Leviticus 26
26
Covenant Blessings and Discipline
1“Do not make worthless idols for yourselves,#Ex 20:3–4; Ps 81:9 set up a carved image or sacred pillar for yourselves, or place a sculpted stone in your land to bow down to it, for I am the Lord your God. 2Keep my Sabbaths and revere my sanctuary;#Ex 15:17; Lv 19:30; Ezk 20:13,16,21; 23:38 I am the Lord.
3“If you follow my statutes and faithfully observe my commands, 4I will give you rain at the right time, and the land will yield its produce, and the trees of the field will bear their fruit. 5Your threshing will continue until grape harvest, and the grape harvest will continue until sowing time; you will have plenty of food to eat and live securely in your land.#Lv 25:18–19; Dt 28:1–2,12; Is 30:21–23; Am 9:13 6I will give peace to the land, and you will lie down with nothing to frighten you. I will remove dangerous animals from the land, and no sword will pass through your land.#Jr 30:10; Ezk 34:25,28; Mc 4:4 7You will pursue your enemies, and they will fall before you by the sword. 8Five of you will pursue a hundred, and a hundred of you will pursue ten thousand; your enemies will fall before you by the sword.#Dt 3:22; 32:30; Jos 10:19; 23:3,10
9“I will turn to you, make you fruitful and multiply you, and confirm my covenant with you. 10You will eat the old grain of the previous year and will clear out the old to make room for the new. 11I will place my residence#26:11 Or tabernacle among you, and I will not reject you.#Ex 25:8; 29:45–46; Lv 26:44; 1Kg 6:13 12I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be my people.#Jr 7:23; Lk 1:68; 2Co 6:16; Rv 21:3 13I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, so that you would no longer be their slaves. I broke the bars of your yoke#Ex 6:6–7; Is 9:4; Jr 5:5; 28:10–11 and enabled you to live in freedom.#26:13 Lit to walk uprightly
14“But if you do not obey me and observe all these commands — 15if you reject my statutes and despise my ordinances, and do not observe all my commands — and break my covenant, 16then I will do this to you: I will bring terror#Ps 78:33; Is 65:23; Jr 15:8 on you — wasting disease and fever that will cause your eyes to fail and your life to ebb away. You will sow your seed in vain because your enemies will eat it. 17I will turn#26:17 Lit will set my face against you, so that you will be defeated by your enemies. Those who hate you will rule over you, and you will flee even though no one is pursuing you.#Ex 12:23; Dt 28:25
18“But if after these things you will not obey me, I will proceed to discipline you seven times for your sins.#Gn 4:15,24; Heb 12:4–11 19I will break down your strong pride. I will make your sky like iron and your land like bronze, 20and your strength will be used up for nothing.#Dt 28:23; Am 4:7–8 Your land will not yield its produce, and the trees of the land will not bear their fruit.
21“If you act with hostility toward me and are unwilling to obey me, I will multiply your plagues seven times for your sins.#Gn 4:15,24 22I will send wild animals against you that will deprive you of your children, ravage your livestock, and reduce your numbers until your roads are deserted.#Dt 32:24; Jdg 5:6; Is 33:8; Lm 1:1–4; Ezk 14:15; Zch 7:14
23“If in spite of these things you do not accept my discipline, but act with hostility toward me, 24then I will act with hostility toward you; I also will strike you seven times for your sins. 25I will bring a sword against you#Ezk 14:21 to execute the vengeance of the covenant. Though you withdraw into your cities, I will send a pestilence among you, and you will be delivered into enemy hands. 26When I cut off your supply of bread, ten women will bake your bread in a single oven and ration out your bread by weight, so that you will eat but not be satisfied.#Is 3:1; Ezk 4:16; 14:13; Am 4:6; Mc 6:14
27“And if in spite of this you do not obey me but act with hostility toward me, 28I will act with furious hostility toward you; I will also discipline you seven times for your sins. 29You will eat the flesh of your sons; you will eat the flesh of your daughters.#Dt 28:53–57; 2Kg 6:28–29; Jr 19:9; Lm 4:10; Mc 3:2–3 30I will destroy your high places, cut down your shrines,#26:30 Or incense altars and heap your lifeless bodies on the lifeless bodies of your idols;#Gn 31:19; Ezk 6:3–6 I will reject you. 31I will reduce your cities to ruins and devastate your sanctuaries. I will not smell the pleasing aroma of your sacrifices.#Gn 8:21; 1Sm 26:19; Am 5:21–22 32I also will devastate the land, so that your enemies who come to live there will be appalled by it. 33But I will scatter you among the nations, and I will draw a sword to chase after you. So your land will become desolate, and your cities will become ruins.
34“Then the land will make up for its Sabbath years during the time it lies desolate, while you are in the land of your enemies. At that time the land will rest and make up for its Sabbaths. 35As long as it lies desolate, it will have the rest it did not have during your Sabbaths when you lived there.
36“I will put anxiety in the hearts of those of you who survive in the lands of their enemies. The sound of a wind-driven leaf will put them to flight, and they will flee as one flees from a sword, and fall though no one is pursuing them. 37They will stumble over one another as if fleeing from a sword though no one is pursuing them. You will not be able to stand against your enemies. 38You will perish among the nations; the land of your enemies will devour you. 39Those#26:39 Lit Those of you who survive in the lands of your enemies will waste away because of their iniquity; they will also waste away because of their ancestors’ iniquities along with theirs.
40“But when they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their ancestors — their unfaithfulness that they practiced against me, and how they acted with hostility toward me, 41and I acted with hostility toward them and brought them into the land of their enemies — and when their uncircumcised hearts are humbled#Dt 30:6; Jr 4:4; 9:25; Ezk 44:7,9 and they make amends for their iniquity, 42then I will remember my covenant with Jacob. I will also remember my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham, and I will remember the land. 43For the land abandoned by them will make up for its Sabbaths by lying desolate without the people, while they make amends for their iniquity, because they rejected my ordinances and abhorred my statutes. 44Yet in spite of this, while they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject or abhor them so as to destroy them and break my covenant with them, since I am the Lord their God.#Gn 17:8; Ezk 36:22; Hs 11:8–9; Zch 10:9 45For their sake I will remember the covenant with their ancestors, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations to be their God; I am the Lord.”
46These are the statutes, ordinances, and laws the Lord established between himself and the Israelites through Moses on Mount Sinai.
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Leviticus 26: CSB
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© 2017 Holman Bible Publishers
Leviticus 26
26
Rewards for Obeying God
1“Don’t make idols for yourselves. Don’t set up statues or memorial stones in your land to bow down to, because I am the Lord your God!
2“Remember my special days of rest#26:2 special days of rest Or “Sabbaths.” This might mean Saturday, or it might mean all the special days when the people were not supposed to work. and honor my holy place. I am the Lord.
3“Remember my laws and commands, and obey them. 4If you do these things, I will give you rains at the time they should come. The land will grow crops and the trees of the field will grow their fruit. 5Your threshing will continue until it is time to gather grapes. And your grape gathering will continue until it is time to plant. Then you will have plenty to eat. And you will live safely in your land. 6I will give peace to your country. You will lie down in peace. No one will come to make you afraid. I will keep harmful animals out of your country. And armies will not come through your country.
7“You will chase your enemies and defeat them. You will kill them with your swords. 8Five of you will chase 100 men, and 100 of you will chase 10,000 men. You will defeat your enemies and kill them with your sword.
9“Then I will turn to you. I will let you have many children. I will keep my agreement with you. 10You will have enough crops to last for more than a year. You will harvest the new crops. But then you will have to throw out the old crops to make room for the new crops. 11Also, I will place my Holy Tent among you. I will not turn away from you. 12I will walk with you and be your God. And you will be my people. 13I am the Lord your God. You were slaves in Egypt, but I brought you out of Egypt. You were bent low from the heavy weights you carried as slaves, but I broke the poles that were on your shoulders. I let you walk proudly again.
Punishment for Not Obeying God
14“But if you don’t obey me and all my commands, bad things will happen to you. 15If you refuse to obey my laws and commands, you have broken my agreement. 16If you do that, I will cause terrible things to happen to you. I will cause you to have disease and fever. They will destroy your eyes and take away your life. You will not have success when you plant your seed. And your enemies will eat your crops. 17I will be against you, so your enemies will defeat you. These enemies will hate you and rule over you. You will run away even when no one is chasing you.
18“After these things, if you still don’t obey me, I will punish you seven times more for your sins. 19And I will also destroy the great cities that make you proud. The skies will not give rain, and the earth will not produce crops.#26:19 The skies … crops Literally, “Your skies will be like iron, your land like bronze.” 20You will work hard, but it will not help. Your land will not give any crops, and your trees will not grow their fruit.
21“If you still turn against me and refuse to obey me, I will beat you seven times harder! The more you sin, the more you will be punished. 22I will send wild animals against you. They will take your children away from you. They will destroy your animals. They will kill many of your people. The roads will all be empty.
23“If you don’t learn your lesson after all this, and if you still turn against me, 24then I will also turn against you. I—yes, I myself—will punish you seven times for your sins. 25You will have broken my agreement, so I will punish you. I will bring armies against you. You will go into your cities for safety, but I will cause diseases to spread among you. And your enemies will defeat you. 26I will give you a share of the grain left in that city. But there will be very little food to eat. Ten women will be able to cook all their bread in one oven. They will measure each piece of bread. You will eat, but you will still be hungry.
27“If you still refuse to listen to me, and if you still turn against me, 28then I will really show my anger! I—yes, I myself—will punish you seven times for your sins. 29You will become so hungry that you will eat the bodies of your sons and daughters. 30I will destroy your high places. I will cut down your incense altars. I will put your dead bodies on the dead bodies of your idols. You will be disgusting to me. 31I will destroy your cities. I will make your holy places empty. I will stop smelling your offerings. 32I will make your land empty. And your enemies who come to live there will be shocked at it. 33I will scatter you among the nations. I will pull out my sword and destroy you. Your land will become empty, and your cities will be destroyed.
34“You will be taken to your enemy’s country. Your country will be empty. So your land will finally get its rest. The land will enjoy its time of rest. 35During the time that the land is empty, it will get the time of rest that you did not give it while you lived there. 36The survivors will lose their courage in the land of their enemies. They will be afraid of everything. They will run around like a leaf blown by the wind. They will run as if someone is chasing them with a sword. They will fall even when no one is chasing them. 37They will run as if someone is chasing them with a sword. They will fall over each other—even when no one is chasing them.
“You will not be strong enough to stand up against your enemies. 38You will be lost in other nations. You will disappear in the land of your enemies. 39So the survivors will rot away in their sin in their enemies’ countries. They will rot away in their sins just as their ancestors did.
There Is Always Hope
40“But maybe the people will confess their sins. And maybe they will confess the sins of their ancestors. Maybe they will admit that they turned against me. Maybe they will admit that they sinned against me. 41Maybe they will admit that I turned against them and brought them into the land of their enemies. These people will be like strangers to me. But maybe they will become humble#26:41 These people … humble Literally, “If they humble their uncircumcised heart.” and accept the punishment for their sin. 42If they do, I will remember my agreement with Jacob. I will remember my agreement with Isaac. I will remember my agreement with Abraham, and I will remember the land.
43“The land will be empty. The land will enjoy its time of rest. Then the survivors will accept the punishment for their sins. They will learn that they were punished because they hated my laws and refused to obey my rules. 44They have sinned. But if they come to me for help, I will not turn away from them. I will listen to them, even if they are in the land of their enemies. I will not completely destroy them. I will not break my agreement with them, because I am the Lord their God. 45For them, I will remember the agreement with their ancestors. I brought their ancestors out of the land of Egypt so that I could become their God. The other nations saw these things. I am the Lord.”
46These are the laws, rules, and teachings that the Lord gave to the Israelites. These laws are the agreement between the Lord and the Israelites. The Lord gave these laws to Moses at Mount Sinai.
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