never have to go there again. There you will try to sell yourselves to your enemies as slaves, but no one will want to buy you."

Deuteronomy 28 Commentary

Chapter 28

The blessings for obedience. (1-14) The curses for disobedience. (15-44) Their ruin, if disobedient. (45-68)

Verses 1-14 This chapter is a very large exposition of two words, the blessing and the curse. They are real things and have real effects. The blessings are here put before the curses. God is slow to anger, but swift to show mercy. It is his delight to bless. It is better that we should be drawn to what is good by a child-like hope of God's favour, than that we be frightened to it by a slavish fear of his wrath. The blessing is promised, upon condition that they diligently hearken to the voice of God. Let them keep up religion, the form and power of it, in their families and nation, then the providence of God would prosper all their outward concerns.

Verses 15-44 If we do not keep God's commandments, we not only come short of the blessing promised, but we lay ourselves under the curse, which includes all misery, as the blessing all happiness. Observe the justice of this curse. It is not a curse causeless, or for some light cause. The extent and power of this curse. Wherever the sinner goes, the curse of God follows; wherever he is, it rests upon him. Whatever he has is under a curse. All his enjoyments are made bitter; he cannot take any true comfort in them, for the wrath of God mixes itself with them. Many judgments are here stated, which would be the fruits of the curse, and with which God would punish the people of the Jews, for their apostacy and disobedience. We may observe the fulfilling of these threatenings in their present state. To complete their misery, it is threatened that by these troubles they should be bereaved of all comfort and hope, and left to utter despair. Those who walk by sight, and not by faith, are in danger of losing reason itself, when every thing about them looks frightful.

Verses 45-68 If God inflicts vengeance, what miseries his curse can bring upon mankind, even in this present world! Yet these are but the beginning of sorrows to those under the curse of God. What then will be the misery of that world where their worm dieth not, and their fire is not quenched! Observe what is here said of the wrath of God, which should come and remain upon the Israelites for their sins. It is amazing to think that a people so long the favourites of Heaven, should be so cast off; and yet that a people so scattered in all nations should be kept distinct, and not mixed with others. If they would not serve God with cheerfulness, they should be compelled to serve their enemies. We may justly expect from God, that if we do not fear his fearful name, we shall feel his fearful plagues; for one way or other God will be feared. The destruction threatened is described. They have, indeed, been plucked from off the land, ver. ( 63 ) . Not only by the Babylonish captivity, and when Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans; but afterwards, when they were forbidden to set foot in Jerusalem. They should have no rest; no rest of body, ver. 65, but be continually on the remove, either in hope of gain, or fear of persecution. No rest of the mind, which is much worse. They have been banished from city to city, from country to country; recalled, and banished again. These events, compared with the favour shown to Israel in ancient times, and with the prophecies about them, should not only excite astonishment, but turn unto us for a testimony, assuring us of the truth of Scripture. And when the other prophecies of their conversion to Christ shall come to pass, the whole will be a sign and a wonder to all the nations of the earth, and the forerunner of a general spread of true christianity. The fulfilling of these prophecies upon the Jewish nation, delivered more than three thousand years ago, shows that Moses spake by the Spirit of God; who not only foresees the ruin of sinners, but warns of it, that they may prevent it by a true and timely repentance, or else be left without excuse. And let us be thankful that Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, by being made a curse for us, and bearing in his own person all that punishment which our sins merit, and which we must otherwise have endured for ever. To this Refuge and salvation let sinners flee; therein let believers rejoice, and serve their reconciled God with gladness of heart, for the abundance of his spiritual blessings.

Cross References

• 1. 28.1-14Deuteronomy 11.13-17.
• 2. 28.57 2 K 6.28, 29;Lamentations 4.10.

Footnotes

• [a]. The Lord; [or] Your enemies.
• [b]. he; [or] I.

Chapter Summary

INTRODUCTION TO DEUTERONOMY 28

In this chapter Moses enlarges on the blessings and the curses which belong, the one to the doers, the other to the transgressors of the law; the blessings, De 28:1-14; the curses, some of which concern individual persons, others the whole nation and body of people, and that both under the former and present dispensations, and which had their fulfilment in their former captivities, and more especially in their present dispersion, De 28:15-68.