Deuteronomy 28:56-66

56 And she that is tender and delicate among you, whose foot has not assayed to go upon the earth for delicacy and tenderness, shall look with an evil eye on her husband in her bosom, and her son and her daughter,
57 and her offspring that comes out between her feet, and the child which she shall bear; for she shall eat them because of the want of all things, secretly in thy straitness, and in thy affliction, with which thine enemy shall afflict thee in thy cities.
58 If thou wilt not hearken to do all the words of this law, which have been written in this book, to fear this glorious and wonderful name, the Lord thy God;
59 then the Lord shall magnify thy plagues, and the plagues of thy seed, great and wonderful plagues, and evil and abiding diseases.
60 And he shall bring upon thee all the evil pain of Egypt, of which thou wast afraid, and they shall cleave to thee.
61 And the Lord shall bring upon thee every sickness, and every plague that is not written, and every one that is written in the book of this law, until he shall have destroyed thee.
62 And ye shall be left few in number, whereas ye were as the stars of the sky in multitude; because thou didst not hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God.
63 And it shall come to pass that as the Lord rejoiced over you to do you good, and to multiply you, so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you; and ye shall be quickly removed from the land, into which ye go to inherit it.
64 And the Lord thy God shall scatter thee among all nations, from one end of the earth to the other; and thou shalt there serve other gods, wood and stone, which thou hast not known, nor thy fathers.
65 Moreover among those nations he will not give thee quiet, neither by any means shall the sole of thy foot have rest; and the Lord shall give thee there another and a misgiving heart, and failing eyes, and a wasting soul.
66 And thy life shall be in suspense before thine eyes; and thou shalt be afraid by day and by night, and thou shalt have no assurance of thy life.

Deuteronomy 28:56-66 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.

Footnotes 2

  • [a]. afterbirth.
  • [b]. which thou feardst before their face.

The Brenton translation of the Septuagint is in the public domain.