Study Desk

and that He will set you high above all the nations which He has made, for praise, fame, and honor: and that you shall be a holy people [set apart and consecrated] to the LORD your God, just as He has spoken."

"So it shall be on the day when you cross the Jordan to [enter] the land which the LORD your God gives you, that you shall set up for yourself large stones and coat them with plaster (lime, whitewash).

Then Moses and the Levitical priests said to all Israel, "Be silent and listen, O Israel! This day you have become a people for the LORD your God.

"These [tribes] shall stand on Mount Ebal to pronounce the curse [for disobedience]: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali.

"The LORD will open for you His good treasure house, the heavens, to give rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hand; and you will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow.

"Your carcasses will be food for all the birds of the sky and the beasts of the earth, and there will be no one to frighten them away.

"Your sons and daughters will be given to another people, while your eyes look on and long for them continually; but there will be nothing you can do.

"You will have sons and daughters, but they will not be yours [for long], because they will go into captivity.

"Because you did not serve the LORD your God with a heart full of joy and gladness for the abundance of all things [with which He blessed you],

a defiant nation who will have no respect for the old, nor show favor to the young,

and toward her afterbirth that comes from between her legs and toward the children whom she bears; for she will eat them secretly for lack of anything else, during the siege and the misery by which your enemy will oppress you in your cities.

"Among those nations you will find no peace (rest), and there will be no resting place for the sole of your foot; but there the LORD will give you a trembling heart, failing eyes, and a despairing soul.

"The LORD will bring you back to Egypt in ships, by the way about which I said to you, 'You will never see it again!' And there you will offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no one to buy you."

(for you know how we lived in the land of Egypt, and how we passed through the nations along the way;

"Then the LORD will single him out for disaster from all the tribes of Israel [making an example of him], according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this Book of the Law.

'For they went and served other gods and worshiped them, [false] gods whom they have not known and whom He had not allotted (given) to them.

"Then the LORD your God shall make you abundantly prosperous in everything that you do, in the offspring of your body and in the offspring of your cattle and in the produce of your land; for the LORD will again delight over you for good, just as He delighted over your fathers,

"For this commandment which I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it out of reach.

"It is not [a secret hidden] in heaven, that you should say, 'Who will go up to heaven for us and bring it to us, so that we may hear it and obey it?'

"Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, 'Who will cross the sea for us and bring it to us, so that we may hear it and obey it?'