Blessings for Obedience

28 “If you will only obey the Lord your God, by diligently observing all his commandments that I am commanding you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth;^{(A) 2} all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the Lord your God:

³ “Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field.^(B)

⁴ “Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground, and the fruit of your livestock, both the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock.^(C)

⁵ “Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.

⁶ “Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.

⁷ “The Lord will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you; they shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways.^{(D) 8} The Lord will command the blessing upon you in your barns and in all that you undertake; he will bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. ⁹ The Lord will establish you as his holy people, as he has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in his ways.^{(E) 10} All the peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the Lord, and they shall be afraid of you.^{(F) 11} The Lord will make you abound in prosperity, in the fruit of your womb, in the fruit of your livestock, and in the fruit of your ground in the land that the Lord swore to your ancestors to give you.^{(G) 12} The Lord will open for you his rich storehouse, the heavens, to give the rain of your land in its season and to bless all your undertakings. You will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow.^{(H) 13} The Lord will make you the head and not the tail; you shall be only at the top and not at the bottom—if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today by diligently observing them, ¹⁴ and if you do not turn aside from any of the words that I am commanding you today, either to the right or to the left, following other gods to serve them.^(I)

Warnings against Disobedience

¹⁵ “But if you will not obey the Lord your God by diligently observing all his commandments and decrees that I am commanding you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you:^(J)

¹⁶ “Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field.

¹⁷ “Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.

¹⁸ “Cursed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground, the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock.

¹⁹ “Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.

²⁰ “The Lord will send upon you disaster, panic, and frustration in everything you attempt to do, until you are destroyed and perish quickly, on account of the evil of your deeds with which you have forsaken me.^{(K) 21} The Lord will make the pestilence cling to you until it has consumed you off the land that you are entering to possess.^{(L) 22} The Lord will afflict you with consumption, fever, inflammation, with fiery heat and drought,^[a] and with blight and mildew; they shall pursue you until you perish.^{(M) 23} The sky over your head shall be bronze and the earth under you iron.^{(N) 24} The Lord will change the rain of your land into powder, and only dust shall come down upon you from the sky until you are destroyed.

²⁵ “The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies; you shall go out against them one way and flee before them seven ways. You shall become an object of horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.^{(O) 26} Your corpses shall be food for every bird of the air and animal of the earth, and there shall be no one to frighten them away.^{(P) 27} The Lord will afflict you with the boils of Egypt, with tumors, scurvy, and itch, of which you cannot be healed.^{(Q) 28} The Lord will afflict you with madness, blindness, and confusion of mind; ²⁹ you shall grope about at noon as blind people grope in darkness, but you shall be unable to find your way, and you shall be continually abused and robbed, without anyone to help.^{(R) 30} You shall become engaged to a woman, but another man shall lie with her. You shall build a house but not live in it. You shall plant a vineyard but not enjoy its fruit.^{(S) 31} Your ox shall be butchered before your eyes, but you shall not eat of it. Your donkey shall be stolen in front of you and shall not be restored to you. Your sheep shall be given to your enemies without anyone to help you. ³² Your sons and daughters shall be given to another people while you look on; you will strain your eyes looking for them all day but be powerless to do anything.^{(T) 33} A people whom you do not know shall eat up the fruit of your ground and of all your labors; you shall be continually abused and crushed^{(U) 34} and driven mad by the sight that your eyes shall see. ³⁵ The Lord will strike you on the knees and on the legs with grievous boils of which you cannot be healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.^{(V) 36} The Lord will bring you and the king whom you set over you to a nation that neither you nor your ancestors have known, where you shall serve other gods, of wood and stone.^{(W) 37} You shall become an object of horror, a proverb, and a byword among all the peoples where the Lord will lead you.^(X)

³⁸ “You shall carry much seed into the field but shall gather little in, for the locust shall consume it.^{(Y) 39} You shall plant vineyards and dress them, but you shall neither drink the wine nor gather the grapes, for the worm shall eat them. ⁴⁰ You shall have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you shall not anoint yourself with the oil, for your olives shall drop off. ⁴¹ You shall have sons and daughters, but they shall not remain yours, for they shall go into captivity.^{(Z) 42} All your trees and the fruit of your ground the cicada shall take over.^{(AA) 43} Aliens residing among you shall ascend above you higher and higher, while you shall descend lower and lower.^{(AB) 44} They shall lend to you, but you shall not lend to them; they shall be the head, and you shall be the tail.^(AC)

⁴⁵ “All these curses shall come upon you, pursuing and overtaking you until you are destroyed, because you did not obey the Lord your God by observing the commandments and the decrees that he commanded you.^{(AD) 46} They shall be among you and your descendants as a sign and a portent forever.

⁴⁷ “Because you did not serve the Lord your God joyfully and with gladness of heart for the abundance of everything,^{(AE) 48} therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness and lack of everything. He will put an iron yoke on your neck until he has destroyed you.^{(AF) 49} The Lord will bring a nation from far away, from the end of the earth, to swoop down on you like an eagle, a nation whose language you do not understand,^{(AG) 50} a grim-faced nation showing no respect to the old or favor to the young. ⁵¹ It shall consume the fruit of your livestock and the fruit of your ground until you are destroyed, leaving you neither grain, wine, and oil nor the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock, until it has made you perish.^{(AH) 52} It shall besiege you in all your towns until your high and fortified walls, in which you trusted, come down throughout your land; it shall besiege you in all your towns throughout the land that the Lord your God has given you.^{(AI) 53} In the desperate straits to which the enemy siege reduces you, you will eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your own sons and daughters whom the Lord your God has given you.^{(AJ) 54} Even the most refined and gentle of men among you will begrudge food to his own brother, to the wife whom he embraces, and to the last of his remaining children, ⁵⁵ giving to none of them any of the flesh of his children whom he is eating, because nothing else remains to him, in the desperate straits to which the enemy siege will reduce you in all your towns. ⁵⁶ She who is the most refined and gentle among you, so gentle and refined that she does not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground, will begrudge food to the husband whom she embraces, to her own son, and to her own daughter,^{(AK) 57} begrudging even the afterbirth that comes out from between her thighs and the children that she bears, because she is eating them in secret for lack of anything else, in the desperate straits to which the enemy siege will reduce you in your towns.

⁵⁸ “If you do not diligently observe all the words of this law that are written in this book, fearing this glorious and awesome name, the Lord your God,^{(AL) 59} then the Lord will overwhelm both you and your offspring with severe and lasting afflictions and grievous and lasting maladies. ⁶⁰ He will bring back upon you all the diseases of Egypt, of which you were in dread, and they shall cling to you.^{(AM) 61} Every other malady and affliction, even though not recorded in the book of this law, the Lord will inflict on you until you are destroyed.^{(AN) 62} Although once you were as numerous as the stars in heaven, you shall be left few in number because you did not obey the Lord your God.^{(AO) 63} And just as the Lord took delight in making you prosperous and numerous, so the Lord will take delight in bringing you to ruin and destruction; you shall be plucked off the land that you are entering to possess.^{(AP) 64} The Lord will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you shall serve other gods, of wood and stone, which neither you nor your ancestors have known.^{(AQ) 65} Among those nations you shall find no ease, no resting place for the sole of your foot. There the Lord will give you a trembling heart, failing eyes, and a languishing spirit.^{(AR) 66} Your life shall hang in doubt before you; night and day you shall be in dread, with no assurance of your life. ⁶⁷ In the morning you shall say, ‘If only it were evening!’ and at evening you shall say, ‘If only it were morning!’—because of the dread that your heart shall feel and the sights that your eyes shall see.^{(AS) 68} The Lord will bring you back in ships to Egypt, by a route that I promised you would never see again, and there you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no buyer.”

Relentless Judgment on Israel

¹⁸ It may be that there is among you a man or woman or a family or tribe whose heart is already turning away from the Lord our God to serve the gods of those nations. It may be that there is among you a root sprouting poisonous and bitter growth.^{(A) 19} All who hear the words of this oath and bless themselves, thinking in their hearts, ‘We are safe even though we go our own stubborn ways’ (thus sweeping away the moist with the dry)^[a]— ²⁰ the Lord will be unwilling to pardon them, for then the Lord’s anger and passion will smoke against them. All the curses written in this book will descend on them, and the Lord will blot out their names from under heaven.^{(B) 21} The Lord will single them out from all the tribes of Israel for calamity, in accordance with all the curses of the covenant written in this book of the law.^{(C) 22} The next generation, your children who rise up after you, as well as the foreigner who comes from a distant country, will see the devastation of that land and the afflictions with which the Lord has afflicted it^(D)— ²³ all its soil burned out by sulfur and salt, nothing planted, nothing sprouting, unable to support any vegetation, like the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the Lord destroyed in his fierce anger^(E)— ²⁴ they and indeed all the nations will wonder, ‘Why has the Lord done thus to this land? What caused this great display of anger?’^{(F) 25} They will conclude, ‘It is because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, the God of their ancestors, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt. ²⁶ They turned and served other gods, worshiping them, gods whom they had not known and whom he had not allotted to them; ²⁷ so the anger of the Lord was kindled against that land, bringing on it every curse written in this book. ²⁸ The Lord uprooted them from their land in anger, fury, and great wrath and cast them into another land, as is now the case.’^(G)

⁶ You must observe them and perform them, for this will show your wisdom and discernment to the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and discerning people!’^{(A) 7} For what other great nation has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is whenever we call to him?^{(B) 8} And what other great nation has statutes and ordinances as just as this entire law that I am setting before you today?

God’s Faithless Bride

16 The word of the Lord came to me: ² Mortal, make known to Jerusalem her abominations^{(A) 3} and say: Thus says the Lord God to Jerusalem: Your origin and your birth were in the land of the Canaanites; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.^{(B) 4} As for your birth, on the day you were born your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to cleanse you, nor rubbed with salt, nor wrapped in cloths.^{(C) 5} No eye pitied you to do any of these things for you out of compassion for you, but you were thrown out in the open field, for you were abhorred on the day you were born.^(D)

⁶ I passed by you and saw you flailing about in your blood. As you lay in your blood, I said to you, “Live!^{(E) 7} and grow up^[a] like a plant of the field.” You grew up and became tall and arrived at full womanhood;^[b] your breasts were formed, and your hair had grown, yet you were naked and bare.^(F)

⁸ I passed by you again and looked on you; you were at the age for love. I spread the edge of my cloak over you and covered your nakedness: I pledged myself to you and entered into a covenant with you, says the Lord God, and you became mine.^{(G) 9} Then I bathed you with water and washed off the blood from you and anointed you with oil. ¹⁰ I clothed you with embroidered cloth and with sandals of fine leather; I bound you in fine linen and covered you with rich fabric.^{[c] 11} I adorned you with ornaments: I put bracelets on your arms, a chain on your neck,^{(H) 12} a ring on your nose, earrings in your ears, and a beautiful crown upon your head. ¹³ You were adorned with gold and silver, while your clothing was of fine linen, rich fabric,^[d] and embroidered cloth. You had choice flour and honey and oil for food. You grew exceedingly beautiful, fit to be a queen.^{(I) 14} Your fame spread among the nations on account of your beauty, for it was perfect because of my splendor that I had bestowed on you, says the Lord God.

¹⁵ But you trusted in your beauty and prostituted yourself because of your fame and lavished your prostitutions on any passer-by.^{[e](J) 16} You took some of your garments and made for yourself colorful high places and on them prostituted yourself; nothing like this has ever been or ever shall be.^{[f](K) 17} You also took your beautiful jewels of my gold and my silver that I had given you and made for yourself male images and with them prostituted yourself,^{(L) 18} and you took your embroidered garments to cover them and set my oil and my incense before them. ¹⁹ Also my bread that I gave you—I fed you with choice flour and oil and honey—you set it before them as a pleasing odor, and so it was, says the Lord God. ²⁰ You took your sons and your daughters, whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. As if your prostitutions were not enough!^{(M) 21} You slaughtered my children and delivered them up as an offering to them.^{(N) 22} And in all your abominations and your prostitutions you did not remember the days of your youth, when you were naked and bare, flailing about in your blood.^(O)

²³ After all your wickedness (woe, woe to you! says the Lord God), ²⁴ you built yourself a platform and made yourself a lofty place in every square;^{(P) 25} at the head of every street you built your lofty place and prostituted your beauty, offering yourself^[g] to every passer-by and multiplying your prostitution.^{(Q) 26} You prostituted yourself with the Egyptians, your lustful neighbors,^[h] multiplying your prostitution, to provoke me to anger.^{(R) 27} Therefore I stretched out my hand against you, reduced your rations, and gave you up to the will of your enemies, the daughters of the Philistines, who were ashamed of your lewd behavior.^{(S) 28} You prostituted yourself with the Assyrians because you were insatiable; you prostituted yourself with them, and still you were not satisfied.^{(T) 29} You multiplied your prostitution with Chaldea, the land of merchants, and even with this you were not satisfied.^(U)

³⁰ How sick is your heart,^[i] says the Lord God, that you did all these things, the deeds of a brazen prostitute, ³¹ building your platform at the head of every street and making your lofty place in every square! Yet you were not like a prostitute because you scorned payment. ³² Adulterous wife who receives strangers instead of her husband! ³³ Gifts are given to all prostitutes, but you gave your gifts to all your lovers, bribing them to come to you from all around for your prostitutions.^{(V) 34} So you were different from other women in your prostitutions: no one solicited you to prostitute yourself, and you gave payment, while no payment was given to you; you were different.

³⁵ Therefore, O prostitute, hear the word of the Lord: ³⁶ Thus says the Lord God: Because your lust was poured out and your nakedness uncovered in your prostitution with your lovers, and because of all your abominable idols, and because of the blood of your children that you gave to them,^{(W) 37} therefore, I will gather all your lovers with whom you took pleasure, all those you loved and all those you hated; I will gather them against you from all around and will uncover your nakedness to them so that they may see all your nakedness.^{(X) 38} I will judge you as women who commit adultery and shed blood are judged and bring blood upon you in wrath and jealousy.^{(Y) 39} I will deliver you into their hands, and they shall throw down your platform and break down your lofty places; they shall strip you of your clothes and take your beautiful objects and leave you naked and bare.^{(Z) 40} They shall bring up a mob against you, and they shall stone you and cut you to pieces with their swords.^{(AA) 41} They shall burn your houses and execute judgments on you in the sight of many women; I will stop you from prostituting yourself, and you shall also make no more payments.^{(AB) 42} So I will satisfy my fury on you, and my jealousy shall turn away from you; I will be calm and will be angry no longer. ⁴³ Because you have not remembered the days of your youth but have enraged me with all these things, therefore I have returned your deeds upon your head, says the Lord God.

Have you not committed lewdness beyond all your abominations?^{(AC) 44} See, everyone who uses proverbs will use this proverb about you, “Like mother, like daughter.”^{(AD) 45} You are the daughter of your mother, who loathed her husband and her children, and you are the sister of your sisters, who loathed their husbands and their children. Your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite. ⁴⁶ Your big sister is Samaria, who lived with her daughters to the north of you; your little sister, who lived to the south of you, is Sodom with her daughters.^{(AE) 47} You not only followed their ways and acted according to their abominations; within a very little time you were more corrupt than they in all your ways.^{(AF) 48} As I live, says the Lord God, your sister Sodom and her daughters have not done as you and your daughters have done.^{(AG) 49} This was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease but did not aid the poor and needy.^{(AH) 50} They were haughty and did abominable things before me; therefore I removed them when I saw it.^{(AI) 51} Samaria has not committed half your sins; you have committed more abominations than they and have made your sisters appear righteous by all the abominations that you have committed.^{(AJ) 52} Bear your disgrace, you also, for you have brought about for your sisters a more favorable judgment; because of your sins in which you acted more abominably than they, they are more in the right than you. So be ashamed, you also, and bear your disgrace, for you have made your sisters appear righteous.

⁵³ I will restore their fortunes, the fortunes of Sodom and her daughters and the fortunes of Samaria and her daughters, and I will restore your own fortunes along with theirs,^{(AK) 54} in order that you may bear your disgrace and be ashamed of all that you have done, becoming a consolation to them.^{(AL) 55} As for your sisters, Sodom and her daughters shall return to their former state; Samaria and her daughters shall return to their former state, and you and your daughters shall return to your former state. ⁵⁶ Was not your sister Sodom a byword in your mouth in the day of your pride, ⁵⁷ before your wickedness was uncovered? Now you are a mockery to the daughters of Edom^[j] and all her neighbors and to the daughters of the Philistines, those all around who despise you.^{(AM) 58} You must bear the penalty of your lewdness and your abominations, says the Lord.^(AN)

An Everlasting Covenant

⁵⁹ Yes, thus says the Lord God: I will deal with you as you have done, you who have despised the oath, breaking the covenant,^{(AO) 60} yet I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish with you an everlasting covenant.^{(AP) 61} Then you will remember your ways and be ashamed when you receive your older and younger sisters and I give them to you as daughters, but not on account of my^[k] covenant with you.^{(AQ) 62} I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall know that I am the Lord,^{(AR) 63} in order that you may remember and be confounded and never open your mouth again because of your shame, when I forgive you all that you have done, says the Lord God.^(AS)

Death of Joshua

⁶ When Joshua dismissed the people, the Israelites all went to their own inheritances to take possession of the land.^{(A) 7} The people served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work that the Lord had done for Israel. ⁸ Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of one hundred ten years. ⁹ So they buried him within the bounds of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. ¹⁰ Moreover, that whole generation was gathered to their ancestors, and another generation grew up after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel.^(B)

Israel’s Unfaithfulness

¹¹ Then the Israelites did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals,^{(C) 12} and they abandoned the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt; they followed other gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were all around them and bowed down to them, and they provoked the Lord to anger.^{(D) 13} They abandoned the Lord and served Baal and the Astartes.^{(E) 14} So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he gave them over to plunderers who plundered them, and he sold them into the power of their enemies all around, so that they could no longer withstand their enemies.^(F)