1. And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken. He teaches the same thing as before in different words; but the diversity of expression, as well as the repetition, tends to its confirmation.

9. The Lord shall establish thee a holy people unto himself. This refers indeed to earthly blessings, as if Moses said, that by them would be manifested God’s love towards His chosen people; still it rises higher, so that the Israelites, led on by degrees, should learn to embrace God alone, and to…

12. The Lord shall open to thee his good treasure. He again repeats, that the goodness of God shines forth in many ways in the life of men, since He not only supplies the bread that they eat, but that the rain which descends from heaven waters the earth; and that thus He produces whatever is…

15. But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken. This list of curses is longer than the previous one which was proclaimed from Mount Sinai, undoubtedly because the Spirit of God foresaw that the sluggishness of the people had need of sharper stimulants.

19. Cursed shalt thou be when thou comest in. God here pronounces that all their undertakings should meet with ill success; for going out and coming in signifies their various actions, and the whole course of their life; and this is more clearly expressed in the next verse, where He denounces…

21. The Lord shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee. He now proceeds to diseases which are as it were the lictors of God; and finally, His executioners, if men pertinaciously continue in their ungodliness.

23. And thy heaven that is over thy head. He enumerates other causes of barrenness, and especially drought. Often does God by the Prophets, desirous of giving a token of His favor towards the people, promise them the rain of autumn and of spring: the one immediately following the sowing, the other…

25. The Lord shall cause thee to be smitten before thine enemies. What He had briefly threatened in His mention of “the sword,” He now more fully pursues, that they should be given up to the will of their enemies, so as to be indiscriminately slaughtered.

26. And thy carcase shall be meat. The punishment is here doubled by the disgrace which is added to death; for it is ignominious to be deprived of burial, and justly reckoned amongst the curses of God; whilst it is a sign of His paternal favor that we should be distinguished from the brutes,…

27. The Lord will smite thee with the botch of Egypt. Whether you understand this passage of the extraordinary plagues which God inflicted on the Egyptians at the time of His people’s deliverance, or of the ordinary diseases which had before prevailed among them, though the latter is more probable,…

28. The Lord shall smite thee with madness and blindness. This punishment is very often referred to by the Prophets, when God is said to smite the wicked with a spirit of giddiness and madness, to make them drunk with astonishment.

30. Thou shalt betroth a wife, and another man. He here denounces that all they possessed should be rifled and plundered by their enemies. He, however, puts the most painful thing of all in the first place, viz., that they shall be despoiled of their wives, and magnifies the enormity of the evil,…

35. The Lord shall smite thee in the knees. Since death is common to the whole human race, they must needs also be all subject to disease; nor is it a matter of surprise that the whole posterity of Adam, which is infected with the taint of sin, should so be liable to many afflictions, which are the…

36. The Lord shall bring thee, and thy king. The fulfillment of this prophecy at length taught the Jews, though too late, that it was no empty threat, merely for the purpose of frightening them; and this also applies to the other predictions.

37. And thou shalt become an astonishment. The climax of their miseries is here added, that they should be so far from receiving consolation from men, that on every side their misery should meet with taunts and insults; for nothing more bitterly wounds the wretched than this indignity of being…

38. Thou shalt carry much seed out into the field. He again makes mention of the scarcity of wine, of wheat, and all sorts of corn; but He assigns different causes for it.

43. The stranger that is within thee shall get up above thee. This also was no doubtful mark of God’s wrath, that the sojourners who dwelt in the land of Canaan by sufferance should in a manner become its masters; for we know how those who are in debt are under the power of their creditors.

45. Moreover, all these curses shall come upon thee. He not only confirms what he has already said, but takes away all hope of alleviation, since God’s scourges shall not cease until they have repented.

49. The Lord shall bring a nation against them from far. He enforces the same threatenings in different words, viz., that unknown and barbarous enemies should come, who shall attack them with great impetuosity and violence.

52. And he shall besiege thee in thy gates. He overthrows every ground of false confidence. The number of their towns inspired them with courage, because they never would have supposed that their enemies would undergo so much fatigue as not to cease from fighting till they were all taken.

53. And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body. This is one of those portents which was mentioned a little while ago; for it is an act of ferocity detestable and more than tragical, that fathers and mothers should eat their own offspring, so great love of which is naturally implanted in every…

58. If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law. Inasmuch as even believers, although they are disposed to a willing obedience to the Law, and earnestly apply themselves to it, are still impeded and withheld by the infirmity of their flesh from fulfilling their duty, care and attention…

61. Also every sickness and every plague. This passage confirms what I have said about the plague and the sickness, for the sickness stands first as the species, and then the plague follows, which has a wider meaning, and comprehends all the curses in itself.

62. And ye shall be left few in number. Since it had been promised to Abraham that his seed should be like the stars of heaven in multitude, it was a signal token of God’s wrath that his posterity should be reduced to so small a number; thus the comparison which is here made for the purpose of…

63. And it shall come to pass, that as the Lord rejoiced over you. The wonderful and inestimable love of God towards His people is here set forth, via, that He had rejoiced in heaping blessings upon them; wherefore their depravity was all the more base and intolerable, in that God, though…

64. And the Lord shall scatter thee among all people. At the end of the preceding verse, he had threatened them with banishment, which was far more painful to the people of Israel than to other nations.

68. And the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again with ships. We know that the people were so driven about in the desert amidst divers perils, that they only escaped from it in safety by extraordinary miracles.