Punishment for Disobedience
14 p“But if you will not listen to me and will not do all these commandments, 15 if you spurn my statutes, and if your soul abhors my rules, so that you will not do all my commandments, but qbreak my covenant, 16 then I will do this to you: I will visit you with panic, with rwasting disease and fever that consume the eyes and make the heart ache. And syou shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it. 17 I will tset my face against you, and uyou shall be struck down before your enemies. vThose who hate you shall rule over you, and wyou shall flee when none pursues you. 18 And if in spite of this you will not listen to me, then I will discipline you again xsevenfold for your sins, 19 and I will break ythe pride of your power, and I zwill make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze. 20 And ayour strength shall be spent in vain, for byour land shall not yield its increase, and the trees of the land shall not yield their fruit.
21 c“Then if you walk contrary to me and will not listen to me, I will continue striking you, sevenfold for your sins. 22 And dI will let loose the wild beasts against you, which shall bereave you of your children and destroy your livestock and make you few in number, so that eyour roads shall be deserted.
23 “And fif by this discipline you are not turned to me cbut walk contrary to me, 24 gthen I also will walk contrary to you, and I myself will strike you sevenfold for your sins. 25 And hI will bring a sword upon you, that shall execute vengeance for the covenant. And if you gather within your cities, iI will send pestilence among you, and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy. 26 jWhen I break your supply1 of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in a single oven and shall dole out your bread again by weight, and kyou shall eat and not be satisfied.
27 “But lif in spite of this you will not listen to me, but walk contrary to me, 28 then I will walk contrary to you min fury, and I myself will discipline you xsevenfold for your sins. 29 nYou shall eat the flesh of your sons, and you shall eat the flesh of your daughters. 30 And oI will destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars and pcast your dead bodies upon the dead bodies of your idols, and my soul will abhor you. 31 And I will qlay your cities waste and will rmake your sanctuaries desolate, and sI will not smell your pleasing aromas. 32 And tI myself will devastate the land, so that your enemies who settle in it shall be uappalled at it. 33 And vI will scatter you among the nations, and I will unsheathe the sword after you, and your land shall be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste.
34 w“Then the land shall enjoy2 its Sabbaths as long as it lies desolate, while you are in your enemies’ land; then the land shall rest, and enjoy its Sabbaths. 35 As long as it lies desolate it shall have rest, the rest that it did not have on your Sabbaths when you were dwelling in it. 36 And as for those of you who are left, xI will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies. The ysound of a zdriven leaf shall put them to flight, and they shall flee as one flees from the sword, and they shall fall when none pursues. 37 They shall stumble over one another, as if to escape a sword, though none pursues. And ayou shall have no power to stand before your enemies. 38 And you shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. 39 And those of you who are left shall brot away in your enemies’ lands because of their iniquity, and also because of the iniquities of their fathers they shall rot away like them.
40 “But if cthey confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers in their treachery that they dcommitted against me, and also in walking contrary to me, 41 so that I walked contrary to them and brought them into the land of their enemies—if then their euncircumcised heart is fhumbled and they make amends for their iniquity, 42 then I will gremember my covenant with Jacob, and I will remember my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham, and I will hremember the land. 43 But wthe land shall be abandoned by them and enjoy its Sabbaths while it lies desolate without them, and they shall make amends for their iniquity, because they spurned my rules and their soul abhorred my statutes. 44 Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, iI will not spurn them, neither will I abhor them so as to destroy them utterly and jbreak my covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God. 45 But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, kwhom I brought out of the land of Egypt lin the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the Lord.”
Curses for Disobedience
15 “But lif you will not obey the voice of the Lord your God or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and movertake you. 16 Cursed shall you be nin 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 and the fruit of your ground, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock. 19 Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.
20 “The Lord owill send on you curses, confusion, and pfrustration in all that you undertake to do, quntil you are destroyed and perish quickly on account of the evil of your deeds, because you have forsaken me. 21 The Lord will make rthe pestilence stick to you until he has consumed you off the land that you are entering to take possession of it. 22 sThe Lord will strike you with wasting disease and with fever, inflammation and fiery heat, and with drought1 and with tblight and with mildew. They shall pursue you until you perish. 23 And uthe heavens over your head shall be bronze, and the earth under you shall be iron. 24 The Lord will make the rain of your land powder. From heaven dust shall come down on you until you are destroyed.
25 v“The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You shall go out one way against them and flee seven ways before them. And you wshall be a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth. 26 And xyour dead body shall be food for all birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth, and ythere shall be no one to frighten them away. 27 The Lord will strike you zwith the boils of Egypt, and with tumors and ascabs and itch, of which you cannot be healed. 28 The Lord will strike you with bmadness and blindness and confusion of mind, 29 and you shall cgrope at noonday, as the blind grope in darkness, and you shall not prosper in your ways.2 And you shall be only oppressed and robbed continually, and there shall be no one to help you. 30 dYou shall betroth a wife, but another man shall ravish her. eYou shall build a house, but you shall not dwell in it. fYou shall plant a vineyard, but you shall not enjoy its fruit. 31 Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you shall not eat any of it. Your donkey shall be seized before your face, but shall not be restored to you. Your sheep shall be given to your enemies, but there shall be no one to help you. 32 gYour sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, while your eyes look on and fail with longing for them all day long, hbut you shall be helpless. 33 A nation that you have not known shall eat up the fruit of your ground and of all your labors, and you shall be only oppressed and crushed continually, 34 so that you are driven mad iby the sights that your eyes see. 35 The Lord will strike you on the knees and on the legs jwith grievous boils of which you cannot be healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.
36 “The Lord will kbring you and your king whom you set over you to a nation that neither you lnor your fathers have known. And mthere you shall serve other gods of wood and stone. 37 And you shall become na horror, a proverb, and a byword among all the peoples where the Lord will lead you away. 38 oYou shall carry much seed into the field and shall gather in little, for pthe locust shall consume it. 39 qYou shall plant vineyards and dress them, but you shall neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes, for the worm shall eat them. 40 You shall have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you rshall not anoint yourself with the oil, for your olives shall drop off. 41 You shall father sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours, for sthey shall go into captivity. 42 pThe cricket3 shall possess all your trees and the fruit of your ground. 43 tThe sojourner who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower. 44 uHe shall lend to you, and you shall not lend to him. tHe shall be the head, and you shall be the tail.
45 v“All these curses shall come upon you and pursue you and overtake you till you are destroyed, because you did not obey the voice of the Lord your God, to keep his commandments and his statutes that he commanded you. 46 They shall be wa sign and a wonder against you and your offspring forever. 47 xBecause you did not serve the Lord your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things, 48 therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything. And he ywill put a yoke of iron on your neck until he has destroyed you. 49 zThe Lord will bring a nation against you from far away, from the end of the earth, aswooping down like the eagle, a nation bwhose language you do not understand, 50 a hard-faced nation cwho shall not respect the old or show mercy to the young. 51 It shall deat the offspring of your cattle and the fruit of your ground, until you are destroyed; it also shall not leave you grain, wine, or oil, the increase of your herds or the young of your flock, until they have caused you to perish.
52 “They shall ebesiege you in all your towns, until your high and fortified walls, in which you trusted, come down throughout all your land. And they shall besiege you in all your towns throughout all your land, which the Lord your God has given you. 53 And fyou shall eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your sons and daughters, whom the Lord your God has given you, gin the siege and in the distress with which your enemies shall distress you. 54 The man who is the most tender and refined among you will hbegrudge food to his brother, to ithe wife he embraces,4 and to the last of the children whom he has left, 55 so that he will not give to any of them any of the flesh of his children whom he is eating, because he has nothing else left, jin the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in all your towns. 56 kThe most tender and refined woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground because she is so delicate and tender, will begrudge to the husband she embraces,5 to her son and to her daughter, 57 her afterbirth that comes out from between her feet and her children whom she bears, because lacking everything she will eat them secretly, jin the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in your towns.
58 “If you are not careful to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that you may fear this glorious and awesome name, lthe Lord your God, 59 then the Lord will bring on you and your offspring extraordinary afflictions, afflictions severe and lasting, and sicknesses grievous and lasting. 60 And he will bring upon you again all mthe diseases of Egypt, of which you were afraid, and they shall cling to you. 61 Every sickness also and every affliction that is not recorded in the book of this law, the Lord will bring upon you, until you are destroyed. 62 Whereas nyou were as numerous oas the stars of heaven, you shall be left few in number, because you did not obey the voice of the Lord your God. 63 And as the Lord ptook delight in doing you good and multiplying you, so the Lord will qtake delight in bringing ruin upon you and destroying you. And you shall be plucked off the land that you are entering to take possession of it.
64 “And the Lord rwill scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other, and sthere you shall serve other gods tof wood and stone, uwhich neither you nor your fathers have known. 65 And vamong these nations you shall find no respite, and there shall be no resting place for the sole of your foot, but wthe Lord will give you there a trembling heart and failing eyes and xa languishing soul. 66 Your life shall hang in doubt before you. Night and day you shall be in dread and have no assurance of your life. 67 yIn 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 zthe sights that your eyes shall see. 68 And the Lord awill bring you back in ships to Egypt, a journey that I promised that byou should never make again; and there you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no buyer.”
