Deuteronomy 28:47-57

THOUGHT QUESTIONS 28:47-57

500.

Joyfulness and gladness are an essential ingredient for acceptableness with Jehovah; Why?

501.

Who put a yoke of iron upon the neck of Israel?

502.

Note the three characteristics of the nation brought in by God to oppress Israel.

503.

Notice the progressive nature of the siege; list the steps.

504.

War makes animals of men. Why?

505.

Is there no one who will remain true to his standards of ethics regardless of circumstances? Discuss.

AMPLIFIED TRANSLATION 28:47-57

47 Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joyfulness of [mind and] heart [in gratitude] for the abundance of all [with which He had blessed you].
48 Therefore -you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord shall send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and in want of all things; and He will put a yoke of iron upon your neck, until He has destroyed you.
49 The Lord will bring a nation against you from afar, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flies, a nation whose language you shall not understand;
50 A nation of unyielding countenance, who will not regard the person of the old, or show favor to the young.
51 And shall eat the fruit of your cattle and the fruit of your ground, until you are destroyed; who also shall not leave you grain, new wine, oil, the increase of your cattle or the young of your sheep until they have caused you to perish.
52 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 your land, which the Lord your God has given you.

53 And you shall eat the fruit of your own body, the flesh of your sons and daughters, whom the Lord your God has given you, in the siege and in the (pressing) misery with which your enemies shall distress you, [Fulfilled, 2 Kings 6:24-29.]

54 The man who is most tender among you, and extremely particular and well-bred, his eye shall be cruel and grudging of food toward his brother, and toward the wife of his bosom, and toward those of his children still remaining;
55 So that he will not give to any of them any of the flesh of his children which he is eating, because he has nothing left him in the siege and in the distress with which your enemies shall distress you in all your towns.
56 The most tender and daintily bred woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot upon the ground because she is so dainty and kind, will grudge to the husband of her bosom, to her son, and to her daughter.
57 Her afterbirth that comes out from her body and the children whom she shall bear; for she will eat them secretly for want of all else in the siege and distress with which your enemies shall distress you in your towns.

COMMENT 28:47-57

These verses, while in certain instances aptly describing the Babylonian and other invaders and their treatment of Israel, are especially descriptive of the Roman siege of Judea and Jerusalem. In 66 A.D. the Jews openly rebelled against the Roman rule and violence, and gained control of Jerusalem. Rome's first counter was to send, late in the summer of 66 A.D. 40,000 soldiers from Antioch under the Roman legate in Syria, Cestius Gallus. But he was thoroughly routed by the Jews in and around Jerusalem, and retreated minus 6,000 of his men, Word of Gallus-' sorry failure was hurried to Rome, and Nero now chose his greatest general, Titus Flavius Vespasian, to put Palestine, and Jerusalem particularly, into its proper place. By the spring of 67 A.D. he had 50,000 troops massed at Ptolemais on the coast north of Mount Carmel. Bit by bit, he successfully crushed opposition in the areas of Samaria, Peraea, and Idumaea. But in June of 68 Nero died and Vespasian himself was placed upon the throne. The Jewish war was abandoned for almost two years. Finally, in the spring of 70, another sizeable Roman army was organized, this time at Caesarea, and its command entrusted to the emperor's own son, Titus. Many of the statements of this chapter describe his conquest of Jerusalem as perfectly as if it was written some 1500 years later.

BECAUSE THOU SERVEST NOT, etc. Read Deuteronomy 28:47 slowly and carefully through again, and note Deuteronomy 28:48 begins THEREFORE. Here is the verse upon which all the prophecies of doom in this entire chapter are pedicated! Israel did not serve Jehovah with a full, rich, glad heart EVEN THOUGH HE BLESSED THEM WITH THE ABUNDANCE OF ALL THINGS! Therefore they would get a WANT OF ALL THINGS (Deuteronomy 28:48). Oh that this passage could be burned into the heart and emblazoned across the consciousness of every professing Christian! If such heartfelt and joyous service was part and parcel with a faithful keeping of the Mosaic law, how much more our devotion to Christ and our faithful service to Him! As we saw so plainly in Deuteronomy 6:4 ff., the law demanded more than mechanical, perfunctory, stoical observance of precepts. If it was so then, how much more now, when under the gospel everything is dependent upon our right relationship with that One who promised He that findeth his life shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it?

Nevernever in the history of the world has God accepted service to Him that was not earnest, sincere, and spontaneous. He never will. And here the rebuke is levelled at a nation who failed to give God such service in spite of prosperity and plenty from his very hand. Frequently they feared Jehovah, and served their own gods, and did secretly things that were not right against Jehovah (See 2 Kings 17).

AND HE SHALL PUT A YOKE OF IRON UPON THY NECK, UNTIL HE HAVE DESTROYED THEE (Deuteronomy 28:48)See our previous discussion of destroy, Deuteronomy 28:20. The Babylonian domination and captivity was called an iron yoke (Jeremiah 28:13-14). And that captivity may be symbolized here. But, as a good many expositors have pointed out, iron was symbolic of the rule of Rome, who employed that metal in their armies far more than any previous -nation. Daniel used the metal to symbolize this empire, Daniel 2:40-43; Daniel 7:7.

A NATION AGAINST THEE FROM FAR, FROM THE END OF THE EARTH, AS THE EAGLE FLIETH; A NATION WHOSE TONGUE THOU SHALT NOT UNDERSTAND (Deuteronomy 28:49)This particular verse would appear to rule out the Babylonians, for their language, at least at the time of their conquest of Judah (586 B.C.) had marked similarities to the Hebrew. Probably because of the widespread migrations of the Aramaeans, by the year 1000 B.C. Aramaic was spoken extensively in the land of Babylon. This language became somewhat of a lingua franca (hybrid language) of the whole Tigris-Euphrates valley. Thus Sennacberib, king of Assyria, could communicate (through Rabshakeh) to the leaders of Israel in the Syrian language (literally, Aramean), 2 Kings 18:26, though at that time most Israelites could not understand it (Isaiah 36:11), And Artaxerxes, king of Persia, received a communication from the enemies of Israel in the same language, Ezra 4:7. The Hebrews also used Aramaic increasingly after the exile, and in all probability learned it in Babylon, Daniel and his friends, for example, were taught the learning and tongue of the Chaldeans (Daniel 1:4), and the Syrian language was in vogue (Deuteronomy 2:4). Aramaic is like Hebrew and Arayian, a North Semitic tongue, standing in a manner between them. before the reign of Tiglath-pileser Aramaic was the general speech for commerce and diplomacy all over S.W. Asia. generally understood from Asia Minor on the north to the Cataracts of the Nile on the south, and from the mountains of Media on the east to the Mediterranean on the west (I.S.B.E.).

Thus we look for an invader outside the Near East for this prophecy's fulfillment. Rome, whose capital was some 1500 miles from Jerusalem as the crow flies certainly qualifies as one from far, from the end of the earth. And her Latin languages, so totally different from the Hebrew, certainly was a tongue thou shalt not understand. A Hebrew could no more understand Latin than an American can understand Chinese.

AS THE EAGLE FLIETH (Deuteronomy 28:49)as swift as the eagle flies (R.S.V.) or swooping down upon you like an eagle.[48] The Roman standard was an eagle, which has been called the appropriate emblem of their soaring pride, their far-sighted cupidity, their swift descent, and their insatiable rapacity (Cooke, N.S.I.B.L.).

[48] Some render the Heb. word Nesher, (a tearer with the beak) vulture. But the context of the most passages where the word occurs almost demand eagle: 2 Samuel 1:23, Proverbs 30:19, Isaiah 40:31, Obadiah 1:4. It should also be mentioned that the flight and ways of the eagle are also used to describe Babylon's conquest, Isaiah 8:8.

A NATION OF FIERCE COUNTENANCE (Deuteronomy 28:50)The verses to follow illustrate this truth. The conquering nation then, is to be distinguished by three characteristics:

1.

It was to come from far, from the end of the earth.

2.

Its language was to be one not understood by Israel.

3.

It was to be unmerciful and ruthless to all classes of persons.

Such were the Romans, whose devastating conquests were to come a millennium and a half after these utterances;

AND THOU SHALT EAT THE FRUIT OF THINE OWN BODY (Deuteronomy 28:53)See also Leviticus 26:27-29, 2 Kings 6:29, also Jeremiah 19:9, where the Babylonian siege is referred to. Such atrocities describe conditions of great famine, or a people who are being starved out by the enemy. See 2 Kings 6:24-29, describing conditions as Ben-hadad of Syria besieged Samaria (Israel). Also, in anticipation of the Babylonian siege, see Lamentations 2:20; Lamentations 4:10. Starving people are desperate people! Josephus, describing the Roman siege, tells how parents seized morsels of food from their children (though they were perishing) and how old men who held on to their food were beaten.. and if women hid what they had within their hands, their hair was torn for so doing; nor was there any commiseration shown either to the aged or to the infants, but they lifted up children from the ground as they hung upon the morsels they had gotten, and shook them down upon the floor.[49]

[49] Wars of the Jews, Book V Ch. X, #3.

He later describes a starving woman who slew and roasted her own son, a babe still sucking at her breast.. she slew her son, and then roasted him, and ate the one half of him, and kept the other half by her concealed.[50]

[50] Ibid, Book VI, Ch. III, #4.

AND THE MAN THAT IS TENDER AMONG YOU, AND VERY DELICATE, HIS EYE SHALL BE EVIL (Deuteronomy 28:54). THE TENDER AND DELICATE WOMAN (Deuteronomy 28:56)War and starvation will turn them into ravenous animalsthough they normally be refined and reserved. In the case cited above, for example, Josephus reports that the woman, upon being discovered by a group of fellow-Jews, said, ... Come, eat of this food; for I have eaten of it myself! Do not you pretend to be either more tender than a woman or more compassionate than a mother.

58 If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, JEHOVAH THY GOD; 59 then Jehovah will make thy plagues wonderful, and the plagues of thy seed, even great plagues, and of long continuance, and sore sicknesses, and of long continuance. 60 And he will bring upon thee again all the diseases of Egypt, which thou was afraid of; and they shall cleave unto thee. 61 Also every sickness, and every plague, which is not written in the book of this law, them will Jehovah bring upon thee, until thou be destroyed. 62 And ye shall be left few in number, whereas ye were as the stars of heaven for multitude; because thou didst not hearken unto the voice of Jehovah thy God. 63 And it shall come to pass, that, as Jehovah rejoiced over you to do you good, and to multiply you, so Jehovah will rejoice over you to cause you to perish, and to destroy you; and ye shall be plucked from off the land whither thou goest in to possess it. 64 And Jehovah will scatter thee among all peoples, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; and there thou shalt serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou nor thy fathers, even wood and stone. 65 And among these nations shalt thou find no ease, and there shall be no rest for the sole of thy foot: but Jehovah will give thee there a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and pining of soul; 66 and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee; and thou shalt fear night and day, and shalt have no assurance of thy life. 67 In the morning thou shalt say, Would it were even! and at even thou shalt say, Would it were morning; for the fear of thy heart which thou shalt fear, and for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see. 68 And Jehovah will bring thee into Egypt again with ships, by the way whereof I said unto thee, Thou shalt see it no more again: and there ye shall sell yourselves unto your enemies for bondmen and for bondwomen, and no man shall buy you.