Leviticus 26:17

And I will set my face against you, and ye shall be slain before your enemies: they that hate you shall reign over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth you.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(17) And I will set my face against you.—That is, make them feel his anger. (See Note on Leviticus 17:10.)

Be slain before your enemies.—Better, be smitten before your enemies, as this phrase is rendered in the Authorised Version (Numbers 14:42; Deuteronomy 1:42; Deuteronomy 28:25).

Shall reign over you.—Better, shall rule over you, as the Authorised Version renders it in Isaiah 14:2; Ezekiel 29:15; Ezekiel 34:4, &c.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

26:14-39 After God has set the blessing before them which would make them a happy people if they would be obedient, he here sets the curse before them, the evils which would make them miserable, if they were disobedient. Two things would bring ruin. 1. A contempt of God's commandments. They that reject the precept, will come at last to renounce the covenant. 2. A contempt of his corrections. If they will not learn obedience by the things they suffer, God himself would be against them; and this is the root and cause of all their misery. And also, The whole creation would be at war with them. All God's sore judgments would be sent against them. The threatenings here are very particular, they were prophecies, and He that foresaw all their rebellions, knew they would prove so. TEMPORAL judgments are threatened. Those who will not be parted from their sins by the commands of God, shall be parted from them by judgments. Those wedded to their lusts, will have enough of them. SPIRITUAL judgments are threatened, which should seize the mind. They should find no acceptance with God. A guilty conscience would be their continual terror. It is righteous with God to leave those to despair of pardon, who presume to sin; and it is owing to free grace, if we are not left to pine away in the iniquity we were born in, and have lived in.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The first warning for disobedience is disease. "Terror" (literally trembling) is rendered trouble in Psalm 78:33; Isaiah 65:23. It seems here to denote that terrible affliction, an anxious temperament, the mental state ever at war with Faith and Hope. This might well be placed at the head of the visitations on a backslider who had broken the covenant with his God. Compare Deuteronomy 32:25; Jeremiah 15:8; Proverbs 28:1; Job 24:17; Psalm 23:4.

Consumption, and the burning ague - Compare the margin reference. The first of the words in the original comes from a root signifying to waste away; the latter (better, fever), from one signifying to kindle a fire. Consumption is common in Egypt and some parts of Asia Minor, but it is more rare in Syria. Fevers of different kinds are the commonest of all diseases in Syria and all the neighboring countries. The opposite promise to the threat is given in Exodus 15:26; Exodus 23:25.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

16. I will even appoint over you terror—the falling sickness [Patrick].

consumption, and the burning ague—Some consider these as symptoms of the same disease—consumption followed by the shivering, burning, and sweating fits that are the usual concomitants of that malady. According to the Septuagint, "ague" is "the jaundice," which disorders the eyes and produces great depression of spirits. Others, however, consider the word as referring to a scorching wind; no certain explanation can be given.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And I will set my face against you,.... Exert his power, and stir up his wrath and indignation against them, as enemies of his, to cut them off; see Psalm 34:16; which is the reverse of having respect to them, Leviticus 26:9,

and ye shall be slain before your enemies; as they were sometimes by the Philistines and others:

and they that hate you shall reign over you; as did the Chaldeans and Babylonians; see Psalm 106:41,

and ye shall flee when none pursueth you; of such pusillanimous spirits should they be, and filled with such dread and terror of their enemies, so contrary from what is promised them on their obedience, Leviticus 26:8.

Geneva Study Bible

And I will set {g} my face against you, and ye shall be slain before your enemies: they that hate you shall reign over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth you.

(g) Read Le 17:10.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

17. ye shall flee when none pursueth you] Cp. Leviticus 26:36; Proverbs 28:1; also Psalm 53:5.

Leviticus 26:17

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Yea, the Lord would turn His face against them, so that they would be beaten by their enemies, and be so thoroughly humbled in consequence, that they would flee when no man pursued (cf. Leviticus 26:36).

But if these punishments did not answer their purpose, and bring Israel back to fidelity to its God, the Lord would punish the disobedient nation still more severely, and chasten the rebellious for their sin, not simply only, but sevenfold. This He would do, so long as Israel persevered in obstinate resistance, and to this end He would multiply His judgments by degrees. This graduated advance of the judgments of God is so depicted in the following passage, that four times in succession new and multiplied punishments are announced: (1) utter barrenness in their land, - that is to say, one heavier punishment (Leviticus 26:18-20); (2) the extermination of their cattle by beasts of prey, and childlessness, - two punishments (Leviticus 26:21, Leviticus 26:22); (3) war, plague, and famine, - three punishments (Leviticus 26:23-26); (4) the destruction of all idolatrous abominations, the overthrow of their towns and holy places, the devastation of the land, and the dispersion of the people among the heathen-four punishments which would bring the Israelites to the verge of destruction (Leviticus 26:27-33). In this way would the Lord punish the stiffneckedness of His people. - These divine threats embrace the whole of Israel's future. But the series of judgments mentioned is not to be understood historically, as a prediction of the temporal succession of the different punishments, but as an ideal account of the judgments of God, unfolding themselves with inward necessity in a manner answering to the progressive development of the sin. As the nation would not resist the Lord continually, but times of disobedience and apostasy would alternate with times of obedience and faithfulness, so the judgments of God would alternate with His blessings; and as the opposition would not increase in uniform progress, sometimes becoming weaker and then at other times gaining greater force again, so the punishments would not multiply continuously, but correspond in every case to the amount of the sin, and only burst in upon the incorrigible race in all the intensity foretold, when ungodliness gained the upper hand.