Deuteronomy 28:1--33:29

The Covenant Blessings

28:1 “If you indeed obey the Lord your God and are careful to observe all his commandments I am giving you today, the Lord your God will elevate you above all the nations of the earth. 28:2 All these blessings will come to you in abundance if you obey the Lord your God: 28:3 You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the field. 28:4 Your children will be blessed, as well as the produce of your soil, the offspring of your livestock, the calves of your herds, and the lambs of your flocks. 28:5 Your basket and your mixing bowl will be blessed. 28:6 You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out. 28:7 The Lord will cause your enemies who attack you to be struck down before you; they will attack you from one direction but flee from you in seven different directions. 28:8 The Lord will decree blessing for you with respect to your barns and in everything you do – yes, he will bless you in the land he is giving you. 28:9 The Lord will designate you as his holy people just as he promised you, if you keep his commandments and obey him. 28:10 Then all the peoples of the earth will see that you belong to the Lord, and they will respect you. 28:11 The Lord will greatly multiply your children, the offspring of your livestock, and the produce of your soil in the land which he promised your ancestors he would give you. 28:12 The Lord will open for you his good treasure house, the heavens, to give you rain for the land in its season and to bless all you do; you will lend to many nations but you will not borrow from any. 28:13 The Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you will always end up at the top and not at the bottom, if you obey his commandments which I am urging you today to be careful to do. 28:14 But you must not turn away from all the commandments I am giving you today, to either the right or left, nor pursue other gods and worship them.

Curses as Reversal of Blessings

28:15 “But if you ignore the Lord your God and are not careful to keep all his commandments and statutes I am giving you today, then all these curses will come upon you in full force: 28:16 You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the field. 28:17 Your basket and your mixing bowl will be cursed. 28:18 Your children will be cursed, as well as the produce of your soil, the calves of your herds, and the lambs of your flocks. 28:19 You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.

Curses by Disease and Drought

28:20 “The Lord will send on you a curse, confusing you and opposing you in everything you undertake until you are destroyed and quickly perish because of the evil of your deeds, in that you have forsaken me. 28:21 The Lord will plague you with deadly diseases until he has completely removed you from the land you are about to possess. 28:22 He will afflict you with weakness, fever, inflammation, infection, sword, blight, and mildew; these will attack you until you perish. 28:23 The sky above your heads will be bronze and the earth beneath you iron. 28:24 The Lord will make the rain of your land powder and dust; it will come down on you from the sky until you are destroyed.

Curses by Defeat and Deportation

28:25 “The Lord will allow you to be struck down before your enemies; you will attack them from one direction but flee from them in seven directions and will become an object of terror to all the kingdoms of the earth. 28:26 Your carcasses will be food for every bird of the sky and wild animal of the earth, and there will be no one to chase them off. 28:27 The Lord will afflict you with the boils of Egypt and with tumors, eczema, and scabies, all of which cannot be healed. 28:28 The Lord will also subject you to madness, blindness, and confusion of mind. 28:29 You will feel your way along at noon like the blind person does in darkness and you will not succeed in anything you do; you will be constantly oppressed and continually robbed, with no one to save you. 28:30 You will be engaged to a woman and another man will rape her. You will build a house but not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but not even begin to use it. 28:31 Your ox will be slaughtered before your very eyes but you will not eat of it. Your donkey will be stolen from you as you watch and will not be returned to you. Your flock of sheep will be given to your enemies and there will be no one to save you. 28:32 Your sons and daughters will be given to another people while you look on in vain all day, and you will be powerless to do anything about it. 28:33 As for the produce of your land and all your labor, a people you do not know will consume it, and you will be nothing but oppressed and crushed for the rest of your lives. 28:34 You will go insane from seeing all this. 28:35 The Lord will afflict you in your knees and on your legs with painful, incurable boils – from the soles of your feet to the top of your head. 28:36 The Lord will force you and your king whom you will appoint over you to go away to a people whom you and your ancestors have not known, and you will serve other gods of wood and stone there. 28:37 You will become an occasion of horror, a proverb, and an object of ridicule to all the peoples to whom the Lord will drive you.

The Curse of Reversed Status

28:38 “You will take much seed to the field but gather little harvest, because locusts will consume it. 28:39 You will plant vineyards and cultivate them, but you will not drink wine or gather in grapes, because worms will eat them. 28:40 You will have olive trees throughout your territory but you will not anoint yourself with olive oil, because the olives will drop off the trees while still unripe. 28:41 You will bear sons and daughters but not keep them, because they will be taken into captivity. 28:42 Whirring locusts will take over every tree and all the produce of your soil. 28:43 The foreigners who reside among you will become higher and higher over you and you will become lower and lower. 28:44 They will lend to you but you will not lend to them; they will become the head and you will become the tail!

28:45 All these curses will fall on you, pursuing and overtaking you until you are destroyed, because you would not obey the Lord your God by keeping his commandments and statutes that he has given you. 28:46 These curses will be a perpetual sign and wonder with reference to you and your descendants.

The Curse of Military Siege

28:47 “Because you have not served the Lord your God joyfully and wholeheartedly with the abundance of everything you have, 28:48 instead in hunger, thirst, nakedness, and poverty you will serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you. They will place an iron yoke on your neck until they have destroyed you. 28:49 The Lord will raise up a distant nation against you, one from the other side of the earth as the eagle flies, a nation whose language you will not understand, 28:50 a nation of stern appearance that will have no regard for the elderly or pity for the young. 28:51 They will devour the offspring of your livestock and the produce of your soil until you are destroyed. They will not leave you with any grain, new wine, olive oil, calves of your herds, or lambs of your flocks until they have destroyed you. 28:52 They will besiege all of your villages until all of your high and fortified walls collapse – those in which you put your confidence throughout the land. They will besiege all your villages throughout the land the Lord your God has given you. 28:53 You will then eat your own offspring, the flesh of the sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you, because of the severity of the siege by which your enemies will constrict you. 28:54 The man among you who is by nature tender and sensitive will turn against his brother, his beloved wife, and his remaining children. 28:55 He will withhold from all of them his children’s flesh that he is eating (since there is nothing else left), because of the severity of the siege by which your enemy will constrict you in your villages. 28:56 Likewise, the most tender and delicate of your women, who would never think of putting even the sole of her foot on the ground because of her daintiness, will turn against her beloved husband, her sons and daughters, 28:57 and will secretly eat her afterbirth and her newborn children (since she has nothing else), because of the severity of the siege by which your enemy will constrict you in your villages.

The Curse of Covenant Termination

28:58 “If you refuse to obey all the words of this law, the things written in this scroll, and refuse to fear this glorious and awesome name, the Lord your God, 28:59 then the Lord will increase your punishments and those of your descendants – great and long-lasting afflictions and severe, enduring illnesses. 28:60 He will infect you with all the diseases of Egypt that you dreaded, and they will persistently afflict you. 28:61 Moreover, the Lord will bring upon you every kind of sickness and plague not mentioned in this scroll of commandments, until you have perished. 28:62 There will be very few of you left, though at one time you were as numerous as the stars in the sky, because you will have disobeyed the Lord your God. 28:63 This is what will happen: Just as the Lord delighted to do good for you and make you numerous, he will take delight in destroying and decimating you. You will be uprooted from the land you are about to possess. 28:64 The Lord will scatter you among all nations, from one end of the earth to the other. There you will worship other gods that neither you nor your ancestors have known, gods of wood and stone. 28:65 Among those nations you will have no rest nor will there be a place of peaceful rest for the soles of your feet, for there the Lord will give you an anxious heart, failing eyesight, and a spirit of despair. 28:66 Your life will hang in doubt before you; you will be terrified by night and day and will have no certainty of surviving from one day to the next. 28:67 In the morning you will say, ‘If only it were evening!’ And in the evening you will say, ‘I wish it were morning!’ because of the things you will fear and the things you will see. 28:68 Then the Lord will make you return to Egypt by ship, over a route I said to you that you would never see again. There you will sell yourselves to your enemies as male and female slaves, but no one will buy you.”

Narrative Interlude

29:1 (28:69) These are the words of the covenant that the Lord commanded Moses to make with the people of Israel in the land of Moab, in addition to the covenant he had made with them at Horeb.

The Exodus, Wandering, and Conquest Reviewed

29:2 Moses proclaimed to all Israel as follows: “You have seen all that the Lord did in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh, all his servants, and his land. 29:3 Your eyes have seen the great judgments, those signs and mighty wonders. 29:4 But to this very day the Lord has not given you an understanding mind, perceptive eyes, or discerning ears! 29:5 I have led you through the desert for forty years. Your clothing has not worn out nor have your sandals deteriorated. 29:6 You have eaten no bread and drunk no wine or beer – all so that you might know that I am the Lord your God! 29:7 When you came to this place King Sihon of Heshbon and King Og of Bashan came out to make war and we defeated them. 29:8 Then we took their land and gave it as an inheritance to Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh.

The Present Covenant Setting

29:9 “Therefore, keep the terms of this covenant and obey them so that you may be successful in everything you do. 29:10 You are standing today, all of you, before the Lord your God – the heads of your tribes, your elders, your officials, every Israelite man, 29:11 your infants, your wives, and the foreigners living in your encampment, those who chop wood and those who carry water – 29:12 so that you may enter by oath into the covenant the Lord your God is making with you today. 29:13 Today he will affirm that you are his people and that he is your God, just as he promised you and as he swore by oath to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 29:14 It is not with you alone that I am making this covenant by oath, 29:15 but with whoever stands with us here today before the Lord our God as well as those not with us here today.

The Results of Disobedience

29:16 “(For you know how we lived in the land of Egypt and how we crossed through the nations as we traveled. 29:17 You have seen their detestable things and idols of wood, stone, silver, and gold.) 29:18 Beware that the heart of no man, woman, clan, or tribe among you turns away from the Lord our God today to pursue and serve the gods of those nations; beware that there is among you no root producing poisonous and bitter fruit. 29:19 When such a person hears the words of this oath he secretly blesses himself and says, “I will have peace though I continue to walk with a stubborn spirit.” This will destroy the watered ground with the parched. 29:20 The Lord will be unwilling to forgive him, and his intense anger will rage against that man; all the curses written in this scroll will fall upon him and the Lord will obliterate his name from memory. 29:21 The Lord will single him out for judgment from all the tribes of Israel according to all the curses of the covenant written in this scroll of the law. 29:22 The generation to come – your descendants who will rise up after you, as well as the foreigner who will come from distant places – will see the afflictions of that land and the illnesses that the Lord has brought on it. 29:23 The whole land will be covered with brimstone, salt, and burning debris; it will not be planted nor will it sprout or produce grass. It will resemble the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the Lord destroyed in his intense anger. 29:24 Then all the nations will ask, “Why has the Lord done all this to this land? What is this fierce, heated display of anger all about?” 29:25 Then people will say, “Because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, the God of their ancestors, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt. 29:26 They went and served other gods and worshiped them, gods they did not know and that he did not permit them to worship. 29:27 That is why the Lord’s anger erupted against this land, bringing on it all the curses written in this scroll. 29:28 So the Lord has uprooted them from their land in anger, wrath, and great rage and has deported them to another land, as is clear today.” 29:29 Secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those that are revealed belong to us and our descendants forever, so that we might obey all the words of this law.

The Results of Covenant Reaffirmation

30:1 “When you have experienced all these things, both the blessings and the curses I have set before you, you will reflect upon them in all the nations where the Lord your God has banished you. 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 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 you today. 30:9 The Lord your God will make the labor of your hands abundantly successful and multiply your children, the offspring of your cattle, and the produce of your soil. For the Lord your God will once more rejoice over you to make you prosperous 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 with your whole mind and being.

Exhortation to Covenant Obedience

30:11 “This commandment I am giving you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it too remote. 30:12 It is not in heaven, as though one must say, “Who will go up to heaven to get it for us and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 30:13 And it is not across the sea, as though one must say, “Who will cross over to the other side of the sea and get it for us and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 30:14 For the thing is very near you – it is in your mouth and in your mind so that you can do it.

30:15 “Look! I have set before you today life and prosperity on the one hand, and death and disaster on the other. 30:16 What I am commanding you today is to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to obey his commandments, his statutes, and his ordinances. Then you will live and become numerous and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are about to possess. 30:17 However, if you turn aside and do not obey, but are lured away to worship and serve other gods, 30:18 I declare to you this very day that you will certainly perish! You will not extend your time in the land you are crossing the Jordan to possess. 30:19 Today I invoke heaven and earth as a witness against you that I have set life and death, blessing and curse, before you. Therefore choose life so that you and your descendants may live! 30:20 I also call on you to love the Lord your God, to obey him and be loyal to him, for he gives you life and enables you to live continually in the land the Lord promised to give to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

Succession of Moses by Joshua

31:1 Then Moses went and spoke these words to all Israel. 31:2 He said to them, “Today I am a hundred and twenty years old. I am no longer able to get about, and the Lord has said to me, ‘You will not cross the Jordan.’ 31:3 As for the Lord your God, he is about to cross over before you; he will destroy these nations before you and dispossess them. As for Joshua, he is about to cross before you just as the Lord has said. 31:4 The Lord will do to them just what he did to Sihon and Og, the Amorite kings, and to their land, which he destroyed. 31:5 The Lord will deliver them over to you and you will do to them according to the whole commandment I have given you. 31:6 Be strong and courageous! Do not fear or tremble before them, for the Lord your God is the one who is going with you. He will not fail you or abandon you!” 31:7 Then Moses called out to Joshua in the presence of all Israel, “Be strong and courageous, for you will accompany these people to the land that the Lord promised to give their ancestors, and you will enable them to inherit it. 31:8 The Lord is indeed going before you – he will be with you; he will not fail you or abandon you. Do not be afraid or discouraged!”

The Deposit of the Covenant Text

31:9 Then Moses wrote down this law and gave it to the Levitical priests, who carry the ark of the Lord’s covenant, and to all Israel’s elders. 31:10 He commanded them: “At the end of seven years, at the appointed time of the cancellation of debts, at the Feast of Temporary Shelters, 31:11 when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God in the place he chooses, you must read this law before them within their hearing. 31:12 Gather the people – men, women, and children, as well as the resident foreigners in your villages – so they may hear and thus learn about and fear the Lord your God and carefully obey all the words of this law. 31:13 Then their children, who have not known this law, will also hear about and learn to fear the Lord your God for as long as you live in the land you are crossing the Jordan to possess.”

The Commissioning of Joshua

31:14 Then the Lord said to Moses, “The day of your death is near. Summon Joshua and present yourselves in the tent of meeting so that I can commission him.” So Moses and Joshua presented themselves in the tent of meeting. 31:15 The Lord appeared in the tent in a pillar of cloud that stood above the door of the tent. 31:16 Then the Lord said to Moses, “You are about to die, and then these people will begin to prostitute themselves with the foreign gods of the land into which they are going. They will reject me and break my covenant that I have made with them. 31:17 At that time my anger will erupt against them and I will abandon them and hide my face from them until they are devoured. Many disasters and distresses will overcome them so that they will say at that time, ‘Have not these disasters overcome us because our God is not among us?’ 31:18 But I will certainly hide myself at that time because of all the wickedness they will have done by turning to other gods. 31:19 Now write down for yourselves the following song and teach it to the Israelites. Put it into their very mouths so that this song may serve as my witness against the Israelites! 31:20 For after I have brought them to the land I promised to their ancestors – one flowing with milk and honey – and they eat their fill and become fat, then they will turn to other gods and worship them; they will reject me and break my covenant. 31:21 Then when many disasters and distresses overcome them this song will testify against them, for their descendants will not forget it. I know the intentions they have in mind today, even before I bring them to the land I have promised.” 31:22 So on that day Moses wrote down this song and taught it to the Israelites, 31:23 and the Lord commissioned Joshua son of Nun, “Be strong and courageous, for you will take the Israelites to the land I have promised them, and I will be with you.”

Anticipation of Disobedience

31:24 When Moses finished writing on a scroll the words of this law in their entirety, 31:25 he commanded the Levites who carried the ark of the Lord’s covenant, 31:26 “Take this scroll of the law and place it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God. It will remain there as a witness against you, 31:27 for I know about your rebellion and stubbornness. Indeed, even while I have been living among you to this very day, you have rebelled against the Lord; you will be even more rebellious after my death! 31:28 Gather to me all your tribal elders and officials so I can speak to them directly about these things and call the heavens and the earth to witness against them. 31:29 For I know that after I die you will totally corrupt yourselves and turn away from the path I have commanded you to walk. Disaster will confront you in the days to come because you will act wickedly before the Lord, inciting him to anger because of your actions.” 31:30 Then Moses recited the words of this song from start to finish in the hearing of the whole assembly of Israel.

Invocation of Witnesses

32:1 Listen, O heavens, and I will speak;

hear, O earth, the words of my mouth.

32:2 My teaching will drop like the rain,

my sayings will drip like the dew,

as rain drops upon the grass,

and showers upon new growth.

32:3 For I will proclaim the name of the Lord;

you must acknowledge the greatness of our God.

32:4 As for the Rock, his work is perfect,

for all his ways are just.

He is a reliable God who is never unjust,

he is fair and upright.

32:5 His people have been unfaithful to him;

they have not acted like his children – this is their sin.

They are a perverse and deceitful generation.

32:6 Is this how you repay the Lord,

you foolish, unwise people?

Is he not your father, your creator?

He has made you and established you.

32:7 Remember the ancient days;

bear in mind the years of past generations.

Ask your father and he will inform you,

your elders, and they will tell you.

32:8 When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance,

when he divided up humankind,

he set the boundaries of the peoples,

according to the number of the heavenly assembly.

32:9 For the Lord’s allotment is his people,

Jacob is his special possession.

32:10 The Lord found him in a desolate land,

in an empty wasteland where animals howl.

He continually guarded him and taught him;

he continually protected him like the pupil of his eye.

32:11 Like an eagle that stirs up its nest,

that hovers over its young,

so the Lord spread out his wings and took him,

he lifted him up on his pinions.

32:12 The Lord alone was guiding him,

no foreign god was with him.

32:13 He enabled him to travel over the high terrain of the land,

and he ate of the produce of the fields.

He provided honey for him from the cliffs,

and olive oil from the hardest of rocks,

32:14 butter from the herd

and milk from the flock,

along with the fat of lambs,

rams and goats of Bashan,

along with the best of the kernels of wheat;

and from the juice of grapes you drank wine.

Israel’s Rebellion

32:15 But Jeshurun became fat and kicked,

you got fat, thick, and stuffed!

Then he deserted the God who made him,

and treated the Rock who saved him with contempt.

32:16 They made him jealous with other gods,

they enraged him with abhorrent idols.

32:17 They sacrificed to demons, not God,

to gods they had not known;

to new gods who had recently come along,

gods your ancestors had not known about.

32:18 You have forgotten the Rock who fathered you,

and put out of mind the God who gave you birth.

A Word of Judgment

32:19 But the Lord took note and despised them

because his sons and daughters enraged him.

32:20 He said, “I will reject them,

I will see what will happen to them;

for they are a perverse generation,

children who show no loyalty.

32:21 They have made me jealous with false gods,

enraging me with their worthless gods;

so I will make them jealous with a people they do not recognize,

with a nation slow to learn I will enrage them.

32:22 For a fire has been kindled by my anger,

and it burns to lowest Sheol;

it consumes the earth and its produce,

and ignites the foundations of the mountains.

32:23 I will increase their disasters,

I will use up my arrows on them.

32:24 They will be starved by famine,

eaten by plague, and bitterly stung;

I will send the teeth of wild animals against them,

along with the poison of creatures that crawl in the dust.

32:25 The sword will make people childless outside,

and terror will do so inside;

they will destroy both the young man and the virgin,

the infant and the gray-haired man.

The Weakness of Other Gods

32:26 “I said, ‘I want to cut them in pieces.

I want to make people forget they ever existed.

32:27 But I fear the reaction of their enemies,

for their adversaries would misunderstand

and say, “Our power is great,

and the Lord has not done all this!”’

32:28 They are a nation devoid of wisdom,

and there is no understanding among them.

32:29 I wish that they were wise and could understand this,

and that they could comprehend what will happen to them.”

32:30 How can one man chase a thousand of them,

and two pursue ten thousand;

unless their Rock had delivered them up,

and the Lord had handed them over?

32:31 For our enemies’ rock is not like our Rock,

as even our enemies concede.

32:32 For their vine is from the stock of Sodom,

and from the fields of Gomorrah.

Their grapes contain venom,

their clusters of grapes are bitter.

32:33 Their wine is snakes’ poison,

the deadly venom of cobras.

32:34 “Is this not stored up with me?” says the Lord,

“Is it not sealed up in my storehouses?

32:35 I will get revenge and pay them back

at the time their foot slips;

for the day of their disaster is near,

and the impending judgment is rushing upon them!”

32:36 The Lord will judge his people,

and will change his plans concerning his servants;

when he sees that their power has disappeared,

and that no one is left, whether confined or set free.

32:37 He will say, “Where are their gods,

the rock in whom they sought security,

32:38 who ate the best of their sacrifices,

and drank the wine of their drink offerings?

Let them rise and help you;

let them be your refuge!

The Vindication of the Lord

32:39 “See now that I, indeed I, am he!” says the Lord,

“and there is no other god besides me.

I kill and give life,

I smash and I heal,

and none can resist my power.

32:40 For I raise up my hand to heaven,

and say, ‘As surely as I live forever,

32:41 I will sharpen my lightning-like sword,

and my hand will grasp hold of the weapon of judgment;

I will execute vengeance on my foes,

and repay those who hate me!

32:42 I will make my arrows drunk with blood,

and my sword will devour flesh –

the blood of the slaughtered and captured,

the chief of the enemy’s leaders!’”

32:43 Cry out, O nations, with his people,

for he will avenge his servants’ blood;

he will take vengeance against his enemies,

and make atonement for his land and people.

Narrative Interlude

32:44 Then Moses went with Joshua son of Nun and recited all the words of this song to the people. 32:45 When Moses finished reciting all these words to all Israel 32:46 he said to them, “Keep in mind all the words I am solemnly proclaiming to you today; you must command your children to observe carefully all the words of this law. 32:47 For this is no idle word for you – it is your life! By this word you will live a long time in the land you are about to cross the Jordan to possess.”

Instructions about Moses’ Death

32:48 Then the Lord said to Moses that same day, 32:49 “Go up to this Abarim hill country, to Mount Nebo (which is in the land of Moab opposite Jericho) and look at the land of Canaan that I am giving to the Israelites as a possession. 32:50 You will die on the mountain that you ascend and join your deceased ancestors, just as Aaron your brother died on Mount Hor and joined his deceased ancestors, 32:51 for both of you rebelled against me among the Israelites at the waters of Meribah Kadesh in the desert of Zin when you did not show me proper respect among the Israelites. 32:52 You will see the land before you, but you will not enter the land that I am giving to the Israelites.”

Introduction to the Blessing of Moses

33:1 This is the blessing Moses the man of God pronounced upon the Israelites before his death. 33:2 He said:

A Historical Review

The Lord came from Sinai

and revealed himself to Israel from Seir.

He appeared in splendor from Mount Paran,

and came forth with ten thousand holy ones.

With his right hand he gave a fiery law to them.

33:3 Surely he loves the people;

all your holy ones are in your power.

And they sit at your feet,

each receiving your words.

33:4 Moses delivered to us a law,

an inheritance for the assembly of Jacob.

33:5 The Lord was king over Jeshurun,

when the leaders of the people assembled,

the tribes of Israel together.

Blessing on Reuben

33:6 May Reuben live and not die,

and may his people multiply.

Blessing on Judah

33:7 And this is the blessing to Judah. He said,

Listen, O Lord, to Judah’s voice,

and bring him to his people.

May his power be great,

and may you help him against his foes.

Blessing on Levi

33:8 Of Levi he said:

Your Thummim and Urim belong to your godly one,

whose authority you challenged at Massah,

and with whom you argued at the waters of Meribah.

33:9 He said to his father and mother, “I have not seen him,”

and he did not acknowledge his own brothers

or know his own children,

for they kept your word,

and guarded your covenant.

33:10 They will teach Jacob your ordinances

and Israel your law;

they will offer incense as a pleasant odor,

and a whole offering on your altar.

33:11 Bless, O Lord, his goods,

and be pleased with his efforts;

undercut the legs of any who attack him,

and of those who hate him, so that they cannot stand.

Blessing on Benjamin

33:12 Of Benjamin he said:

The beloved of the Lord will live safely by him;

he protects him all the time,

and the Lord places him on his chest.

Blessing on Joseph

33:13 Of Joseph he said:

May the Lord bless his land

with the harvest produced by the sky, by the dew,

and by the depths crouching beneath;

33:14 with the harvest produced by the daylight

and by the moonlight;

33:15 with the best of the ancient mountains

and the harvest produced by the age-old hills;

33:16 with the harvest of the earth and its fullness

and the pleasure of him who resided in the burning bush.

May blessing rest on Joseph’s head,

and on the top of the head of the one set apart from his brothers.

33:17 May the firstborn of his bull bring him honor,

and may his horns be those of a wild ox;

with them may he gore all peoples,

all the far reaches of the earth.

They are the ten thousands of Ephraim,

and they are the thousands of Manasseh.

Blessing on Zebulun and Issachar

33:18 Of Zebulun he said:

Rejoice, Zebulun, when you go outside,

and Issachar, when you are in your tents.

33:19 They will summon peoples to the mountain,

there they will sacrifice proper sacrifices;

for they will enjoy the abundance of the seas,

and the hidden treasures of the shores.

Blessing on Gad

33:20 Of Gad he said:

Blessed be the one who enlarges Gad.

Like a lioness he will dwell;

he will tear at an arm – indeed, a scalp.

33:21 He has selected the best part for himself,

for the portion of the ruler is set aside there;

he came with the leaders of the people,

he obeyed the righteous laws of the Lord

and his ordinances with Israel.

Blessing on Dan

33:22 Of Dan he said:

Dan is a lion’s cub;

he will leap forth from Bashan.

Blessing on Naphtali

33:23 Of Naphtali he said:

O Naphtali, overflowing with favor,

and full of the Lord’s blessing,

possess the west and south.

Blessing on Asher

33:24 Of Asher he said:

Asher is blessed with children,

may he be favored by his brothers

and may he dip his foot in olive oil.

33:25 The bars of your gates will be made of iron and bronze,

and may you have lifelong strength.

General Praise and Blessing

33:26 There is no one like God, O Jeshurun,

who rides through the sky to help you,

on the clouds in majesty.

33:27 The everlasting God is a refuge,

and underneath you are his eternal arms;

he has driven out enemies before you,

and has said, “Destroy!”

33:28 Israel lives in safety,

the fountain of Jacob is quite secure,

in a land of grain and new wine;

indeed, its heavens rain down dew.

33:29 You have joy, Israel! Who is like you?

You are a people delivered by the Lord,

your protective shield

and your exalted sword.

May your enemies cringe before you;

may you trample on their backs.