Deuteronomy 28:8-46

8 The LORD will send a blessing on your barns and on everything you put your hand to. The LORD your God will bless you in the land he is giving you.

9 The LORD will establish you as his holy people, as he promised you on oath, if you keep the commands of the LORD your God and walk in obedience to him.

10 Then all the peoples on earth will see that you are called by the name of the LORD, and they will fear you.

11 The LORD will grant you abundant prosperity—in the fruit of your womb, the young of your livestock and the crops of your ground—in the land he swore to your ancestors to give you.

12 The LORD will open the heavens, the storehouse of his bounty, to send rain on your land in season and to bless all the work of your hands. You will lend to many nations but will borrow from none.

13 The LORD will make you the head, not the tail. If you pay attention to the commands of the LORD your God that I give you this day and carefully follow them, you will always be at the top, never at the bottom.

14 Do not turn aside from any of the commands I give you today, to the right or to the left, following other gods and serving them.

Curses for Disobedience

15 However, if you do not obey the LORD your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come on you and overtake you:

16 You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the country.

17 Your basket and your kneading trough will be cursed.

18 The fruit of your womb will be cursed, and the crops of your land, and the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks.

19 You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.

20 The LORD will send on you curses, confusion and rebuke in everything you put your hand to, until you are destroyed and come to sudden ruin because of the evil you have done in forsaking him.^[a]

21 The LORD will plague you with diseases until he has destroyed you from the land you are entering to possess.

22 The LORD will strike you with wasting disease, with fever and inflammation, with scorching heat and drought, with blight and mildew, which will plague you until you perish.

23 The sky over your head will be bronze, the ground beneath you iron.

24 The LORD will turn the rain of your country into dust and powder; it will come down from the skies until you are destroyed.

25 The LORD will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You will come at them from one direction but flee from them in seven, and you will become a thing of horror to all the kingdoms on earth.

26 Your carcasses will be food for all the birds and the wild animals, and there will be no one to frighten them away.

27 The LORD will afflict you with the boils of Egypt and with tumors, festering sores and the itch, from which you cannot be cured.

28 The LORD will afflict you with madness, blindness and confusion of mind.

29 At midday you will grope about like a blind person in the dark. You will be unsuccessful in everything you do; day after day you will be oppressed and robbed, with no one to rescue you.

30 You will be pledged to be married to a woman, but another will take her and rape her. You will build a house, but you will not live in it. You will plant a vineyard, but you will not even begin to enjoy its fruit.

31 Your ox will be slaughtered before your eyes, but you will eat none of it. Your donkey will be forcibly taken from you and will not be returned. Your sheep will be given to your enemies, and no one will rescue them.

32 Your sons and daughters will be given to another nation, and you will wear out your eyes watching for them day after day, powerless to lift a hand.

33 A people that you do not know will eat what your land and labor produce, and you will have nothing but cruel oppression all your days.

34 The sights you see will drive you mad.

35 The LORD will afflict your knees and legs with painful boils that cannot be cured, spreading from the soles of your feet to the top of your head.

36 The LORD will drive you and the king you set over you to a nation unknown to you or your ancestors. There you will worship other gods, gods of wood and stone.

37 You will become a thing of horror, a byword and an object of ridicule among all the peoples where the LORD will drive you.

38 You will sow much seed in the field but you will harvest little, because locusts will devour it.

39 You will plant vineyards and cultivate them but you will not drink the wine or gather the grapes, because worms will eat them.

40 You will have olive trees throughout your country but you will not use the oil, because the olives will drop off.

41 You will have sons and daughters but you will not keep them, because they will go into captivity.

42 Swarms of locusts will take over all your trees and the crops of your land.

43 The foreigners who reside among you will rise above you higher and higher, but you will sink lower and lower.

44 They will lend to you, but you will not lend to them. They will be the head, but you will be the tail.

45 All these curses will come on you. They will pursue you and overtake you until you are destroyed, because you did not obey the LORD your God and observe the commands and decrees he gave you.

46 They will be a sign and a wonder to you and your descendants forever.

Deuteronomy 28:8-46 Meaning and Commentary

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.

Cross References

• 1. Deuteronomy 15:4
• 2. S Exodus 19:6; Deuteronomy 7:6
• 3. S Leviticus 26:3
• 4. S Numbers 6:27; 1 Kings 8:43; Jeremiah 25:29; Daniel 9:18; 2 Chronicles 7:14
• 5. S Genesis 30:27
• 6. ver 4; Deuteronomy 30:9; Proverbs 10:22
• 7. Job 38:22; Psalms 135:7; Jeremiah 10:13; Jeremiah 51:16
• 8. Psalms 65:11; Psalms 68:10; Jeremiah 31:12
• 9. S Leviticus 26:4; 1 Kings 8:35-36; 1 Kings 18:1; Psalms 104:13; Isaiah 5:6; Isaiah 30:23; Isaiah 32:20
• 10. Isaiah 61:9; Isaiah 65:23; Jeremiah 32:38-41; Malachi 3:12
• 11. ver 44; S Leviticus 25:19; S Deuteronomy 15:3,6; Ezekiel 34:26
• 12. Jeremiah 11:6
• 13. S Deuteronomy 26:19
• 14. S Deuteronomy 5:32; Joshua 1:7
• 15. 1 Kings 9:6; 2 Chronicles 7:19; Leviticus 26:14
• 16. S Deuteronomy 27:26
• 17. Deuteronomy 29:27; Joshua 23:15; 2 Chronicles 12:5; Daniel 9:11; Malachi 2:2
• 18. ver 3
• 19. ver 5
• 20. ver 4
• 21. ver 6
• 22. ver 8,15; Leviticus 26:16; Jeremiah 42:18; Malachi 2:2; Malachi 3:9; Malachi 4:6
• 23. Psalms 39:11; Psalms 76:6; Psalms 80:16; Isaiah 17:13; Isaiah 51:20; Isaiah 54:9; Isaiah 66:15; Ezekiel 5:15
• 24. Deuteronomy 4:26
• 25. S Exodus 32:22
• 26. Leviticus 26:25; Numbers 14:12; Jeremiah 24:10; Amos 4:10
• 27. ver 48; Deuteronomy 32:24
• 28. Leviticus 26:16; 2 Kings 8:1; Job 12:15; Psalms 105:16; Jeremiah 14:1; Haggai 1:11; Malachi 3:9
• 29. Haggai 2:17
• 30. S Leviticus 26:25
• 31. Deuteronomy 4:26; Amos 4:9
• 32. S Leviticus 26:19
• 33. Leviticus 26:19; Deuteronomy 11:17; 1 Kings 8:35; 1 Kings 17:1; Isaiah 5:6; Jeremiah 14:1; Haggai 1:10
• 34. 1 Samuel 4:10; Psalms 78:62
• 35. S Leviticus 26:17; Isaiah 30:17
• 36. ver 37
• 37. 2 Chronicles 29:8; 2 Chronicles 30:7; Jeremiah 15:4; Jeremiah 24:9; Jeremiah 26:6; Jeremiah 29:18; Jeremiah 44:12; Ezekiel 23:46
• 38. S Genesis 40:19
• 39. Psalms 79:2; Isaiah 18:6; Jeremiah 7:33; Jeremiah 12:9; Jeremiah 15:2; Jeremiah 16:4; Jeremiah 19:7; Jeremiah 34:20
• 40. ver 60-61; Deuteronomy 7:15; 1 Samuel 5:6
• 41. Genesis 19:11; Exodus 10:21; Job 5:14; Job 12:25; Job 24:13; Job 38:15; Isaiah 59:10
• 42. Judges 3:9; 2 Kings 13:5; Esther 4:14; Isaiah 19:20; Isaiah 43:11; Hosea 13:4; Obadiah 1:21
• 43. Job 31:10; Jeremiah 8:10
• 44. Isaiah 65:22; Amos 5:11
• 45. Jeremiah 12:13
• 46. ver 41
• 47. Jeremiah 6:6; Jeremiah 22:17
• 48. Jeremiah 5:15-17; Ezekiel 25:4
• 49. ver 67
• 50. ver 27; Deuteronomy 7:15; Revelation 16:2
• 51. Job 2:7; Job 7:5; Job 13:28; Job 30:17,30; Isaiah 1:6
• 52. 1 Samuel 12:25; 2 Kings 17:4,6; 2 Kings 24:12,14; 2 Kings 25:7,11
• 53. S Deuteronomy 4:27; 2 Kings 24:14; 2 Kings 25:7,11; 2 Chronicles 33:11; 2 Chronicles 36:21; Ezra 5:12; Jeremiah 15:14; Jeremiah 16:13; Jeremiah 27:20; Jeremiah 39:1-9; Jeremiah 52:28; Lamentations 1:3
• 54. S Deuteronomy 4:28
• 55. ver 25; Jeremiah 42:18; Ezekiel 5:15
• 56. Psalms 22:7; Psalms 39:8; Psalms 44:13; Psalms 64:8; Jeremiah 18:16; Jeremiah 48:27; Micah 6:16
• 57. 2 Chronicles 7:20; Ezra 9:7; Jeremiah 44:8
• 58. 1 Kings 9:7; Psalms 44:14; Jeremiah 19:8; Jeremiah 24:9; Jeremiah 25:9,18; Jeremiah 29:18; Lamentations 2:15
• 59. Leviticus 26:20; Psalms 129:7; Isaiah 5:10; Jeremiah 12:13; Hosea 8:7; Micah 6:15; Haggai 1:6,9; Haggai 2:16
• 60. S Exodus 10:4
• 61. S Exodus 10:15; Joel 1:4
• 62. S Leviticus 10:9
• 63. Joel 1:4; Joel 2:25; Malachi 3:11
• 64. Isaiah 5:10; Isaiah 17:10-11; Zephaniah 1:13
• 65. Jeremiah 11:16; Micah 6:15
• 66. ver 32
• 67. ver 38; Judges 6:5; Judges 7:12; Jeremiah 46:23
• 68. ver 13
• 69. S ver 12
• 70. ver 13; S Deuteronomy 26:19
• 71. S Exodus 15:9
• 72. ver 15; Deuteronomy 4:25-26
• 73. S Numbers 16:38; Psalms 71:7; Isaiah 8:18; Isaiah 20:3; Ezekiel 5:15; Zechariah 3:8; Ezekiel 14:8

Footnotes

• [a]. Hebrew "me"