Deuteronomy 28:36-46

THOUGHT QUESTIONS 28:36-46

494.

Consider the chronology involved in Deuteronomy 28:36. How many years for the conquest? How many years in the period of Judges? How long before the nation of Israel was taken into captivity?

495.

Which captivity is prophesied here?

496.

We should learn the oft repeated lesson: what is so many times referred to as good luck is actually God's blessing; what is called bad luck is God's chastizment.

497.

Read Jeremiah 16:13; Jeremiah 44:17-19 for one fulfillment.

498.

There is a contrast in Deuteronomy 28:15 and Deuteronomy 28:43-44. What is it?

499.

According to Deuteronomy 28:46 what was to be a sign to the nation of Israel?

AMPLIFIED TRANSLATION 28:36-46

36 The Lord shall bring you and your king whom you have set over you, to a nation which neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you shall [be forced to] serve other gods, of wood and stone. [Fulfilled, 2 Kings 17:4; 2 Kings 17:6; 2 Kings 24:12; 2 Kings 24:14; 2 Kings 25:7; 2 Kings 25:11; Daniel 6:11-12.]

37 And you shall become an amazement, a proverb, and a byword, among all peoples to which the Lord will lead you.

38 You shall carry much seed out into the field, and shall gather little in; for the locust shall consume it. [Fulfilled, Haggai 1:6.]

39 You shall plant vineyards and dress them, but 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 shall not anoint yourself with the oil; for your olive trees shall drop their fruit.

41 You shall beget sons and daughters, but shall not enjoy them; for they shall go into captivity. [Fulfilled, Lamentations 1:5.]

42 All your trees and the fruit of your ground shall the locust possess. [Fulfilled, Joel 1:4.]

43 The transient (stranger) among you shall mount up higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower.
44 He shall lend to you, and you shall not lend to him; he shall be the head, and you shall be the tail.
45 All these curses shall come upon you and shall pursue you and overtake you, till you are destroyed, because you do not obey the voice of the Lord your God, to keep His commandments and His statutes which He commanded you;
46 They shall be upon you for a sign [of warning to other nations] and for a wonder, and upon your descendants for ever.

COMMENT 28:36-46

A NATION THAT THOU HAST NOT KNOWN, THOU NOR THY FATHERS; AND THERE SHALT THOU SERVE OTHER GODS, WOOD AND STONE (Deuteronomy 28:36)What nation in history that has conquered and carried away Israel, best fits this prophecy? But before we proceed further, we must ask the question, Is God always referring to the same nation in this chapter, or are his words at times general in scope, with perhaps a number of specific fulfillments? We must immediately answer that the last statement is at least true so far as history is concerned: history will show a number of nations that meet the requirements of most of these scriptures, such as Persia, Babylonia, Assyria, Greece and Rome. And who is to say these nations were not instruments in the hand of God. (Daniel 4:31-32; Daniel 4:35; Jeremiah 1:10; Jeremiah 18:5-9)? Some are overwhelmingly convinced that the Babylonian siege and captivity, and that only, was in the mind of God throughout these verses. We could not deny this in such verses as Deuteronomy 28:36, but in Deuteronomy 28:49; Deuteronomy 28:52-53 the destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman legions so perfectly fits the description that it surely can be called one fulfillment of the prophecy. And this writer would be hard pressed to deny the claim of one who argued that the atrocities and wholesale murders of the Jews by the Germans before and during World War II was another fulfillment of several statements in Deuteronomy 28. The atrocities were cruel, inhuman, and malicious on the part of the Germans, but so are those described here!

As a general rule we may say that Deuteronomy 28:36-46 better describe the Babylonian siege and captivity, and Deuteronomy 28:47-57 the Roman. Compare this first section with Deuteronomy 4:25-31 and note the promise of returning to their homeland when they returned to God. This, of course, was especially true of the seventy-year Babylonian captivity.

Since 1948 Israel, as a result of the Zionist movement, has again been officially recognized as a nation. In the summer of 1967 they won an important victory over the Arabs, regaining the Arab sector of Jerusalem and other important territory to the south. But what of Israel's future? As long as she continues to reject the Messiah her prosperity can only be temporary.

A NATION THAT THOU HAST NOT KNOWN (Deuteronomy 28:36)with reference to the Babylonian captivity, Jeremiah said, therefore will I [God] cast you forth out of this land into the land that ye have not known, neither ye nor your fathers; and there shall ye serve other gods day and night. (Jeremiah 16:13). The Hebrew exiles, with some honourable exceptions, were seduced or compelled into idolatry in the Assyrian and Babylonish captivities (Jeremiah 44:17-19). Thus, the sin to which they had too often betrayed a perverse fondness, a deep-rooted propensity, became their punishment and their misery (J.F.B.).

The nation described in Deuteronomy 28:49, on the other hand, was not only from far, but had a language foreign to the Hebrews. Compare Daniel 3:6-7. Babylon would fulfill the not known requirement, but their language was a kindred one to the Hebrews-'. See Deuteronomy 28:49.

Note here too that Israel's king was to be taken in this captivitywhich was true of the Chaldean conquest, not the Roman.

THEY SHALL GO INTO CAPTIVITY (Deuteronomy 28:41)True of the Northern ten tribes to some degree (2 Kings 17:6; 2 Kings 18:11-12) but more literally fulfilled when Jerusalem was sacked by Nebuchadnezzar, 2 Kings 24:14; 2 Kings 25:11, 2 Chronicles 36:20, Jeremiah 22:24-28. Henry Cooke (N.S.I.B.L.) adds, Besides the captivities recorded in the Old Testament, the destruction of Jerusalem after [during]the Christian era was accompanied by the captivity of many thousands of all ages and sexes, and their exposure to sale and slavery.

THE SOJOURNER THAT IS IN THE MIDST OF THEE SHALL MOUNT UP HIGHER AND HIGHER (Deuteronomy 28:43)Especially well illustrated in the case of the Assyrian infiltration, then domination, of the ten northern tribes (2 Kings 15:19; 2 Kings 15:29; 2 Kings 17:1-6). Perhaps the Seleucid domination even better depicts this description. The conquests of Alexander the great of Macedonia, at least as far as its immediate effect, was benign, in that it relieved the Jews of the galling yoke of the Persians. But upon Alexander's death Palestine became part of one of the five divisions of the empire, Ruled from Syria by the hated Seleucid dynasty even into Roman times, the Jews finally revolted under the leadership of the Macabees in 166 B.C.

HE SHALL LEND TO THEE (Deuteronomy 28:44)Contrast Deuteronomy 28:12, Deuteronomy 15:6. And remember that borrowing often inferred subjection, Proverbs 22:7.

AND THEY SHALL BE, etc. (Deuteronomy 28:46)a better rendering is, They shall serve as signs and proofs against you and your offspring for all time. (The Torah)

47 Because thou servedst not Jehovah thy God with joyfulness, and with gladness of heart, by reason of the abundance of all things; 48 therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies that Jehovah shall send against thee, in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all things: and he shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck, until he have destroyed thee. 49 Jehovah will bring a nation against thee from far, from the end of the earth, as the eagle flieth; a nation whose tongue thou shalt not understand; 50 a nation of fierce countenance, that shall not regard the person of the old, nor show favor to the young, 51 and shall eat the fruit of thy cattle, and the fruit of thy ground, until thou be destroyed; that also shall not leave thee grain, new wine, or oil, the increase of thy cattle, or the young of thy flock, until they have caused thee to perish. 52 And they shall besiege thee in all thy gates, until thy high and fortified walls come down, wherein thou trustedst, throughout all thy land; and they shall besiege thee in all thy gates throughout all thy land, which Jehovah thy God hath given thee. 53 And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters, whom Jehovah thy God hath given thee, in the siege and in the distress wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee. 54 The man that is tender among you, and very delicate, his eye shall be evil toward his brother, and toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the remnant of his children whom he hath remaining; 55 so that he will not give to any of them of the flesh of his children whom he shall eat, because he hath nothing left him, in the siege and in the distress wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in all thy gates. 56 The tender and delicate woman among you, who would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil toward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward her daughter, 57 and toward her young one that cometh out from between her feet, and toward her children whom she shall bear; for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly, in the siege and in the distress wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates.