Deuteronomy 28:32-42

32 Your sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, while your eyes look on and fail with longing for them all the day; and it shall not be in the power of your hand to prevent it.
33 A nation which you have not known shall eat up the fruit of your ground and of all your labors; and you shall be only oppressed and crushed continually;
34 so that you shall be driven mad by the sight which your eyes shall see.
35 The LORD will smite you on the knees and on the legs with grievous boils of which you cannot be healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.
36 "The LORD will bring you, and your king whom you set over you, to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known; and there you shall serve other gods, of wood and stone.
37 And you shall become a horror, a proverb, and a byword, among all the peoples where the LORD will lead you away.
38 You shall carry much seed into the field, and shall gather little in; for the locust shall consume it.
39 You shall plant vineyards and dress them, but you shall neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes; for the worm shall eat them.
40 You shall have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you shall not anoint yourself with the oil; for your olives shall drop off.
41 You shall beget sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours; for they shall go into captivity.
42 All your trees and the fruit of your ground the locust shall possess.

Deuteronomy 28:32-42 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.

Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1952 [2nd edition, 1971] by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.