Deuteronomy 28:3

Blessed shalt thou be in the city, and blessed shalt thou be in the field.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

28:1-14 This chapter is a very large exposition of two words, the blessing and the curse. They are real things and have real effects. The blessings are here put before the curses. God is slow to anger, but swift to show mercy. It is his delight to bless. It is better that we should be drawn to what is good by a child-like hope of God's favour, than that we be frightened to it by a slavish fear of his wrath. The blessing is promised, upon condition that they diligently hearken to the voice of God. Let them keep up religion, the form and power of it, in their families and nation, then the providence of God would prosper all their outward concerns.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

A comparison of this chapter with Exodus 23:20-23 and Leviticus 26 will show how Moses here resumes and amplifies the promises and threats already set forth in the earlier records of the Law. The language rises in this chapter to the sublimest strains, especially in the latter part of it; and the prophecies respecting the dispersion and degradation of the Jewish nation in its later days are among the most remarkable in scripture. They are plain, precise, and circumstantial; and the fulfillment of them has been literal, complete, and undeniable.

The Blessing. The six repetitions of the word "blessed" introduce the particular forms which the blessing would take in the various relations of life.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2. all these blessings shall come on thee—Their national obedience was to be rewarded by extraordinary and universal prosperity.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Blessed shalt thou be in the city,.... Not only in the city of Jerusalem, where the temple would be built, and there be blessed with the service, worship, and ordinances of God, but in all other cities of the land; where they should dwell in title, large, and spacious houses, and their cities should be walled and fenced, and be very populous; yet should enjoy health, and have plenty of all sorts of provisions brought unto them, as well as prosper in all kinds of merchandise there, as Aben Ezra notes:

and blessed shalt thou be in the field; in the country villages, and in all rural employments, in sowing and planting, as the same writer observes; in all kinds of husbandry, in the culture of the fields for corn, and of vineyards and oliveyards; all should prosper and succeed, and bring forth fruit abundantly.

Geneva Study Bible

Blessed shalt thou be in the {c} city, and blessed shalt thou be in the field.

(c) You will live richly.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

3–6. Six forms of blessing, each introd. by the pass. part, of the vb. to bless. They cover Israel’s life: in town and field, in their offspring, crops and cattle, annual harvests and daily bread, all their movement out and in. The structure of the first two and last three is uniform: with 3 accents. The longer third, Deuteronomy 28:4, has been expanded; fruit of thy cattle does not appear in LXX nor in the parallel Deuteronomy 28:18, and is probably a gloss from Deuteronomy 28:11.

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 3-7. - The fullness of the blessing in all the relations of life, external and internal, is presented in six particulars, each introduced by the word "blessed." Israel should be blessed in the house and in the field, in the fruit of the body, in the productions of the soil and the increase of herd and flock, in the store and in the use of what nature provided, - in all their undertakings, whether in peace or in war, at home or abroad. Basket and thy store; rather, basket and kneading-trough (see Exodus 8:3; Exodus 12:34); "the basket" representing the store in which the fruits of the earth were laid up, the "kneading-trough" the use of these for the supply of daily needs (ver. 6; cf. Numbers 27:17; Psalm 121:8). Deuteronomy 28:3

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Blessing. - Deuteronomy 28:1. If Israel would hearken to the voice of the Lord its God, the Lord would make it the highest of all the nations of the earth. This thought, with which the discourse on the law in Deuteronomy 26:19 terminated, forms the theme, and in a certain sense the heading, of the following description of the blessing, through which the Lord, according to the more distinct declaration in Deuteronomy 28:2, would glorify His people above all the nations of the earth. The indispensable condition for obtaining this blessing, was obedience to the word of the Lord, or keeping His commandments. To impress this condition sine qua non thoroughly upon the people, Moses not only repeats it at the commencement (Deuteronomy 28:2), and in the middle (Deuteronomy 28:9), but also at the close (Deuteronomy 28:13, Deuteronomy 28:14), in both a positive and a negative form. In Deuteronomy 28:2, "the way in which Israel was to be exalted is pointed out" (Schultz); and thus the theme is more precisely indicated, and the elaboration of it is introduced. "All these blessings (those mentioned singly in what follows) will come upon thee and reach thee." The blessings are represented as actual powers, which follow the footsteps of the nation, and overtake it. In Deuteronomy 28:3-6, the fulness of the blessing of God in all the relations of life is depicted in a sixfold repetition of the word "blessed." Israel will be blessed in the town and in the field, the two spheres in which its life moves (Deuteronomy 28:3); blessed will be the fruit of the body, of the earth, and of the cattle, i.e., in all its productions (Deuteronomy 28:4; for each one, see Deuteronomy 7:13-14); blessed will be the basket (Deuteronomy 26:2) in which the fruits are kept, and the kneading - trough (Exodus 12:34) in which the daily bread is prepared (Deuteronomy 28:5); blessed will the nation be in all its undertakings ("coming in and going out;" vid., Numbers 27:17).