Exodus 20:5
New English Translation
5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them,[a] for I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous[b] God, responding to[c] the transgression of fathers by dealing with children to the third and fourth generations[d] of those who reject me,[e]
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- Exodus 20:5 tn The combination of these two verbs customarily refers to the worship of pagan deities (e.g., Deut 17:3: 30:17; Jer 8:2; see J. J. Stamm and M. E. Andrew, The Ten Commandments in Recent Research [SBT], 86). The first verb is לאֹ־תִשְׁתַּחֲוֶה (loʾ tishtakhaveh), now to be classified as a Hishtaphel imperfect from חָוָה (khavah; BDB 1005 s.v. שׁחה), “to make oneself to be low to the ground.” It is used of the true worship of God as well. The second verb is וְלֹא תָעָבְדֵם (veloʾ toʿovdem). The two could be taken as a hendiadys: “you will not prostrate yourself to serve them.” In an interesting side comment U. Cassuto (Exodus, 242) suggests that the second verb was spelled with the qamets khatuf vowel to show contempt for pagan worship, as if their conduct does not even warrant a correct spelling of the word “serve.” Gesenius says that forms like this are anomalous, but he wonders if it was pointed as a Hophal with the meaning “you shall not allow yourself to be brought to worship them” (GKC 161 §60.b).
- Exodus 20:5 sn The word “jealous” is the same word often translated “zeal” or “zealous.” The word describes a passionate intensity to protect or defend something that is jeopardized. The word can also have the sense of “envy,” but in that case the object is out of bounds. God’s zeal or jealousy is to protect his people or his institutions or his honor. Yahweh’s honor is bound up with the life of his people.
- Exodus 20:5 tn Verses 5 and 6 are very concise, and the word פָּקַד (paqad) is difficult to translate. Often rendered “visiting,” it might here be rendered “dealing with” in a negative sense or “punishing,” but it describes positive attention in 13:19. When used of God, it essentially means that God intervenes in the lives of people for blessing or for cursing. Some would simply translate the participle here as “punishing” the children for the sins of the fathers (cf. Lev 18:25; Isa 26:21; Jer 29:32; 36:31; Hos 1:4; Amos 3:2). That is workable, but may not say enough. The verse may indicate that those who hate Yahweh and do not keep his commandments will repeat the sins their fathers committed and suffer for them. Deut 24:16 says that individuals will die for their own sins and not their father’s sins (see also Deut 7:10 and Ezek 18). It may have more to do with patterns of sin being repeated from generation to generation; if the sin and the guilt were not fully developed in the one generation, then left unchecked they would develop and continue in the next. But it may also indicate that the effects of the sins of the fathers will be experienced in the following generations, especially in the case of Israel as a national entity (U. Cassuto, Exodus, 243). God is showing here that his ethical character is displayed in how he deals with sin and righteousness, all of which he describes as giving strong motivation for loyalty to him and for avoiding idolatry. There is a justice at work in the dealings of God that is not present in the pagan world.
- Exodus 20:5 tn The Hebrew word for “generations” is not found in v. 5 or 6. The numbers are short for a longer expression, which is understood as part of the description of the children already mentioned (see Deut 7:9, where “generation” [דּוֹר, dor] is present and more necessary, since “children” have not been mentioned).
- Exodus 20:5 tn This is an important qualification to the principle. The word rendered “reject” is often translated “hate” and carries with it the idea of defiantly rejecting and opposing God and his word. Such people are doomed to carry on the sins of their ancestors and bear guilt with them.
Deuteronomy 5:9
New English Translation
9 You must not worship or serve them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God. I punish[a] the sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons for the sin of the fathers who reject[b] me,[c]
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- Deuteronomy 5:9 tn In the Hebrew text the form is a participle, which is subordinated to what precedes. For the sake of English style, the translation divides this lengthy verse into two sentences.
- Deuteronomy 5:9 tn Heb “who hate” (so NAB, NIV, NLT). Just as “to love” (אָהֵב, ʾahev) means in a covenant context “to choose, obey,” so “to hate” (שָׂנֵא, saneʾ) means “to reject, disobey” (cf. the note on the word “loved” in Deut 4:37; see also 5:10).
- Deuteronomy 5:9 tn Heb “visiting the sin of fathers upon sons and upon a third (generation) and upon a fourth (generation) of those who hate me.” God sometimes punishes children for the sins of a father (cf. Num 16:27, 32; Josh 7:24-25; 2 Sam 21:1-9). On the principle of corporate solidarity and responsibility in OT thought see J. Kaminsky, Corporate Responsibility in the Hebrew Bible (JSOTSup). In the idiom of the text, the father is the first generation and the “sons” the second generation, making grandsons the third and great-grandsons the fourth. The reference to a third and fourth generation is a way of emphasizing that the sinner’s punishment would last throughout his lifetime. In this culture, where men married and fathered children at a relatively young age, it would not be unusual for one to see his great-grandsons. In an Aramaic tomb inscription from Nerab dating to the seventh century b.c., Agbar observes that he was surrounded by “children of the fourth generation” as he lay on his death bed (see ANET 661). The language of the text differs from Exod 34:7, the sons are the first generation, the grandsons (literally, “sons of the sons”) the second, great-grandsons the third, and great-great-grandsons the fourth. One could argue that formulation in Deut 5:9 (see also Exod 20:5) is elliptical/abbreviated or that the text suffers from an accidental scribal omission (the repetition of the words “sons” would invite accidental omission).
Leviticus 26:14-39
New English Translation
The Consequences of Disobedience
14 “‘If, however,[a] you do not obey me and keep[b] all these commandments— 15 if you reject my statutes and abhor my regulations so that you do not keep[c] all my commandments and you break my covenant— 16 I for my part[d] will do this to you: I will inflict horror on you, consumption and fever, which diminish eyesight and drain away the vitality of life.[e] You will sow your seed in vain because[f] your enemies will eat it.[g] 17 I will set my face against you. You will be struck down before your enemies, those who hate you will rule over you, and you will flee when there is no one pursuing you.
18 “‘If, in spite of all these things,[h] you do not obey me, I will discipline you seven times more on account of your sins.[i] 19 I will break your strong pride and make your sky like iron and your land like bronze. 20 Your strength will be used up in vain, your land will not give its yield, and the trees of the land[j] will not produce their fruit.
21 “‘If you walk in hostility against me[k] and are not willing to obey me, I will increase your affliction[l] seven times according to your sins. 22 I will send the wild animals[m] against you and they will bereave you of your children,[n] annihilate your cattle, and diminish your population[o] so that your roads will become deserted.
23 “‘If in spite of these things[p] you do not allow yourselves to be disciplined and you walk in hostility against me,[q] 24 then I myself will also walk in hostility against you and strike you[r] seven times on account of your sins. 25 I will bring on you an avenging sword, a covenant vengeance.[s] Although[t] you will gather together into your cities, I will send pestilence among you and you will be given into enemy hands.[u] 26 When I break off your supply of bread,[v] ten women will bake your bread in one oven; they will ration your bread by weight,[w] and you will eat and not be satisfied.
27 “‘If in spite of this[x] you do not obey me but walk in hostility against me,[y] 28 I will walk in hostile rage against you[z] and I myself will also discipline you seven times on account of your sins. 29 You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters.[aa] 30 I will destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars,[ab] and I will stack your dead bodies on top of the lifeless bodies of your idols.[ac] I will abhor you.[ad] 31 I will lay your cities waste[ae] and make your sanctuaries desolate, and I will refuse to smell your soothing aromas. 32 I myself will make the land desolate and your enemies who live in it will be appalled. 33 I will scatter you among the nations and unsheathe the sword[af] after you, so your land will become desolate and your cities will become a waste.
34 “‘Then the land will make up for[ag] its Sabbaths all the days it lies desolate while you are in the land of your enemies; then the land will rest and make up its Sabbaths. 35 All the days of the desolation it will have the rest it did not have[ah] on your Sabbaths when you lived on it.
36 “‘As for[ai] the ones who remain among you, I will bring despair into their hearts in the lands of their enemies. The sound of a blowing leaf will pursue them, and they will flee as one who flees the sword and will fall down even though there is no pursuer. 37 They will stumble over each other as those who flee before a sword, though[aj] there is no pursuer, and there will be no one to take a stand[ak] for you before your enemies. 38 You will perish among the nations; the land of your enemies will consume you.
Restoration through Confession and Repentance
39 “‘As for the ones who remain among you, they will rot away because of[al] their iniquity in the lands of your enemies, and they will also rot away because of their ancestors’[am] iniquities which are with them.
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- Leviticus 26:14 tn Heb “And if.”
- Leviticus 26:14 tn Heb “and do not do.”
- Leviticus 26:15 tn Heb “to not do.”
- Leviticus 26:16 tn Or “I also” (see HALOT 76 s.v. אַף 6.b).
- Leviticus 26:16 tn Heb “soul.” These expressions may refer either to the physical effects of consumption and fever as the rendering in the text suggests (e.g., J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 452, 454, “diminishing eyesight and loss of appetite”), or perhaps the more psychological effects, “which exhausts the eyes” because of anxious hope “and causes depression” (Heb “causes soul [נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh] to pine away”), e.g., B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 185.
- Leviticus 26:16 tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) can be considered to have causal force here.
- Leviticus 26:16 tn That is, “your enemies will eat” the produce that grows from the sown seed.
- Leviticus 26:18 tn Heb “And if until these.”
- Leviticus 26:18 tn Heb “I will add to discipline you seven [times] on your sins.”
- Leviticus 26:20 tn Heb “the tree of the land will not give its fruit.” The collective singular has been translated as a plural. One Hebrew ms from Cairo Geniza, other medieval Hebrew mss, Smr, LXX, and Tg. Ps.-J. have “the field” as in v. 4, rather than “the land.”
- Leviticus 26:21 tn Heb “hostile with me,” but see the added preposition ב (bet) on the phrase “in hostility” in v. 24 and 27.
- Leviticus 26:21 tn Heb “your blow, stroke”; cf. TEV “punishment”; NLT “I will inflict you with seven more disasters.”
- Leviticus 26:22 tn Heb “the animal of the field.” This collective singular has been translated as a plural. The expression “animal of the field” refers to a wild (i.e., nondomesticated) animal.
- Leviticus 26:22 tn The words “of your children” are not in the Hebrew text, but are implied.
- Leviticus 26:22 tn Heb “and diminish you.”
- Leviticus 26:23 tn Heb “And if in these.”
- Leviticus 26:23 tn Heb “with me,” but see the added preposition ב (bet) on the phrase “in hostility” in vv. 24 and 27.
- Leviticus 26:24 tn Heb “and I myself will also strike you.”
- Leviticus 26:25 tn Heb “vengeance of covenant”; cf. NAB “the avenger of my covenant.”
- Leviticus 26:25 tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) has a concessive force in this context.
- Leviticus 26:25 tn Heb “in hand of enemy,” but Tg. Ps.-J. and Tg. Neof. have “in the hands of your enemies” (J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 454).
- Leviticus 26:26 tn Heb “When I break to you staff of bread” (KJV, ASV, and NASB all similar).
- Leviticus 26:26 tn Heb “they will return your bread in weight.”
- Leviticus 26:27 tn Heb “And if in this.”
- Leviticus 26:27 tn Heb “with me.”
- Leviticus 26:28 tn Heb “in rage of hostility with you”; NASB “with wrathful hostility”; NRSV “I will continue hostile to you in fury”; CEV “I’ll get really furious.”
- Leviticus 26:29 tn Heb “and the flesh of your daughters you will eat.” The phrase “you will eat” has not been repeated in the translation for stylistic reasons.
- Leviticus 26:30 sn Regarding these cultic installations, see the remarks in B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 188, and R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:903. The term rendered “incense altars” might better be rendered “sanctuaries [of foreign deities]” or “stelae.”
- Leviticus 26:30 tn The translation reflects the Hebrew wordplay “your corpses…the corpses of your idols.” Since idols, being lifeless, do not really have “corpses,” the translation uses “dead bodies” for people and “lifeless bodies” for the idols.
- Leviticus 26:30 tn Heb “and my soul will abhor you.”
- Leviticus 26:31 tn Heb “And I will give your cities a waste”; NLT “make your cities desolate.”
- Leviticus 26:33 tn Heb “and I will empty sword” (see HALOT 1228 s.v. ריק 3).
- Leviticus 26:34 tn There are two Hebrew roots רָצָה (ratsah), one meaning “to be pleased with; to take pleasure” (HALOT 1280-81 s.v. רצה; cf. “enjoy” in NASB, NIV, NRSV, and J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 452), and the other meaning “to restore” (HALOT 1281-82 s.v. II רצה; cf. NAB “retrieve” and B. A. Levine, Leviticus [JPSTC], 189).
- Leviticus 26:35 tn Heb “it shall rest which it did not rest.”
- Leviticus 26:36 tn Heb “And.”
- Leviticus 26:37 tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) is used in a concessive sense here.
- Leviticus 26:37 tn The term rendered “to stand up” is a noun, not an infinitive. It occurs only here and appears to designate someone who would take a powerful stand for them against their enemies.
- Leviticus 26:39 tn Heb “in” (so KJV, ASV; also later in this verse).
- Leviticus 26:39 tn Heb “fathers’” (also in the following verse).
Deuteronomy 28:15-68
New English Translation
Curses as Reversal of Blessings
15 “But if you ignore[a] the Lord your God and are not careful to keep all his commandments and statutes I am giving you today, then all these curses will come upon you in full force:[b] 16 You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the field. 17 Your basket and your mixing bowl will be cursed. 18 Your children[c] will be cursed, as well as the produce of your soil, the calves of your herds, and the lambs of your flocks. 19 You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.[d]
Curses by Disease and Drought
20 “The Lord will send on you a curse, confusing you and opposing you[e] in everything you undertake[f] until you are destroyed and quickly perish because of the evil of your deeds, in that you have forsaken me.[g] 21 The Lord will plague you with deadly diseases[h] until he has completely removed you from the land you are about to possess. 22 He[i] will afflict you with weakness,[j] fever, inflammation, infection,[k] sword,[l] blight, and mildew; these will attack you until you perish. 23 The[m] sky[n] above your heads will be bronze and the earth beneath you iron. 24 The Lord will make the rain of your land powder and dust; it will come down on you from the sky until you are destroyed.
Curses by Defeat and Deportation
25 “The Lord will allow you to be struck down before your enemies; you will attack them from one direction but flee from them in seven directions and will become an object of terror[o] to all the kingdoms of the earth. 26 Your carcasses will be food for every bird of the sky and wild animal of the earth, and there will be no one to chase them off. 27 The Lord will afflict you with the boils of Egypt and with tumors, eczema, and scabies, all of which cannot be healed. 28 The Lord will also subject you to madness, blindness, and confusion of mind.[p] 29 You will feel your way along at noon like the blind person does in darkness and you will not succeed in anything you do;[q] you will be constantly oppressed and continually robbed, with no one to save you. 30 You will be engaged to a woman, and another man will rape[r] her. You will build a house but not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but not even begin to use it. 31 Your ox will be slaughtered before your very eyes, but you will not eat of it. Your donkey will be stolen from you as you watch and will not be returned to you. Your flock of sheep will be given to your enemies, and there will be no one to save you. 32 Your sons and daughters will be given to another people while you look on in vain all day, and you will be powerless to do anything about it.[s] 33 As for the produce of your land and all your labor, a people you do not know will consume it, and you will be nothing but oppressed and crushed for the rest of your lives. 34 You will go insane from seeing all this. 35 The Lord will afflict you in your knees and on your legs with painful, incurable boils—from the soles of your feet to the top of your head. 36 The Lord will force you and your king[t] whom you will appoint over you to go away to a people whom you and your ancestors have not known, and you will serve other gods of wood and stone there. 37 You will become an occasion of horror, a proverb, and an object of ridicule to all the peoples to whom the Lord will drive you.
The Curse of Reversed Status
38 “You will take much seed to the field but gather little harvest, because locusts will consume it. 39 You will plant vineyards and cultivate them, but you will not drink wine or gather in grapes, because worms will eat them. 40 You will have olive trees throughout your territory, but you will not anoint yourself with olive oil, because the olives will drop off the trees while still unripe.[u] 41 You will bear sons and daughters but not keep them, because they will be taken into captivity. 42 Whirring locusts[v] will take over every tree and all the produce of your soil. 43 The resident foreigners[w] who reside among you will become higher and higher over you, and you will become lower and lower. 44 They will lend to you, but you will not lend to them; they will become the head, and you will become the tail!
45 “All these curses will fall on you, pursuing and overtaking you until you are destroyed, because you would not obey the Lord your God by keeping his commandments and statutes that he has given[x] you. 46 These curses[y] will be a perpetual sign and wonder with reference to you and your descendants.[z]
The Curse of Military Siege
47 “Because you have not served the Lord your God joyfully and wholeheartedly with the abundance of everything you have, 48 instead in hunger, thirst, nakedness, and poverty[aa] you will serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you. They[ab] will place an iron yoke on your neck until they have destroyed you. 49 The Lord will raise up a distant nation against you, one from the other side of the earth[ac] as the eagle flies,[ad] a nation whose language you will not understand, 50 a nation of stern appearance that will have no regard for the elderly or pity for the young. 51 They[ae] will devour the offspring of your livestock and the produce of your soil until you are destroyed. They will not leave you with any grain, new wine, olive oil, calves of your herds,[af] or lambs of your flocks[ag] until they have destroyed you. 52 They will besiege all of your villages[ah] until all of your high and fortified walls collapse—those in which you put your confidence throughout the land. They will besiege all your villages throughout the land the Lord your God has given you. 53 You will then eat your own offspring,[ai] the flesh of the sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you, because of the severity of the siege[aj] by which your enemies will constrict you. 54 The man among you who is by nature tender and sensitive will turn against his brother, his beloved wife, and his remaining children. 55 He will withhold from all of them his children’s flesh that he is eating (since there is nothing else left), because of the severity of the siege by which your enemy will constrict[ak] you in your villages. 56 Likewise, the most[al] tender and delicate of your women, who would never think of putting even the sole of her foot on the ground because of her daintiness,[am] will turn against her beloved husband, her sons and daughters, 57 and will secretly eat her afterbirth[an] and her newborn children[ao] (since she has nothing else),[ap] because of the severity of the siege by which your enemy will constrict you in your villages.
The Curse of Covenant Termination
58 “If you refuse to obey[aq] all the words of this law, the things written in this scroll, and refuse to fear this glorious and awesome name, the Lord your God, 59 then the Lord will increase your punishments and those of your descendants—great and long-lasting afflictions and severe, enduring illnesses. 60 He will infect you with all the diseases of Egypt[ar] that you dreaded, and they will persistently afflict you.[as] 61 Moreover, the Lord will bring upon you every kind of sickness and plague not mentioned in this scroll of commandments,[at] until you have perished. 62 There will be very few of you left, though at one time you were as numerous as the stars in the sky,[au] because you will have disobeyed[av] the Lord your God. 63 This is what will happen: Just as the Lord delighted to do good for you and make you numerous, so he[aw] will also take delight in destroying and decimating you. You will be uprooted from the land you are about to possess. 64 The Lord will scatter you among all nations, from one end of the earth to the other. There you will worship other gods that neither you nor your ancestors have known, gods of wood and stone. 65 Among those nations you will have no rest, nor will there be a place of peaceful rest for the soles of your feet, for there the Lord will give you an anxious heart, failing eyesight, and a spirit of despair. 66 Your life will hang in doubt before you; you will be terrified by night and day and will have no certainty of surviving from one day to the next.[ax] 67 In the morning you will say, ‘If only it were evening!’ And in the evening you will say, ‘I wish it were morning!’ because of the things you will fear and the things you will see. 68 Then the Lord will make you return to Egypt by ship, over a route I said to you that you would never see again. There you will sell yourselves to your enemies as male and female slaves, but no one will buy you.”
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- Deuteronomy 28:15 tn Heb “do not hear the voice of.”
- Deuteronomy 28:15 tn Heb “and overtake you” (so NIV, NRSV); NAB, NLT “and overwhelm you.”
- Deuteronomy 28:18 tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).
- Deuteronomy 28:19 sn See note on the similar expression in v. 6.
- Deuteronomy 28:20 tn Heb “the curse, the confusion, and the rebuke” (NASB and NIV similar); NRSV “disaster, panic, and frustration.”
- Deuteronomy 28:20 tn Heb “in all the stretching out of your hand.”
- Deuteronomy 28:20 tc For the MT first person common singular suffix (“me”), the LXX reads either “Lord” (Lucian) or third person masculine singular suffix (“him”; various codices). The MT’s more difficult reading probably represents the original text.tn Heb “the evil of your doings wherein you have forsaken me”; CEV “all because you rejected the Lord.”
- Deuteronomy 28:21 tn Heb “will cause pestilence to cling to you.”
- Deuteronomy 28:22 tn Heb “The Lord.” See note on “he” in 28:8.
- Deuteronomy 28:22 tn Or perhaps “consumption” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV). The term is from a verbal root that indicates a weakening of one’s physical strength (cf. NAB “wasting”; NIV, NLT “wasting disease”).
- Deuteronomy 28:22 tn Heb “hot fever”; NIV “scorching heat.”
- Deuteronomy 28:22 tn Or “drought” (so NIV, NRSV, NLT).
- Deuteronomy 28:23 tc The MT reads “Your.” The LXX reads “Heaven will be to you.”
- Deuteronomy 28:23 tn Or “heavens” (also in the following verse). The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven(s)” or “sky” depending on the context.
- Deuteronomy 28:25 tc The meaningless MT reading זַעֲוָה (zaʿavah) is clearly a transposition of the more commonly attested Hebrew noun זְוָעָה (zevaʿah, “terror”).
- Deuteronomy 28:28 tn Heb “heart” (so KJV, NASB).
- Deuteronomy 28:29 tn Heb “you will not cause your ways to prosper.”
- Deuteronomy 28:30 tc For MT reading שָׁגַל (shagal, “ravish; violate”), the Syriac, Targum, and Vulgate presume the less violent שָׁכַב (shakhav, “lie with”). The unexpected counterpart to betrothal here favors the originality of the MT.
- Deuteronomy 28:32 tn Heb “and there will be no power in your hand”; NCV “there will be nothing you can do.”
- Deuteronomy 28:36 tc The LXX reads the plural “kings.”
- Deuteronomy 28:40 tn Heb “your olives will drop off” (נָשַׁל, nashal), referring to the olives dropping off before they ripen. Elsewhere זַיִת (zayit, “olive”) can refer to an olive, the tree branch, the tree, or the grove. Agriculturally it might make the most sense to mean the olive flower (cf. Job 15:33). Whether the flowers drop off without being fertilized, or the olives drop off while unripe, the harvest is lost.
- Deuteronomy 28:42 tn The Hebrew term denotes some sort of buzzing or whirring insect; some have understood this to be a type of locust (KJV, NIV, CEV), but other insects have also been suggested: “buzzing insects” (NAB); “the cricket” (NASB); “the cicada” (NRSV).
- Deuteronomy 28:43 tn Heb “the foreigner.” This is a collective singular and has therefore been translated as plural; this includes the pronouns in the following verse, which are also singular in the Hebrew text.
- Deuteronomy 28:45 tn Heb “commanded”; NAB, NIV, TEV “he gave you.”
- Deuteronomy 28:46 tn Heb “they”; the referent (the curses mentioned previously) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
- Deuteronomy 28:46 tn Heb “seed” (so KJV, ASV).
- Deuteronomy 28:48 tn Heb “lack of everything.”
- Deuteronomy 28:48 tn Heb “he” (also later in this verse). The pronoun is a collective singular referring to the enemies (cf. CEV, NLT). Many translations understand the singular pronoun to refer to the Lord (cf. NAB, NASB, NIV, NCV, NRSV, TEV).
- Deuteronomy 28:49 tn Heb “from the end of the earth.”
- Deuteronomy 28:49 tn Some translations understand this to mean “like an eagle swoops down” (e.g., NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT), comparing the swift attack of an eagle to the attack of the Israelites’ enemies.
- Deuteronomy 28:51 tn Heb “it” (so NRSV), a collective singular referring to the invading nation (several times in this verse and v. 52).
- Deuteronomy 28:51 tn Heb “increase of herds.”
- Deuteronomy 28:51 tn Heb “growth of flocks.”
- Deuteronomy 28:52 tn Heb “gates,” also in vv. 55, 57.
- Deuteronomy 28:53 tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NRSV); NASB “the offspring of your own body.”
- Deuteronomy 28:53 tn Heb “siege and stress.”
- Deuteronomy 28:55 tn Heb “besiege,” redundant with the noun “siege.”
- Deuteronomy 28:56 tc The LXX adds σφόδρα (sphodra, “very”) to bring the description into line with v. 54.
- Deuteronomy 28:56 tn Heb “delicateness and tenderness.”
- Deuteronomy 28:57 tn Heb includes “that which comes out from between her feet.”
- Deuteronomy 28:57 tn Heb “her sons that she will bear.”
- Deuteronomy 28:57 tn Heb includes “in her need for everything.”
- Deuteronomy 28:58 tn Heb “If you are not careful to do.”
- Deuteronomy 28:60 sn These are the plagues the Lord inflicted on the Egyptians prior to the exodus which, though they did not fall upon the Israelites, must have caused great terror (cf. Exod 15:26).
- Deuteronomy 28:60 tn Heb “will cling to you” (so NIV); NLT “will claim you.”
- Deuteronomy 28:61 tn The Hebrew term תּוֹרָה (torah) can refer either (1) to the whole Pentateuch or, more likely, (2) to the book of Deuteronomy or even (3) only to this curse section of the covenant text. “Scroll” better reflects the actual document, since “book” conveys the notion of a bound book with pages to the modern English reader. Cf. KJV, NASB, NRSV “the book of this law”; NIV, NLT “this Book of the Law”; TEV “this book of God’s laws and teachings.”
- Deuteronomy 28:62 tn Or “heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven(s)” or “sky” depending on the context.
- Deuteronomy 28:62 tn Heb “have not listened to the voice of.”
- Deuteronomy 28:63 tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 28:8.
- Deuteronomy 28:66 tn Heb “you will not be confident in your life.” The phrase “from one day to the next” is implied by the following verse.
Jeremiah 31:29-30
New English Translation
The Lord Will Make a New Covenant with Israel and Judah
29 “When that time comes, people will no longer say, ‘The parents have eaten sour grapes, but the children’s teeth have grown numb.’[a] 30 Rather, each person will die for his own sins. The teeth of the person who eats the sour grapes will themselves grow numb.[b]
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- Jeremiah 31:29 tn This word only occurs here and in the parallel passage in Ezek 18:2 in the Qal stem and in Eccl 10:10 in the Piel stem. In the latter passage it refers to the bluntness of an ax that has not been sharpened. Here the idea is of the “bluntness” of the teeth, not from having ground them down due to the bitter taste of sour grapes, but from the fact that they have lost their “edge,” “bite,” or “sharpness” because they are numb from the sour taste. For this meaning for the word see W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah (Hermeneia), 2:197.sn This is a proverbial statement that is also found in Ezek 18:2. It served to articulate the complaint that the present generation was suffering for the accrued sins of their ancestors (cf. Lam 5:7) and that the Lord was hence unjust (Ezek 18:25, 29). However, Jeremiah had repeatedly warned his own generation that they were as guilty or even more so than their ancestors. The ancestors were indeed guilty of sin, but the present generation had compounded the problem by their stubborn refusal to turn back to God despite repeated warnings from the prophets, and hence God would withhold judgment no longer (cf. especially Jer 16:10-13 and compare Jer 7:24-34; 9:12-16 (9:11-15 HT); 11:1-13).
- Jeremiah 31:30 sn The Lord answers their charge by stating that each person is responsible for his own sin and will himself bear the consequences. Ezek 18 has a more extended treatment of this and shows that it extends not just to the link between parents and children but to that between former and future behavior of the same individual. To a certain extent the principle articulated here is anticipatory of the statement in v. 34 that refers to the forgiveness of former sins.
Ezekiel 18
New English Translation
Individual Retribution
18 The Lord’s message came to me: 2 “What do you mean by quoting this proverb concerning the land of Israel:
“‘The fathers eat sour grapes,
And the children’s teeth become numb?’[a]
3 “As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord,[b] you will not quote this proverb in Israel anymore! 4 Indeed! All lives are mine—the life of the father as well as the life of the son is mine. The one[c] who sins will die.
5 “Suppose a man is righteous. He practices what is just and right, 6 does not eat pagan sacrifices on the mountains[d] or pray to the idols[e] of the house of Israel, does not defile his neighbor’s wife, does not approach a woman for marital relations[f] during her period, 7 does not oppress anyone, but gives the debtor back whatever was given in pledge,[g] does not commit robbery,[h] but gives his bread to the hungry and clothes the naked, 8 does not engage in usury or charge interest,[i] but refrains[j] from wrongdoing, promotes true justice[k] between men, 9 and follows my statutes and observes my regulations by carrying them out.[l] That man[m] is righteous; he will certainly live,[n] declares the Sovereign Lord.
10 “Suppose such a man has[o] a violent son who sheds blood and does any of these things[p] mentioned previously 11 (though the father did not do any of them).[q] He eats pagan sacrifices on the mountains,[r] defiles his neighbor’s wife, 12 oppresses the poor and the needy,[s] commits robbery, does not give back what was given in pledge, prays to[t] idols, performs abominable acts, 13 engages in usury, and charges interest. Will he live? He will not! Because he has done all these abominable deeds he will certainly die.[u] He will bear the responsibility for his own death.[v]
14 “But suppose he in turn has a son who notices all the sins his father commits, considers them, and does not follow his father’s example.[w] 15 He does not eat pagan sacrifices on the mountains, does not pray to the idols of the house of Israel, does not defile his neighbor’s wife, 16 does not oppress anyone or keep what has been given in pledge, does not commit robbery, gives his food to the hungry and clothes the naked, 17 refrains from wrongdoing,[x] does not engage in usury or charge interest, carries out my regulations, and follows my statutes. He will not die for his father’s iniquity;[y] he will surely live. 18 As for his father, because he practices extortion, robs his brother, and does what is not good among his people, he will die for his iniquity.
19 “Yet you say, ‘Why should the son not suffer[z] for his father’s iniquity?’ When the son does what is just and right, and observes all my statutes and carries them out, he will surely live. 20 The person who sins is the one who will die. A son will not suffer[aa] for his father’s iniquity, and a father will not suffer[ab] for his son’s iniquity; the righteous person will be judged according to his righteousness, and the wicked person according to his wickedness.[ac]
21 “But if the wicked person turns from all the sin he has committed and observes all my statutes and does what is just and right, he will surely live; he will not die. 22 None of the sins he has committed will be held[ad] against him; because of the righteousness he has done, he will live. 23 Do I actually delight in the death of the wicked, declares the Sovereign Lord? Do I not prefer that he turn from his wicked conduct and live?
24 “But if a righteous man turns away from his righteousness and practices wrongdoing according to all the abominable practices the wicked carry out, will he live? All his righteous acts will not be remembered; because of the unfaithful acts he has done and the sin he has committed, he will die.[ae]
25 “Yet you say, ‘The Lord’s conduct[af] is unjust!’ Hear, O house of Israel: Is my conduct unjust? Is it not your conduct that is unjust? 26 When a righteous person turns back from his righteousness and practices wrongdoing, he will die for it;[ag] because of the wrongdoing he has done, he will die. 27 When a wicked person turns from the wickedness he has committed and does what is just and right, he will preserve his life. 28 Because he considered[ah] and turned from all the sins he had done, he will surely live; he will not die. 29 Yet the house of Israel says, ‘The Lord’s conduct is unjust!’ Is my conduct unjust, O house of Israel? Is it not your conduct that is unjust?
30 “Therefore, I will judge each person according to his conduct,[ai] O house of Israel, declares the Sovereign Lord. Repent[aj] and turn from all your wickedness; then it will not be an obstacle leading to iniquity.[ak] 31 Throw away all your sins you have committed and fashion yourselves a new heart and a new spirit![al] Why should you die, O house of Israel? 32 For I take no delight in the death of anyone,[am] declares the Sovereign Lord. Repent and live!
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- Ezekiel 18:2 tn This word occurs three times, in the Qal stem here and the parallel passage in Jer 31:29-30, and in the Piel stem at Eccl 10:10. In the latter passage it refers to the bluntness of an ax that has not been sharpened. Here the “bluntness” of the teeth is not due to grinding them down because of the bitter taste of sour grapes but to the fact that they have lost their “edge,” “bite,” or “sharpness” because they are numb from the sour taste. For this meaning for the word, see W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah (Hermeneia), 2:197.
- Ezekiel 18:3 tn This expression occurs often in Ezekiel (5:11; 14:16, 18, 20; 16:48; 17:16, 19; 20:3, 31, 33; 33:11, 27; 34:8; 35:6, 11).
- Ezekiel 18:4 tn Heb “life.”
- Ezekiel 18:6 tn Heb “on the mountains he does not eat.” The mountains are often mentioned as the place where idolatrous sacrifices were eaten (Ezek 20:28; 22:9; 34:6).
- Ezekiel 18:6 tn Heb “does not lift up his eyes.” This refers to looking to idols for help.
- Ezekiel 18:6 tn The expression קָרַב אֶל (qarav ʾel) means “draw near to” or “approach,” but is also used as a euphemism for the intended purpose of sexual relations (Lev 18:14; Deut 22:14; Isa 8:3).
- Ezekiel 18:7 tn Heb “restores to the debtor his pledge.” The root occurs in Exod 22:25 in reference to restoring a man’s garment as a pledge before nightfall.
- Ezekiel 18:7 tn The Hebrew term refers to seizure of property, usually by the rich (Isa 3:14; 10:2; Mic 2:2; see Lev 5:21, 22 HT [6:2, 3 ET]).
- Ezekiel 18:8 sn This law was given in Lev 25:36.
- Ezekiel 18:8 tn Heb, “turns back his hand.”
- Ezekiel 18:8 tn Heb “justice of truth.”
- Ezekiel 18:9 tc The MT reads לַעֲשׂוֹת אֱמֶת (laʿasot ʾemet, “to do with integrity”), while the LXX reads “to do them,” presupposing לַעֲשׂוֹת אֹתָם (laʿasot ʾotam). The ם (mem) and ת (tav) have been reversed in the MT. The LXX reflects the original, supported by similar phrasing in Ezekiel 11:20; 20:19.
- Ezekiel 18:9 tn Heb “he.”
- Ezekiel 18:9 tn Heb “living, he will live.” The infinitive absolute precedes the finite verb for emphasis.
- Ezekiel 18:10 tn Heb “begets.”
- Ezekiel 18:10 tn Heb “and he does, a brother, from one of these.” If “brother” is retained, it may be an adverbial accusative: “against a brother” (i.e., fellow Israelite). But the form is likely dittographic, as the consonants that spell “brother” אח (alef-het) occur in the following word).
- Ezekiel 18:11 tn Heb “and he all of these did not do.” The parenthetical note refers back to the father described in the preceding verses.
- Ezekiel 18:11 sn See note on “mountains” in v. 6.
- Ezekiel 18:12 sn The poor and needy are often mentioned together in the OT (Deut 24:14; Jer 22:16; Ezek 16:49; Pss 12:6; 35:10; 37:14).
- Ezekiel 18:12 tn Heb “lifts up his eyes.”
- Ezekiel 18:13 tn Heb “be put to death.” The translation follows an alternative reading that appears in several ancient textual witnesses.
- Ezekiel 18:13 tn Heb “his blood will be upon him.”
- Ezekiel 18:14 tn Heb “and he sees and does not do likewise.”
- Ezekiel 18:17 tc This translation follows the LXX. The MT reads: “restrains his hand from the poor,” which makes no sense here.
- Ezekiel 18:17 tn Or “in his father’s punishment.” The phrase “in/for [a person’s] iniquity/punishment” occurs fourteen times in Ezekiel: here and in vv. 18, 19, 20; 3:18, 19; 4:17; 7:13, 16; 24:23; 33:6, 8, 9; 39:23. The Hebrew word for “iniquity” may also mean the “punishment for iniquity.”
- Ezekiel 18:19 tn Heb “lift up, bear.”
- Ezekiel 18:20 tn Heb “lift up, bear.”
- Ezekiel 18:20 tn Heb “lift up, bear.”
- Ezekiel 18:20 tn Heb “the righteousness of the righteous one will be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked one will be upon him.”
- Ezekiel 18:22 tn Heb “remembered.”
- Ezekiel 18:24 tn Heb “because of them he will die.”
- Ezekiel 18:25 tn Heb “way.”
- Ezekiel 18:26 tn Heb “for them” or “because of them.”
- Ezekiel 18:28 tn Heb “he saw.”
- Ezekiel 18:30 tn Heb “ways.”
- Ezekiel 18:30 tn The verbs and persons in this verse are plural whereas the individual has been the subject of the chapter.
- Ezekiel 18:30 tn Or “leading to punishment.”
- Ezekiel 18:31 sn In Ezek 11:19 and 36:26 the new heart and new spirit are promised as future blessings.
- Ezekiel 18:32 tn Heb “the death of the one dying.”
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