Deuteronomy 28:21

The LORD shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee, until he have consumed thee from off the land, whither thou goest to possess it.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(21) The pestilence.—One of God’s four sore judgments to be sent upon Jerusalem (Ezekiel 14:19-21).

Until he have consumed thee from off the land.—From Deuteronomy 28:21-35, inclusive, we seem to be reading of the gradual consumption of Israel “in the land of promise” before any actual captivity.

Benson Commentary

Deuteronomy 28:21-24. Shall make the pestilence cleave to thee — Sometimes Divine Providence shall scourge you by one calamity, and sometimes by another, and they will cut off your people in great numbers. Thy heaven shall be brass — Dry, and shut up from giving rain or dew. The earth iron — Exceeding hard through drought, and barren. The rain of thy land powder and dust — As unprofitable to thy ground or seed as if it were only so much dust. Or rather, by reason of long droughts, dust blown up into the air by winds shall fall in showers instead of rain.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

28:15-44 If we do not keep God's commandments, we not only come short of the blessing promised, but we lay ourselves under the curse, which includes all misery, as the blessing all happiness. Observe the justice of this curse. It is not a curse causeless, or for some light cause. The extent and power of this curse. Wherever the sinner goes, the curse of God follows; wherever he is, it rests upon him. Whatever he has is under a curse. All his enjoyments are made bitter; he cannot take any true comfort in them, for the wrath of God mixes itself with them. Many judgments are here stated, which would be the fruits of the curse, and with which God would punish the people of the Jews, for their apostacy and disobedience. We may observe the fulfilling of these threatenings in their present state. To complete their misery, it is threatened that by these troubles they should be bereaved of all comfort and hope, and left to utter despair. Those who walk by sight, and not by faith, are in danger of losing reason itself, when every thing about them looks frightful.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

First series of judgments. The curse of God should rest on all they did, and should issue in manifold forms of disease, in famine, and in defeat in war.

Deuteronomy 28:20

Vexation - Rather, confusion: the word in the original is used Deuteronomy 7:23; 1 Samuel 14:20 for the panic and disorder with which the curse of God smites His foes.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

21. pestilence—some fatal epidemic. There is no reason, however, to think that the plague, which is the great modern scourge of the East, is referred to.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

The Lord shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee,.... Not only to come upon them; but to continue with them:

until he have consumed thee from off the land whither thou goest to possess it; which shows that this respects not some particular seasons, when the pestilence came and continued awhile, and then ceased, as in the times of David; but when it became more general, and issued with other judgments in the utter consumption of them, as at the destruction of Jerusalem, both by the Babylonians and the Romans; at what times the pestilence raged and remained, until by that and other sore judgments the land was wholly depopulated.

Geneva Study Bible

The LORD shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee, until he have consumed thee from off the land, whither thou goest to possess it.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

21. pestilence] Heb. deber, a general word (originally = death); in J, Exodus 5:3; Exodus 9:15, Hosea 13:14, Amos 4:10. See Baldensperger, PEFQ, 1906, 97 ff. LXX here θάνατος.

whither thou goest in to possess it] The usual phrase in the Sg. passages; see on Deuteronomy 6:1. For the corresponding Pl. phrase see Deuteronomy 4:26.

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 21, 22. - The afflictive visitations here named are such as destroy life; but the distinctive character of each it is not easy exactly to define. The pestilence is probably a generic term for any fatal epidemic. In the LXX. it is usually represented by the general word Odoacer, death. Consumption; literally, wasting; the designation of any species of tabes or marasmus. Fever (דַּלֶּקֶת, from דָּלַק, to be parched, to glow); inflammation (חַחְתֻר, from חָרַר, to burn); burning fever (קַדַּחַת, from קָדַח, to kindle): different species of pyrexia, the distinction between which has not been determined. The sword. Instead of חֶרֶב, sword, the Vulgate, Arabic, and Samaritan adopt the reading חֹרֶב, heat, drought (Genesis 31:40); but all the other versions support the reading of the received text, and there is no reason why it should be departed from, more especially as drought is threatened in the verse that follows. Blasting and with mildew; diseases that attack the grain (Amos 4:9); the former (שִׁדָּפון, from שָׁדַּפ, to scorch, to blast) a withering or scorching of the ears caused by the east wind (Genesis 41:23); the latter (יֵרָקון, from יָרַק, to be yellowish) the effect produced by a hot wind, which turns the ears yellow, so that they are rendered unproductive. Deuteronomy 28:21

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The first view, in which the bursting of the threatened curse upon the disobedient people is proclaimed in all its forms. First of all, quite generally in Deuteronomy 28:20. "The Lord will send the curse against thee, consternation and threatening in every undertaking of thy hand which thou carriest out (see Deuteronomy 12:7), till thou be destroyed, till thou perish quickly, because of the wickedness of thy doings, because thou hast forsaken Me." The three words, מארה, מהוּמה, and מגערת, are synonymous, and are connected together to strengthen the thought. מארה, curse or malediction; המּהוּמה, the consternation produced by the curse of God, namely, the confusion with which God smites His foes (see at Deuteronomy 7:23); המּגערה is the threatening word of the divine wrath. - Then Deuteronomy 28:21. in detail. "The Lord will make the pestilence fasten upon (cleave to) thee, till He hath destroyed thee out of the land...to smite thee with giddiness and fever (cf. Leviticus 26:16), inflammation, burning, and sword, blasting of corn, and mildew (of the seed);" seven diseases therefore (seven as the stamp of the words of God), whilst pestilence in particular is mentioned first, as the most terrible enemy of life. דּלּקת, from דּלק to burn, and חרחר, from חרר to glow, signify inflammatory diseases, burning fevers; the distinction between these and קדּחת cannot be determined. Instead of חרב, the sword as the instrument of death, used to designate slaughter and death, the Vulgate, Arabic, and Samaritan have adopted the reading חרב, aestus, heat (Genesis 31:40), or drought, according to which there would be four evils mentioned by which human life is attacked, and three which are injurious to the corn. But as the lxx, Jon., Syr., and others read חרב, this alteration is very questionable, especially as the reading can be fully defended in this connection; and one objection to the alteration is, that drought is threatened for the first time in Deuteronomy 28:23, Deuteronomy 28:24. שׁדּפון, from שׁדף to singe or blacken, and ירקון, from ירק to be yellowish, refer to two diseases which attack the corn: the former to the withering or burning of the ears, caused by the east wind (Genesis 41:23); the other to the effect produced by a warm wind in Arabia, by which the green ears are turned yellow, so that they bear no grains of corn.