Deuteronomy 28

1And it shall be, if you diligently obey the voice of Yahweh your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I am commanding you today, then Yahweh your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.

2And all these blessings will come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of Yahweh your God.

3Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field.

4Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your ground, and the fruit of your livestock—the offspring of your herds and the young of your flocks.

5Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.

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

7Yahweh will give your enemies who rise up against you defeated before you. By one way they will come out against you, and by seven ways they will flee before you.

8Yahweh will command the blessing on you in your storehouses and in all the work of your hand, and he will bless you in the land that Yahweh your God is giving you.

9Yahweh will establish you for himself as a holy people, just as he swore to you, if you keep the commandments of Yahweh your God and walk in his ways.

10Then all the peoples of the earth will see that the name of Yahweh is called upon you, and they will fear you.

11And Yahweh 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, on the land that Yahweh swore to your fathers to give you.

12Yahweh will open to you his good storehouse, the heavens, to give the rain of your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hand. You will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow.

13And Yahweh will make you the head and not the tail, and you will be only above, and you will not be beneath, if you listen to the commandments of Yahweh your God that I am commanding you today, to keep and to do them.

14And do not turn aside from any of the words that I am commanding you today, to the right or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.

15But if you do not listen to the voice of Yahweh your God, to keep and to do all his commandments and his statutes that I am commanding you today, then all these curses will come upon you and overtake you.

16Cursed are you in the city, and cursed are you in the field.

17Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.

18Cursed shall be the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your ground, the offspring of your herds and the young of your flocks.

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

20Yahweh will send on you the curse, the confusion, and the rebuke in every undertaking of your hand that you do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly, because of the evil of your deeds by which you have forsaken me.

21Yahweh will make the plague cling to you until he has wiped you out from the land that you are entering to possess.

22Yahweh will strike you with wasting disease, with fever, with inflammation, with burning heat, with the sword, with blight, and with mildew; and they will pursue you until you perish.

23And the heavens above your head shall be bronze, and the earth beneath you iron.

24Yahweh will make the rain of your land dust and powder; from the heavens it will come down on you until you are destroyed.

25Yahweh will give you over as defeated before your enemies. You will go out against them by one way, and by seven ways you will flee before them, and you will become a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.

26Your carcass will become food for every bird of the sky and for the beasts of the earth, and there will be no one to frighten them away.

27Yahweh will strike you with the boils of Egypt, and with tumors, and with scabs, and with itch, from which you cannot be healed.

28Yahweh will strike you with madness and blindness and confusion of heart.

29And you will grope at noon as the blind gropes in the darkness, and you will not prosper in your ways; and you will be only oppressed and robbed all the days, with no one to save you.

30You will become engaged to a wife, but another man will lie with her; you will build a house, but you will not live in it; you will plant a vineyard, but you will not begin to use its fruit.

31Your ox will be slaughtered before your eyes, but you will not eat any of it; your donkey will be seized from before you and will not be returned to you; your flock will be given to your enemies, and there will be no one to save you.

32Your sons and your daughters will be given to another people, while your eyes look on and fail with longing for them all day long, but your hand will be powerless.

33A people whom you have not known will eat the fruit of your land and all your labor, and you will be only oppressed and crushed all your days.

34And you will be driven mad by the sight your eyes see.

35Yahweh will strike you with severe boils on the knees and on the legs, from which you cannot be healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.

36Yahweh will bring you and the king whom you set over yourself to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you will serve other gods, wood and stone.

37And you shall become an object of horror, a proverb, and a taunt among all the peoples where Yahweh will drive you.

38You will carry much seed out to the field, but you will gather in little, because the locust will consume it.

39You will plant vineyards and cultivate them, but you will not drink the wine or gather it, because the worm will eat it.

40You will have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you will not anoint yourself with oil, because your olives will fall off.

41You will father sons and daughters, but they will not remain yours, because they will go into captivity.

42The cricket shall take possession of all your trees and the fruit of your ground.

43The foreigner who is among you will rise higher and higher above you, and you will go down lower and lower.

44He will lend to you, but you will not lend to him; he will be the head, and you will be the tail.

45And all these curses will come upon you and pursue you and overtake you, until you are destroyed, because you did not listen to the voice of Yahweh your God, to keep his commandments and his statutes that he commanded you.

46And they will be on you and on your offspring as a sign and a wonder forever.

47because you did not serve Yahweh your God with joy and with gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things,

48And you shall serve your enemies, whom Yahweh will send against you, in hunger and in thirst and in nakedness and in lack of everything; and he will put an iron yoke on your neck until he has destroyed you.

49Yahweh will raise up against you a nation from far away, from the end of the earth, as the eagle swoops down—a nation whose language you will not understand.

50a fierce-faced nation, one that shows no regard for the old and shows no favor to the young.

51It will consume the offspring of your livestock and the produce of your land until you are destroyed; it will leave you no grain, new wine, or oil, no calves of your herd or lambs of your flock, until it has destroyed you.

52And he will besiege you in all your gates until your high and fortified walls, in which you trust, come down throughout all your land; and he will besiege you in all your gates throughout all your land that Yahweh your God has given you.

53And you will eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your sons and daughters whom Yahweh your God has given you, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy will oppress you.

54The man who is tender among you and very delicate—his eye will be hostile toward his brother, toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the rest of his children whom he has left.

55so that he will not give to any of them any of the flesh of his sons that he is eating, because he has nothing left, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy will oppress you within all your gates.

56The tender and delicate woman among you, who has not ventured to set the sole of her foot on the ground because of delicacy and tenderness, her eye will be evil toward the husband of her embrace, and toward her son and her daughter—

57and toward her afterbirth that comes out from between her legs, and toward her children whom she bears, because she will eat them secretly, in the lack of everything, during the siege and distress with which your enemy will oppress you within your gates.

58If you are not careful to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, to fear this glorious and awesome name—Yahweh your God—

59then Yahweh will make your plagues and the plagues of your offspring extraordinary—great and lasting plagues, and severe and lasting sicknesses.

60And he will bring back upon you all the diseases of Egypt that you dreaded, and they will cling to you.

61Also every sickness and every affliction that is not written in the book of this law, Yahweh will bring upon you until you are destroyed.

62And you will be left few in number, though you had become as numerous as the stars of the heavens, because you did not listen to the voice of Yahweh your God.

63And it shall be that, just as Yahweh rejoiced over you to do you good and to multiply you, so Yahweh will rejoice over you to destroy you and to wipe you out; and you will be torn away from upon the land that you are entering there to possess it.

64And Yahweh will scatter you among all the peoples, from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth, and there you will serve other gods that neither you nor your fathers have known—wood and stone.

65And among those nations you will find no rest, and there will be no resting place for the sole of your foot; and there Yahweh will give you a trembling heart, failing eyes, and anguish of soul.

66Your life will hang in doubt before you; you will fear night and day, and you will have no assurance of your life.

67In 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 of your heart that you will dread, and because of the sight your eyes will see.

68And Yahweh 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 will offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male servants and female servants, but there will be no buyer.

69These are the words of the covenant that Yahweh commanded Moses to make with the sons of Israel in the land of Moab, besides the covenant that he made with them at Horeb.