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“If you will diligently listen to the voice of the LORD your God, and carefully do all his commandments that I command you today, then the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.
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All these blessings will come upon you and overtake you, if you listen to the voice of the LORD your God:
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Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field.
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Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, the produce of your ground, and the offspring of your livestock, the calves of your cattle and the young of your flock.
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Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
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Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
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The LORD will cause your enemies who rise up against you to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way, but flee before you seven ways.
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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.
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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.
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Then all the peoples of the earth shall see that the name of the LORD is called upon you, and they shall fear you.
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The LORD will also make you abound in good things, in the fruit of your womb, in the offspring of your livestock, and in the produce of your ground — in the land that the LORD swore to your fathers to give you.
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The LORD will open to you his rich storehouse, the heavens, to give rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. You shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow.
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The LORD will make you the head and not the tail; you shall only go up and not down, if you listen to the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you today, and carefully do them,
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and if you do not turn aside to the right or to the left from any of the words that I command you today, by following other gods and serving them.”
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“But if you do not listen to the voice of the LORD your God, and do not carefully do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you:
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Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field.
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Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
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Cursed shall be the fruit of your womb, the produce of your ground, the calves of your cattle, and the young of your flock.
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Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.
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The LORD will send upon you curse, confusion, and rebuke in all that you undertake, until you are destroyed and perish quickly because of the evil of your deeds, because you have forsaken Me.
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The LORD will make the pestilence cling to you, until He has consumed you from the land that you are going to possess.
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The LORD will strike you with wasting disease, fever, inflammation, scorching heat, drought, blight, and mildew; these shall pursue you until you perish.
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The sky over your head shall be bronze, and the earth beneath you iron.
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The LORD will make the rain of your land powder and dust; from the sky it shall come down upon you until you are destroyed.
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The LORD will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You shall go out against them one way, but flee before them seven ways, and you shall become a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.
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Your dead body shall be food for all the birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth, and no one shall frighten them away.
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The LORD will strike you with the boils of Egypt, with sores, with scab, and with itch, from which you cannot be healed.
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The LORD will strike you with madness, blindness, and confusion of mind,
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so that you will grope at noonday, as a blind man gropes in darkness; your way shall not prosper, but you shall be continually oppressed and robbed, with no one to help you.
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You shall betroth a woman, but another man shall lie with her. You shall build a house, but you shall not dwell in it. You shall plant a vineyard, but you shall not enjoy its fruit.
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Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you shall not eat of it. Your donkey shall be taken away from before you, and shall not be restored to you. Your sheep shall be given to your enemies, and there shall be no one to help you.
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Your sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, while your eyes look on, and all day long you shall yearn for them, but you shall be powerless.
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A nation that you have not known shall eat the fruit of your land and all the labor of your hands; you shall be continually oppressed and crushed.
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You shall be driven mad by what your eyes see.
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The LORD will strike you with a severe boil, from which you cannot be healed, on your knees and on your thighs, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.
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The LORD will bring you and the king whom you set over you to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known; and there you shall serve other gods, wood and stone.
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You shall become an object of horror, a proverb, and a byword among all the peoples to which the LORD will drive you.
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You shall carry much seed out to the field, but gather in little, for the locust shall consume it.
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You shall plant and tend vineyards, but you shall not drink the wine or store it up, for the worm shall eat it.
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You shall have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you shall not anoint yourself with the oil, for your olives shall drop off.
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You shall have sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours, for they shall go into captivity.
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All your trees and the produce of your land shall be taken over by swarms of locusts.
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The foreigner who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, while you sink lower and lower.
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He shall lend to you, but you shall not lend to him; he shall be the head, and you shall be the tail.
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All these curses shall come upon you, pursuing you and overtaking you, until you are destroyed, because you did not listen to the voice of the LORD your God and did not keep His commandments and His statutes that He commanded you;
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and they shall be a sign and a wonder among you and among your descendants forever.”
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“Because you would not serve the LORD your God with joy and gladness of heart, though you had abundance of everything,
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therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness and in lack of everything. He will put an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.
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The LORD will bring against you a nation from far away, from the end of the earth, as an eagle swoops down; a nation whose language you do not understand,
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a nation of fierce countenance, who will not respect the old and will show no pity to the young;
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who shall eat the offspring of your livestock and the produce of your land until you are destroyed; who shall leave you neither grain, new wine, nor oil, nor the calves of your cattle nor the lambs of your flock, until he has ruined you.
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They shall besiege 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 the land that the LORD your God has given you.
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And you shall eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your sons and your daughters, whom the LORD your God has given you, in the distress and hardship brought on you by your enemy.
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The man among you who is the most tender and delicate will begrudge his brother, and the wife he embraces, and the rest of his children who remain with him,
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so that he will not give to any one of them any of the flesh of his children that he is eating, because he has nothing left, in the distress and hardship brought on you by your enemy in all your towns.
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The tender and delicate woman among you, who has never tried to set the sole of her foot on the ground because of her delicacy and tenderness, will begrudge her husband whom she embraces, and her son and her daughter,
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because of the afterbirth that comes out from between her feet, and because of the children she bears; for in lack of everything she will eat them secretly, in the distress and hardship brought on you by your enemy within your towns.
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If you do not faithfully observe all the words of this law that are written in this book, and do not fear this glorious and awesome name, the LORD your God,
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then the LORD will bring on you and your offspring extraordinary afflictions, severe and lasting afflictions, and grievous and lasting sicknesses.
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He will also bring upon you all the diseases of Egypt, which you feared, and they shall cling to you.
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Moreover, every sickness and every affliction not written in the book of this law, the LORD will bring upon you until you are destroyed.
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And though you were as numerous as the stars of heaven, only a few of you shall remain, because you did not obey the voice of the LORD your God.
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And just as the LORD took delight in doing you good and multiplying you, so the LORD will take delight in bringing you to ruin and destroying you; and you shall be uprooted from the land that you are entering to possess.
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The LORD will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other; and there you shall serve other gods, which neither you nor your fathers have known, gods of wood and stone.
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Among those nations you shall find no rest, and there shall be no resting place for the sole of your foot; there the LORD will give you a trembling heart, failing eyes, and a languishing soul.
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Your life will hang in doubt; day and night you will be in dread and anxious about your life.
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In the morning you will say, ‘If only it were evening!’ and in the evening you will say, ‘If only it were morning!’ because of the dread in your heart and the things your eyes see.
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The LORD will bring you back to Egypt in ships, by the way of which I said to you, ‘You shall never see it again.’ And there you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male slaves and female slaves, but no one will buy you.”
🌾⚖️⛈️ Summary of Deuteronomy 28 – Blessing and Curse from God
Deuteronomy 28 is the climactic warning in the Torah that describes the serious consequences of obedience or disobedience to God’s commands. This chapter is divided into two major parts:
📌 1. Blessings for Obedience (verses 1–14)
If the people of Israel truly listen and do all the commands of the LORD, then:
✅ Blessings they will receive:
- Exalted above all the nations of the earth (verse 1)
- Blessed in the city and the field (verse 3)
- Blessed in the fruit of the womb, the produce of the land, and the livestock (verse 4)
- Blessed in the basket and the kneading bowl (verse 5)
- Blessed in going out and coming in (verse 6)
- Enemies will be defeated by the LORD (verse 7)
- The LORD blesses the work of their hands (verse 8)
- The treasury of heaven is opened (rain, harvest) (verse 12)
- To become the head and not the tail, always above (verse 13)
🎯 These blessings cover every aspect of life: spiritual, social, economic, military, and family.
📌 2. Curses for Disobedience (verses 15–68)
If the people of Israel do not listen to the voice of the LORD and break His commands:
❌ Curses they will experience:
- Cursed in the city and in the field (verse 16)
- Cursed be the womb, the land, the livestock, and the food (verses 17–18)
- Defeat by enemies, confusion, and distress (verse 25)
- Disease, disaster, famine, and crop failure (verses 21–24)
- Spiritual blindness, anxiety, and fear (verses 28, 34, 65–67)
- Loss of children and property, yet unable to help (verses 32–33)
- Oppression by foreign nations, even slavery again (verses 36–37, 48)
- Loss of national identity, disgrace among the nations (verse 37)
- Siege and extreme famine until cannibalism (verses 52–57)
- Finally brought back to Egypt as slaves — and no one will buy them (verse 68)
🎯 This curse is not only physical suffering, but also spiritual, mental, and social collapse — the result of turning away from God.
📖 Main Teaching
- Obedience brings a life full of blessing and peace.
- Disobedience brings total ruin.
- God gives His people freedom to choose, but also emphasizes the consequences.
- True blessing is not only material, but also peace of soul and God’s presence.
- The curse reflects separation from the source of life: God Himself.
✨ Spiritual Meaning (New Testament)
“Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us.”
“For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus.”
Although Deuteronomy 28 emphasizes the law, the New Testament teaches that Jesus Christ bore that curse on the cross so that we may receive true spiritual blessing. Yet, obedience remains the fruit of true faith.
“If you listen to the voice of the Lord… then all these blessings will come upon you and overtake you.” – Deuteronomy 28:2
“But if you do not listen… then all these curses will come upon you and overtake you.” – Deuteronomy 28:15
