Deuteronomy 30:2-10

30:2 Then if you and your descendants turn to the Lord your God and obey him with your whole mind and being just as I am commanding you today, 30:3 the Lord your God will reverse your captivity and have pity on you. He will turn and gather you from all the peoples among whom he has scattered you. 30:4 Even if your exiles are in the most distant land, from there the Lord your God will gather you and bring you back. 30:5 Then he will bring you to the land your ancestors possessed and you also will possess it; he will do better for you and multiply you more than he did your ancestors. 30:6 The Lord your God will also cleanse your heart and the hearts of your descendants so that you may love him 10  with all your mind and being and so that you may live. 30:7 Then the Lord your God will put all these curses on your enemies, on those who hate you and persecute you. 30:8 You will return and obey the Lord, keeping all his commandments I am giving 11  you today. 30:9 The Lord your God will make the labor of your hands 12  abundantly successful and multiply your children, 13  the offspring of your cattle, and the produce of your soil. For the Lord your God will once more 14  rejoice over you to make you prosperous 15  just as he rejoiced over your ancestors, 30:10 if you obey the Lord your God and keep his commandments and statutes that are written in this scroll of the law. But you must turn to him 16  with your whole mind and being.

Deuteronomy 30:1

The Results of Covenant Reaffirmation

30:1 “When you have experienced all these things, both the blessings and the curses 17  I have set before you, you will reflect upon them 18  in all the nations where the Lord your God has banished you.

Deuteronomy 8:1

The Lord’s Provision in the Desert

8:1 You must keep carefully all these commandments 19  I am giving 20  you today so that you may live, increase in number, 21  and go in and occupy the land that the Lord promised to your ancestors. 22 

Isaiah 55:7

55:7 The wicked need to abandon their lifestyle 23 

and sinful people their plans. 24 

They should return 25  to the Lord, and he will show mercy to them, 26 

and to their God, for he will freely forgive them. 27 

Hosea 6:1-2

Superficial Repentance Breeds False Assurance of God’s Forgiveness

6:1 “Come on! Let’s return to the Lord!

He himself has torn us to pieces,

but he will heal us!

He has injured 28  us,

but he will bandage our wounds!

6:2 He will restore 29  us in a very short time; 30 

he will heal us in a little while, 31 

so that we may live in his presence.

Hosea 14:1

Prophetic Call to Genuine Repentance

14:1 Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God,

for your sin has been your downfall! 32 

Joel 2:12-13

An Appeal for Repentance

2:12 “Yet even now,” the Lord says,

“return to me with all your heart –

with fasting, weeping, and mourning.

Tear your hearts, 33 

not just your garments!”

2:13 Return to the Lord your God,

for he is merciful and compassionate,

slow to anger and boundless in loyal love 34  – often relenting from calamitous punishment. 35 


tn Heb “sons” (so NASB); KJV, ASV, NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT “children.”

tn Or “heart and soul” (also in vv. 6, 10).

tn Heb “according to all.”

tn Heb “the Lord your God.” The pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons to avoid redundancy.

tn Heb “are at the farthest edge of the heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven(s)” or “sky” depending on the context.

tn Heb “the Lord your God.” See note on the second occurrence of the word “he” in v. 3.

tn Heb “fathers” (also later in this verse and in vv. 9, 20).

tn Heb “circumcise” (so KJV, NAB, NIV, NRSV); TEV “will give you and your descendents obedient hearts.” See note on the word “cleanse” in Deut 10:16.

tn Heb “seed” (so KJV, ASV).

10 tn Heb “the Lord your God.” See note on the second occurrence of the word “he” in v. 3.

11 tn Heb “commanding”; NAB “which I now enjoin on you.”

12 tc The MT reads “hand” (singular). Most versions read the plural.

13 tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NIV); NRSV “of your body.”

14 tn Heb “return and.” The Hebrew verb is used idiomatically here to indicate the repetition of the following action.

15 tn The Hebrew text includes “for good.”

16 tn Heb “to the Lord your God.” See note on the second occurrence of the word “he” in v. 3.

17 tn Heb “the blessing and the curse.”

18 tn Heb “and you bring (them) back to your heart.”

19 tn The singular term (מִצְוָה, mitsvah) includes the whole corpus of covenant stipulations, certainly the book of Deuteronomy at least (cf. Deut 5:28; 6:1, 25; 7:11; 11:8, 22; 15:5; 17:20; 19:9; 27:1; 30:11; 31:5). The plural (מִצְוֹת, mitsot) refers to individual stipulations (as in vv. 2, 6).

20 tn Heb “commanding” (so NASB). For stylistic reasons, to avoid redundancy, “giving” has been used in the translation (likewise in v. 11).

21 tn Heb “multiply” (so KJV, NASB, NLT); NIV, NRSV “increase.”

22 tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 16, 18).

23 tn Heb “Let the wicked one abandon his way.” The singular is collective.

24 tn Heb “and the man of evil his thoughts.” The singular is collective.

25 tn Heb “let him return.” The singular is collective, meaning “let them.”

26 tn The imperfect with vav (ו) conjunctive after the jussive indicates purpose/result.

27 sn The appeal and promise of vv. 6-7 echoes the language of Deut 4:25-31; 30:1-10; and 1 Kgs 8:46-53, all of which anticipate the exile and speak of the prerequisites for restoration.

28 tn “has struck”; NRSV “struck down.”

29 tn The Piel of חָיָה (khayah) may mean: (1) to keep/preserve persons alive from the threat of premature death (1 Kgs 20:31; Ezek 13:18; 18:27); (2) to restore the dead to physical life (Deut 32:39; 1 Sam 2:6; cf. NCV “will put new life in us”); or (3) to restore the dying back to life from the threat of death (Ps 71:20; BDB 311 s.v. חָיָה).

30 tn Heb “after two days” (so KJV, NIV, NRSV). The expression “after two days” is an idiom meaning “after a short time” (see, e.g., Judg 11:4; BDB 399 s.v. יוֹם 5.a).

31 tn Heb “on the third day” (so NASB, NIV, NRSV), which parallels “after two days” and means “in a little while.” The “2-3” sequence is an example of graded numerical parallelism (Prov 30:15-16, 18-19, 21-23, 24-28, 29-31). This expresses the unrepentant overconfidence of Israel that the Lord’s discipline of Israel would be relatively short and that he would restore them quickly.

32 tn Heb “For you have stumbled in your iniquity”; NASB, NRSV “because of your iniquity.”

33 sn The figurative language calls for genuine repentance, and not merely external ritual that goes through the motions.

34 tn Heb “and great of loyal love.”

35 tn Heb “and he relents from calamity.”