Deuteronomy 28:32

32 Your sons and daughters will be shipped off to foreigners; you'll wear your eyes out looking vainly for them, helpless to do a thing.

Deuteronomy 28:32 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 28:32

Thy sons and thy daughters [shall be] given unto another
people
This also was not true in the Babylonish captivity; for then their sons and daughters went with them, and continued with them, and returned again; but has been oftentimes verified since their captivity by the Romans; frequently their sons and daughters have been taken from them by force, to be brought up in another religion, by the edicts of kings and popes, and by the canons of councils, and particularly of the fourth council of Toledo:

and thine eyes shall look and fail;
with longing:

for them all the day long;
expecting every day their children would be returned to them, at least wishing and hoping they would; their hearts yearning after them, but all in vain:

and [there shall be] no might in thy hand;
to recover them out of the hands of those who had the possession of them, or fetch them back from distant countries, whither they were carried. By an edict of the Portuguese, the children of the Jews were ordered to be carried to the uninhabited islands; and when, by the king's command, they were had to the ships in which they were to be transported, it is incredible, the Jewish historian says F12, what howlings and lamentations were made by the women; and there wore none pitied them and comforted them, or could help them.


FOOTNOTES:

F12 Shebet Judah, sive Hist. Jud. sect. 59. p. 332.

Deuteronomy 28:32 In-Context

30 You'll get engaged to a woman and another man will take her for his mistress; you'll build a house and never live in it; you'll plant a garden and never eat so much as a carrot;
31 you'll watch your ox get butchered and not get a single steak from it; your donkey will be stolen from in front of you and you'll never see it again; your sheep will be sent off to your enemies and no one will lift a hand to help you.
32 Your sons and daughters will be shipped off to foreigners; you'll wear your eyes out looking vainly for them, helpless to do a thing.
33 Your crops and everything you work for will be eaten and used by foreigners; you'll spend the rest of your lives abused and knocked around.
34 What you see will drive you crazy.
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.