Leviticus26
New King James Version
1‘You shall not make idols for yourselves; neither a carved image nor a sacred pillar shall you rear up for yourselves; nor shall you set up an engraved stone in your land, to bow down to it; for I am the Lord your God.
2You shall keep My Sabbaths and reverence My sanctuary: I am the Lord.
3‘If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments, and perform them,
4then I will give you rain in its season, the land shall yield its produce, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.
5Your threshing shall last till the time of vintage, and the vintage shall last till the time of sowing; you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely.
6I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none will make you afraid; I will rid the land of evil beasts, and the sword will not go through your land.
7You will chase your enemies, and they shall fall by the sword before you.
8Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight; your enemies shall fall by the sword before you.
9‘For I will look on you favorably and make you fruitful, multiply you and confirm My covenant with you.
10You shall eat the old harvest, and clear out the old because of the new.
11I will set My tabernacle among you, and My soul shall not abhor you.
12I will walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people.
13I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves; I have broken the bands of your yoke and made you walk upright.
14‘But if you do not obey Me, and do not observe all these commandments,
15and if you despise My statutes, or if your soul abhors My judgments, so that you do not perform all My commandments, but break My covenant,
16I also will do this to you: I will even appoint terror over you, wasting disease and fever which shall consume the eyes and cause sorrow of heart. And you shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it.
17I will set My face against you, and you shall be defeated by your enemies. Those who hate you shall reign over you, and you shall flee when no one pursues you.
18‘And after all this, if you do not obey Me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins.
19I will break the pride of your power; I will make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze.
20And your strength shall be spent in vain; for your land shall not yield its produce, nor shall the trees of the land yield their fruit.
21‘Then, if you walk contrary to Me, and are not willing to obey Me, I will bring on you seven times more plagues, according to your sins.
22I will also send wild beasts among you, which shall rob you of your children, destroy your livestock, and make you few in number; and your highways shall be desolate.
23‘And if by these things you are not reformed by Me, but walk contrary to Me,
24then I also will walk contrary to you, and I will punish you yet seven times for your sins.
25And I will bring a sword against you that will execute the vengeance of the covenant; when you are gathered together within your cities I will send pestilence among you; and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy.
26When I have cut off your supply of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall bring back your bread by weight, and you shall eat and not be satisfied.
27‘And after all this, if you do not obey Me, but walk contrary to Me,
28then I also will walk contrary to you in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins.
29You shall eat the flesh of your sons, and you shall eat the flesh of your daughters.
30I will destroy your high places, cut down your incense altars, and cast your carcasses on the lifeless forms of your idols; and My soul shall abhor you.
31I will lay your cities waste and bring your sanctuaries to desolation, and I will not smell the fragrance of your sweet aromas.
32I will bring the land to desolation, and your enemies who dwell in it shall be astonished at it.
33I will scatter you among the nations and draw out a sword after you; your land shall be desolate and your cities waste.
34Then the land shall enjoy its sabbaths as long as it lies desolate and you are in your enemies’ land; then the land shall rest and enjoy its sabbaths.
35As long as it lies desolate it shall rest— for the time it did not rest on your sabbaths when you dwelt in it.
36‘And as for those of you who are left, I will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies; the sound of a shaken leaf shall cause them to flee; they shall flee as though fleeing from a sword, and they shall fall when no one pursues.
37They shall stumble over one another, as it were before a sword, when no one pursues; and you shall have no power to stand before your enemies.
38You shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up.
39And those of you who are left shall waste away in their iniquity in your enemies’ lands; also in their fathers’ iniquities, which are with them, they shall waste away.
40‘But if they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers, with their unfaithfulness in which they were unfaithful to Me, and that they also have walked contrary to Me,
41and that I also have walked contrary to them and have brought them into the land of their enemies; if their uncircumcised hearts are humbled, and they accept their guilt—
42then I will remember My covenant with Jacob, and My covenant with Isaac and My covenant with Abraham I will remember; I will remember the land.
43The land also shall be left empty by them, and will enjoy its sabbaths while it lies desolate without them; they will accept their guilt, because they despised My judgments and because their soul abhorred My statutes.
44Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, nor shall I abhor them, to utterly destroy them and break My covenant with them; for I am the Lord their God.
45But for their sake I will remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the Lord.’ ”
46These are the statutes and judgments and laws which the Lord made between Himself and the children of Israel on Mount Sinai by the hand of Moses.
Study Guide
Public-domain commentary and original-language notes for Leviticus 26.
Chapter Summary
In this chapter: Promises upon keeping the precepts. (1–13). Threatenings against disobedience. (14–39). God promises to remember those that repent. (40–46).
vv1-13
This chapter contains a general enforcement of all the laws given by Moses; by promises of reward in case of obedience, on the one hand; and threatenings of punishment for disobedience, on the other. While Israel maintained a national regard to God's worship, sabbaths, and sanctuary, and did not turn aside to idolatry, the Lord engaged to continue to them temporal mercies and religious advantages. These great and precious promises, though they relate chiefly to the life which now is, were typical of the spiritual blessings made sure by the covenant of grace to all believers, through Christ. 1. Plenty and abundance of the fruits of the earth. Every good and perfect gift must be expected from above, from the Father of lights. 2. Peace under the Divine protection. Those dwell in safety, that dwell in God. 3. Victory and success in their wars. It is all one with the Lord to save by many or by few. 4. The increase of their people. The gospel church shall be fruitful. 5. The favour of God, which is the fountain of all Good. 6. Tokens of his presence in and by his ordinances. The way to have God's ordinances fixed among us, is to cleave closely to them. 7. The grace of the covenant. All covenant blessings are summed up in the covenant relation, I will be your God, and ye shall be my people; and they are all grounded upon their redemption. Having purchased them, God would own them, and never cast them off till they cast him off. (Le 26:14-39)
vv14-39
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.
vv40-46
Among the Israelites, persons were not always prosperous or afflicted according to their obedience or disobedience. But national prosperity was the effect of national obedience, and national judgments were brought on by national wickedness. Israel was under a peculiar covenant. National wickedness will end in the ruin of any people, especially where the word of God and the light of the gospel are enjoyed. Sooner or later, sin will be the ruin, as well as the reproach, of every people. Oh that, being humbled for our sins, we might avert the rising storm before it bursts upon us! God grant that we may, in this our day, consider the things which belong to our eternal peace.
Key Words
עָשָׂה: to do or make, in the broadest sense and widest application
אֱלִיל: good for nothing, by anal. vain or vanity; specifically an idol
קוּם: to rise (in various applications, literal, figurative, intensive and causative)
פֶּסֶל: an idol
מַצֵּבָה: something stationed, i.e. a column or (memorial stone); by analogy, an idol
נָתַן: to give, used with greatest latitude of application (put, make, etc.)
מַשְׂכִּית: a figure (carved on stone, the wall, or any object); figuratively, imagination
אֶבֶן: a stone
אֶרֶץ: the earth (at large, or partitively a land)
שָׁחָה: to depress, i.e. prostrate (especially reflexive, in homage to royalty or God)
Cross References
Leviticus 26The parallel primary legal discourse outlining Israel's covenant curses for national disobedience.
Supported by Matthew Henry, JFB
Parallels the terrifying warning of eating the flesh of sons and daughters during severe siege.
Supported by JFB
Explicit fulfillment of the land resting to enjoy its sabbaths during the seventy-year exile.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Explicit historical fulfillment of the land resting to enjoy its sabbaths during the Babylonian exile.
Supported by Matthew Henry, JFB
The matching covenant blessings discourse detailing prosperity for keeping God's commandments.
Supported by Matthew Henry, JFB
The covenant of peace where God rids the land of evil beasts.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Corresponds directly to the judgment of heaven as brass and earth as iron.
Supported by JFB
Lists wild beasts, sword, famine, and pestilence as God's four sore judgments.
Supported by JFB
Directly echoes breaking the staff of bread and delivering bread by weight.
Supported by JFB
Records the tragic historical fulfillment of mothers eating their own children during the siege.
Supported by JFB
Promises the spiritual circumcision of the heart to cure Israel's stubborn, uncircumcised heart.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Calvin highlights this as the direct prohibition of making molten gods of silver or gold.
Supported by John Calvin
The prophetic fulfillment where the plowman overtakes the reaper and treading grapes reaches sowing.
Supported by JFB
Reflects the mathematical impossibility of five chasing an hundred except by God's judgment.
Supported by Matthew Henry, Matthew Poole
Grounds the covenant obligations in the historic redemption from Egyptian bondage.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Expanded details on the sorrow of heart, terror, and failing eyes threatened here.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Fulfillment of being slain before enemies and fleeing when none pursueth.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Describes the highways lying waste and travelers ceasing, fulfilling the predicted desolation.
Supported by JFB
Fulfills the promise to destroy high places, make cities waste, and lay idols desolate.
Supported by JFB
Expands on the threat of being scattered among all people and finding no ease.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Establishes the Sabbatical year law that Israel violated, leading to the forced land rest.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Illustrates the wicked fleeing when no one pursues, matching the shaken leaf terror.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Explicitly describes house of Israel as being physically circumcised but having 'uncircumcised hearts'.
Supported by Matthew Henry
New Testament definition of true circumcision as that of the heart and spirit, not letter.
Supported by Matthew Henry
God hears Israel's groaning and remembers His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Supported by Matthew Poole
Exilic confession that God in His great mercy did not utterly consume or forsake them.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Relates to eating the old store of harvest until the ninth year's increase.
Supported by JFB
The promise of God's sanctuary and tabernacle being set in their midst forever.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Prophetic fulfillment of sowing much but bringing in little as a covenant curse.
Supported by Matthew Henry
The curse of sowing but not reaping, treading olives but not anointing.
Supported by Matthew Henry
The wicked flee when no man pursueth, matching verse 17's internal terror.
Supported by Matthew Henry
Parallels the threat of sending the teeth of wild beasts against disobedient Israel.
Supported by JFB
Prophesies God taking away from Jerusalem the whole stay and staff of bread.
Supported by JFB
Repeats the curse of eating but not being satisfied due to lack of bread.
Supported by JFB
Josiah literalized this by burning human bones on pagan altars, defiling their idols.
Supported by JFB
Solomon's prayer models confession after being smitten before enemies for sinning.
Supported by Matthew Henry