Deuteronomy 28
28
Deuteronomy 28
1¶ And it shall come to pass if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the Lord thy God to keep and to do all his commandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high above all the Gentiles of the earth;
2and all these blessings shall come upon thee and overtake thee when thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God.
3Blessed shalt thou be in the city and blessed shalt thou be in the field.
4Blessed shall be the fruit of thy body and the fruit of thy ground and the fruit of thy beasts, the increase of thy cows, and the flocks of thy sheep.
5Blessed shall be thy basket and thy store.
6Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed shalt thou be when thou goest out.
7The Lord shall cause thine enemies that rise up against thee to be smitten before thy face; they shall come out against thee one way and flee before thee seven ways.
8The Lord shall command the blessing upon thee in thy storehouses and in all that thou settest thine hand unto; and he shall bless thee in the land which the Lord thy God gives thee.
9The Lord shall confirm thee as his holy people, as he has sworn unto thee, when thou shalt keep the commandments of the Lord thy God and walk in his ways.
10And all people of the earth shall see that thou art called by the name of the Lord, and they shall be afraid of thee.
11And the Lord shall cause thee to have good in abundance in the fruit of thy body and in the fruit of thy beasts and in the fruit of thy ground, upon the land which the Lord swore unto thy fathers to give thee.
12The Lord shall open unto thee his good treasure, the heaven, to give the rain unto thy land in its season and to bless all the work of thine hand. And thou shalt lend unto many Gentiles, and thou shalt not borrow.
13And the Lord shall make thee the head, and not the tail, and thou shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath, when thou shalt hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy God, which I command thee this day, to keep them and to fulfill them.
14And thou shalt not go aside from any of the words which I command thee this day to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
15¶ And it shall come to pass if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep, to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee today, that all these curses shall come upon thee and overtake thee.
16Cursed shalt thou be in the city, and cursed shalt thou be in the field.
17Cursed shall be thy basket and thy store.
18Cursed shall be the fruit of thy body and the fruit of thy land, the increase of thy cows and the flocks of thy sheep.
19Cursed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and cursed shalt thou be when thou goest out.
20The Lord shall send upon thee cursing, destruction and rebuke, in all that thou settest thine hand to do, until thou art destroyed and perish quickly because of the wickedness of thy doings, by which thou hast forsaken me.
21The Lord shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee until he has consumed thee from off the land into which thou dost enter to inherit it.
22The Lord shall smite thee with a consumption and with a fever and with an inflammation and with an extreme burning and with the sword and with blight and with mildew; and they shall pursue thee until thou perish.
23And thy heavens which are over thy head shall be brass, and the earth that is under thee shall be iron.
24The Lord shall make the rain of thy land dust and ashes; from the heavens it shall come down upon thee, until thou art destroyed.
25The Lord shall cause thee to be smitten before thine enemies; thou shalt go out one way against them and flee seven ways before them and shalt be an object of trembling unto all the kingdoms of the earth.
26And thy carcase shall be food unto all fowls of the air and unto the beasts of the earth, and there shall be no one to frighten them away.
27The Lord will smite thee with the boil of Egypt and with the hemorrhoids and with the scab and with the itch, of which thou canst not be healed.
28The Lord shall smite thee with madness and blindness and astonishment of heart.
29And thou shalt grope at noonday as the blind grope in the darkness, and thou shalt not be prospered in thy ways; and thou shalt only be oppressed and spoiled all the days, and there shall be no one to save thee.
30Thou shalt betroth a wife, and another man shall lie with her; thou shalt build a house, and thou shalt not dwell therein; thou shalt plant a vineyard and shalt not gather the grapes thereof.
31Thine ox shall be slain before thine eyes, and thou shalt not eat thereof; thine ass shall be violently taken away from before thy face and shall not be restored to thee; thy sheep shall be given unto thine enemies, and thou shalt have no one to rescuethem.
32Thy sons and thy daughters shall be given unto another people, and thine eyes shall look and fail with longing for them all the day long; and there shall be no strength in thine hand.
33The fruit of thy land and all thy labours shall a people which thou knowest not eat up; and thou shalt only be oppressed and crushed all the days.
34So that thou shalt be mad for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see.
35The Lord shall smite thee in the knees and in the legs with an evil boil that cannot be healed, from the sole of thy foot unto the top of thy head.
36The Lord shall bring thee and thy king which thou shalt set over thee unto a nation which neither thou nor thy fathers have known, and there shalt thou serve other gods, even wood and stone.
37And thou shalt become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword among all nations where the Lord shall carry thee away.
38Thou shalt carry much seed out into the field and shalt gather but little in, for the locust shall consume it.
39Thou shalt plant vineyards and dress them, but shalt neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes, for the worms shall eat them.
40Thou shalt have olive trees throughout all thy borders, but thou shalt not anoint thyself with the oil; for thine olive shall fall.
41Thou shalt beget sons and daughters, but thou shalt not enjoy them; for they shall go into captivity.
42All thy trees and fruit of thy land shall the locust consume.
43The stranger that is in the midst of thee shall get up above thee very high, and thou shalt come down very low.
44He shall lend to thee, and thou shalt not lend to him; he shall be the head, and thou shalt be the tail.
45¶ Moreover all these curses shall come upon thee and shall pursue thee and overtake thee until thou art destroyed because thou shalt not have attended unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep his commandments and his statutes which he commanded thee;
46and they shall be in thee for a sign and for a wonder, and in thy seed for ever.
47Because thou didst not serve the Lord thy God with joyfulness and with gladness of heart, for the abundance of all things;
48therefore, thou shalt serve thine enemies which the Lord shall send against thee, in hunger and in thirst and in nakedness and in lack of all things; and he shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck until he has destroyed thee.
49The Lord shall bring a nation against thee from afar, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flies, a nation whose tongue thou shalt not understand,
50a nation of fierce countenance, which shall not regard the person of the old nor show favour to the young;
51and he shall eat the fruit of thy beast and the fruit of thy land until thou art destroyed, which also shall not leave thee either grain, wine, or oil, or the increase of thy cows or flocks of thy sheep until he has destroyed thee.
52And he shall besiege thee in all thy gates until thy high and fenced walls come down, in which thou dost trust, throughout all thy land; and he shall besiege thee in all thy gates throughout all thy land, which the Lord thy God has given thee.
53And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters, which the Lord thy God has given thee, in the siege and in the straitness with which thine enemies shall distress thee.
54The man that is tender among you and very delicate, his eye shall be evil toward his brother and toward the wife of his bosom and toward the remnant of his children which he shall leave,
55so that he will not give to any of them of the flesh of his children whom he shall eat, because he shall have nothing left him in the siege and in the straitness with which thine enemies shall distress thee in all thy gates.
56The tender and delicate woman among you who would not venture to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil toward the husband of her bosom and toward her son and toward her daughter
57and toward her young one that comes out from between her feet and toward her children which she shall bear, for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly in the siege and straitness with which thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates,
58if thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law that are written in this book that thou may fear this glorious and fearful name; I AM thy God.
59Then the Lord will augment thy plagues wonderfully, and the plagues of thy seed, even great plagues and of long continuance, and evil sicknesses and of long continuance.
60Moreover, he will bring upon thee all the diseases of Egypt, which thou wast afraid of, and they shall cleave unto thee.
61Also every sickness and every plague, which is not written in the book of this law, the Lord will bring upon thee until thou art destroyed.
62And ye shall be left few in number, whereas ye were as the stars of heaven for multitude, because thou would not hear the voice of the Lord thy God.
63And 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 cause you to perish and to destroy you; and ye shall be plucked from off the land into which thou dost enter in to inherit it.
64And the Lord shall scatter thee among all the peoples from the one end of the earth even unto the other; and there thou shalt serve other gods, which neither thou nor thy fathers have known, even wood and stone.
65Neither shalt thou find rest among these Gentiles, neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest; but there the Lord shall give thee a trembling heart and failing of eyes and sorrow of soul;
66and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee; and thou shalt fear day and night and shalt have no assurance of thy life.
67In the morning thou shalt say, I wish it were evening, and in the evening thou shalt say, I wish it were morning! For the fear of thine heart with which thou shalt fear and for that which thine eyes shall see.
68And the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again in ships by the way of which I spoke unto thee, Thou shalt see it no more again; and there ye shall be sold unto your enemies for menslaves and womenslaves, and there shall be no one to buy you.
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Deuteronomy 28: JUB
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The Jubilee Bible 2000 (JUB) by Ransom Press International
Deuteronomy 28
28
The LORD will bless you if you obey
Moses said to Israel:
1-2Today I am giving you the laws and teachings of the LORD your God. Always obey them, and the LORD will make Israel the most famous and important nation on earth, and he will bless you in many ways.#Dt 11.13-17.
3The LORD will make your businesses and your farms successful.
4You will have many children. You will harvest large crops, and your herds of cattle and flocks of sheep and goats will produce many young.
5You will have plenty of bread#28.5 bread: The main food of the Israelites. to eat.
6The LORD will make you successful in your daily work.
7The LORD will help you defeat your enemies and make them scatter in all directions.
8The LORD your God is giving you the land, and he will make sure you are successful in everything you do. Your harvests will be so large that your storehouses will be full.
9If you follow and obey the LORD, he will make you his own special people, just as he promised. 10Then everyone on earth will know that you belong to the LORD, and they will be afraid of you.
11The LORD will give you a lot of children and make sure that your animals give birth to many young. The LORD promised your ancestors that this land would be yours, and he will make it produce large crops for you.
12The LORD will open the storehouses of the skies where he keeps the rain, and he will send rain on your land at just the right times. He will make you successful in everything you do. You will have plenty of money to lend to other nations, but you won't need to borrow any yourself.
13Obey the laws and teachings that I'm giving you today, and the LORD your God will make Israel a leader among the nations, and not a follower. Israel will be wealthy and powerful, not poor and weak. 14But you must not reject any of his laws and teachings or worship other gods.
The LORD will put curses on you if you disobey
(Leviticus 26.14-46)
Moses said:
15Israel, today I am giving you the laws and teachings of the LORD your God. And if you don't obey them all, he will put many curses on you.
16Your businesses and farms will fail.
17You won't have enough bread#28.17 bread: The main food of the Israelites. to eat.
18You'll have only a few children, your crops will be small, and your herds of cattle and flocks of sheep and goats won't produce many young.
19The LORD will make you fail in everything you do.
20No matter what you try to accomplish, the LORD will confuse you, and you will feel his anger. You won't last long, and you may even meet with disaster, all because you rejected the LORD.
21-23The LORD will send terrible diseases to attack you, and you will never be well again. You will suffer with burning fever and swelling and pain until you die somewhere in the land that you captured.
The LORD will make the sky overhead seem like a bronze roof that keeps out the rain, and the ground under your feet will become as hard as iron. Your crops will be scorched by the hot east wind or ruined by mildew. 24He will send dust and sandstorms instead of rain, and you will be wiped out.
25The LORD will let you be defeated by your enemies, and you will scatter in all directions. You will be a horrible sight for the other nations to see, 26and no one will disturb the birds and wild animals while they eat your dead bodies.
27The LORD will make you suffer with diseases that will cause oozing sores or crusty itchy patches on your skin or boils like the ones that are common in Egypt. And there will be no cure for you! 28You will become insane and go blind. The LORD will make you so confused, 29that even in bright sunshine you will have to feel your way around like a blind person, who cannot tell day from night. For the rest of your life, people will beat and rob you, and no one will be able to stop them.
30A man will be engaged to a woman, but before they can get married, she will be raped by enemy soldiers. Some of you will build houses, but never get to live in them. If you plant a vineyard, you won't be around long enough to enjoy the first harvest. 31Your cattle will be killed while you watch, but you won't get to eat any of the meat. Your donkeys and sheep will be stolen from you, and no one will be around to force your enemies to give them back. 32Your sons and daughters will be dragged off to a foreign country, while you stand there helpless. And even if you watch for them until you go blind, you will never see them again.
33You will work hard on your farms, but everything you harvest will be eaten by foreigners, who will ill-treat you and abuse you for the rest of your life.
34What you see will be so horrible that you will go insane, 35and the LORD will punish you from head to toe with boils that never heal.
36The LORD will let you and your king be taken captive to a country that you and your ancestors have never even heard of, and there you will have to worship idols#28.36 have to worship idols: It was sometimes thought that only the gods of a country could be worshipped within the borders of that country. made of wood and stone. 37People of nearby countries will shudder when they see your terrible troubles, but they will still make fun of you.
38You will plant a lot of seed, but gather a small harvest, because locusts#28.38 locusts: A type of grasshopper that comes in swarms and causes great damage to plant life. will eat your crops. 39You will plant vineyards and work hard at taking care of them, but you won't gather any grapes, much less get any wine, and the vines themselves will be eaten by worms. 40Even if your olive trees grow everywhere in your country, the olives will fall off before they are ready, and there won't be enough olive oil for combing your hair.#28.40 olive oil…hair: Olive oil was used for combing the hair.
41Even your infant sons and daughters will be taken as prisoners of war.
42Locusts#28.42 Locusts: See the note at 28.38. will eat your crops and strip your trees of leaves and fruit.
43Foreigners in your towns will become wealthy and powerful, while you become poor and powerless. 44You will be so short of money that you will have to borrow from those foreigners. They will be the leaders in the community, and you will be the followers.
More curses for disobedience
Moses said:
45Israel, if you don't obey the laws and teachings that the LORD your God is giving you, he will send these curses to chase, attack, and destroy you. 46Then everyone will look at you and your descendants and realize that the LORD has placed you under a curse.
47If the LORD makes you wealthy, but you don't joyfully worship and honour him, 48he will send enemies to attack you and make you their slaves. Then you will live in poverty with nothing to eat, drink, or wear, and your owners will work you to death.
49Foreigners who speak a strange language will be sent to attack you without warning, just like an eagle swooping down. 50They won't show any mercy, and they will have no respect for old people or pity for children. 51They will take your cattle, sheep, goats, grain, wine, and olive oil, then leave you to starve.
52All over the land that the LORD your God gave you, the enemy army will surround your towns. You may feel safe inside your town walls, but the enemy will tear them down, 53while you wait in horror. Finally, you will get so hungry that you will eat the sons and daughters that the LORD gave you. 54-55Because of hunger, a man who had been gentle and kind will eat his own children and refuse to share the meal with his brother or wife or with his other children. 56-57A woman may have grown up in such luxury that she never had to put a foot on the ground. But times will be so bad that she will secretly eat both her newborn baby and the afterbirth, without sharing any with her husband or her other children.#2 K 6.28,29; Lm 4.10.
Disobedience brings destruction
Moses said to Israel:
58You must obey everything in The Book of God's Law. Because if you don't respect the LORD, 59he will punish you and your descendants with incurable diseases, 60like those you were so afraid of in Egypt. 61Remember! If the LORD decides to destroy your nation, he can use any disease or disaster, not just the ones written in The Book of God's Law.
62There are as many of you now as the stars in the sky, but if you disobey the LORD your God, only a few of you will be left. 63The LORD is happy to make you successful and to help your nation grow while you conquer the land. But if you disobey him, he will be just as happy to pull you up by your roots.
64Those of you who survive will be scattered to every nation on earth, and you will have to worship stone and wood idols#28.64 have to worship…idols: See the note at 28.36. that never helped you or your ancestors. 65You will be restless—always longing for home, but never able to return. 66You will live in constant fear of death. 67Each morning you will wake up to such terrible sights that you will say, “I wish it were night!” But at night you will be terrified and say, “I wish it were day!”
68I told you never to go back to Egypt. But now the LORD himself will load you on ships and send you back. Then you will even try to sell yourselves as slaves, but no one will be interested.
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© British and Foreign Bible Society 2012