Vayikra 26:38

38 And ye shall perish among the Goyim, and the eretz of your enemies shall eat you up.

Vayikra 26:38 Meaning and Commentary

Leviticus 26:38

And ye shall perish among the Heathen
Not utterly, but great numbers of them, through change of air, and different diet, as Aben Ezra, and through the cruel usage of their enemies; for there is a body of them which continues unto this day; unless this is to be understood of the ten tribes, as R. Akiba F2 interprets it, who are supposed to be entirely lost and swallowed up among the nations where they were carried captive:

and the land of your enemies shall eat you up;
they should die in it through one disease or another; by the pestilence, as the Targum of Jonathan, and so be buried in it; in which sense it may be said to eat them up, or consume them, for the grave swallows up and consumes all that are put into it; Jarchi says, this is to be understood of those that die in captivity.


FOOTNOTES:

F2 In Torat Cohanim, ut supra. (par. 1. fol. 197. 2.)

Vayikra 26:38 In-Context

36 And upon them that are left alive of you I will send a fearful faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies; and the sound of a shaken leaf shall chase them; and they shall flee, as fleeing from a cherev; and they shall fall v’ein rodef (when none pursueth, persecutes).
37 And they shall fall one upon another, as it were before a cherev, when none pursueth; and ye shall have no standing place before your enemies.
38 And ye shall perish among the Goyim, and the eretz of your enemies shall eat you up.
39 And they that are left of you shall waste away in their avon in your enemies’ lands; and also in the iniquities of their avot shall they waste away with them.
40 V’hitvadu (if they shall confess) their avon, and the avon of their avot, with their treachery in which they were treacherous against Me, and that also they have walked b’keri (contrary, hostile) unto Me;
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