Deuteronomy 28:54

54 `The man who is tender in thee, and who [is] very delicate -- his eye is evil against his brother, and against the wife of his bosom, and against the remnant of his sons whom he leaveth,

Deuteronomy 28:54 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 28:54

[So that] the man [that is] tender among you, and very
delicate
Not only the rustic that has been brought up meanly, and used to hard living; but one that has been bred very tenderly, and lived in a delicate manner, like the rich man in ( Luke 16:19 ) ; that fared sumptuously every day:

his eye shall be evil towards his brother, and towards the wife of his
bosom, and towards the remnant of his children which he shall leave;
that is, he shall begrudge his brother, who is so nearly related to him, the least bit of food; yea, his wife, he dearly loved, and is one flesh with him, his other self, and even his children, which are parts of himself, such of them as were left not eaten by him; or his eye should be evil upon then, he should look with an evil eye on them, determining within himself to kill and eat them next. Though the particular instance in which his eye would be evil to them follows, yet no doubt there are other instances in which his eye would be evil towards them, as there were at the siege of Jerusalem, and have been since. Josephus

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FOOTNOTES:

F2 says,

``that in every house where there was any appearance of food (or anything that looked like it, that had the shadow of it) there was a battle; and the dearest friends fought with one another, snatching away from each other, the miserable supports of life;''

as the husband from his wife and children, and the wife from her husband and children; see more in ( Deuteronomy 28:56 ) ; and, in later times, we told by the Jewish historian ^F3, that wrote an account of their sufferings and distresses since their dispersion, that at Fez the Jews sold their children for slaves for bread.

F2 De Bello Jud. l. 6. c. 3. sect. 3.
F3 Shebet Judah, sive Hist. Jud. p. 326.

Deuteronomy 28:54 In-Context

52 `And it hath laid siege to thee in all thy gates, till thy walls come down, the high and the fenced ones in which thou art trusting, in all thy land; yea, it hath laid siege to thee in all thy gates, in all thy land, which Jehovah thy God hath given to thee;

53 and thou hast eaten the fruit of thy body, flesh of thy sons and thy daughters (whom Jehovah thy God hath given to thee), in the siege, and in the straitness with which thine enemies do straiten thee.

54 `The man who is tender in thee, and who [is] very delicate -- his eye is evil against his brother, and against the wife of his bosom, and against the remnant of his sons whom he leaveth,

55 against giving to one of them of the flesh of his sons whom he eateth, because he hath nothing left to him, in the siege, and in the straitness with which thine enemy doth straiten thee in all thy gates.

56 `The tender woman in thee, and the delicate, who hath not tried the sole of her foot to place on the ground because of delicateness and because of tenderness -- her eye is evil against the husband of her bosom, and against her son, and against her daughter,