Discovery BoxDeuteronomy 32:22-25 
Context32:22 For a fire has been kindled by my anger,
and it burns to lowest Sheol; 1
it consumes the earth and its produce,
and ignites the foundations of the mountains.
32:23 I will increase their 2 disasters,
I will use up my arrows on them.
32:24 They will be starved by famine,
eaten by plague, and bitterly stung; 3
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 4 both the young man and the virgin,
the infant and the gray-haired man.
1 tn Or “to the lowest depths of the earth”; cf. NAB “to the depths of the nether world”; NIV “to the realm of death below”; NLT “to the depths of the grave.”
sn Sheol refers here not to hell and hell-fire – a much later concept – but to the innermost parts of the earth, as low down as one could get. The parallel with “the foundations of the mountains” makes this clear (cf. Pss 9:17; 16:10; 139:8; Isa 14:9, 15; Amos 9:2).
2 tn Heb “upon them.”
3 tn The Hebrew term קֶטֶב (qetev) is probably metaphorical here for the sting of a disease (HALOT 1091-92 s.v.).
4 tn A verb is omitted here in the Hebrew text; for purposes of English style one suitable to the context is supplied.
