Deuteronomy 28:48

28:48 instead in hunger, thirst, nakedness, and poverty ¹  you will serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you. They ²  will place an iron yoke on your neck until they have destroyed you.

Deuteronomy 28:53-58

28:53 You will then eat your own offspring, ³  the flesh of the sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you, because of the severity of the siege ⁴  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 ⁵  you in your villages. 28:56 Likewise, the most ⁶  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, ⁷  will turn against her beloved husband, her sons and daughters, 28:57 and will secretly eat her afterbirth ⁸  and her newborn children ⁹  (since she has nothing else), ¹⁰  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 ¹¹  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,

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¹ tn Heb “lack of everything.”

² tn Heb “he” (also later in this verse). The pronoun is a collective singular referring to the enemies (cf. CEV, NLT). Many translations understand the singular pronoun to refer to the Lord (cf. NAB, NASB, NIV, NCV, NRSV, TEV).

³ tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NRSV); NASB “the offspring of your own body.”

⁴ tn Heb “siege and stress.”

⁵ tn Heb “besiege,” redundant with the noun “siege.”

⁶ tc The LXX adds σφόδρα (sfodra, “very”) to bring the description into line with v. 54.

⁷ tn Heb “delicateness and tenderness.”

⁸ tn Heb includes “that which comes out from between her feet.”

⁹ tn Heb “her sons that she will bear.”

¹⁰ tn Heb includes “in her need for everything.”

¹¹ tn Heb “If you are not careful to do.”