Discovery BoxLeviticus 26:22-33 
Context26:22 I will send the wild animals 1 against you and they will bereave you of your children, 2 annihilate your cattle, and diminish your population 3 so that your roads will become deserted.
26:23 “‘If in spite of these things 4 you do not allow yourselves to be disciplined and you walk in hostility against me, 5 26:24 I myself will also walk in hostility against you and strike you 6 seven times on account of your sins. 26:25 I will bring on you an avenging sword, a covenant vengeance. 7 Although 8 you will gather together into your cities, I will send pestilence among you and you will be given into enemy hands. 9 26:26 When I break off your supply of bread, 10 ten women will bake your bread in one oven; they will ration your bread by weight, 11 and you will eat and not be satisfied.
26:27 “‘If in spite of this 12 you do not obey me but walk in hostility against me, 13 26:28 I will walk in hostile rage against you 14 and I myself will also discipline you seven times on account of your sins. 26:29 You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters. 15 26:30 I will destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars, 16 and I will stack your dead bodies on top of the lifeless bodies of your idols. 17 I will abhor you. 18 26:31 I will lay your cities waste 19 and make your sanctuaries desolate, and I will refuse to smell your soothing aromas. 26:32 I myself will make the land desolate and your enemies who live in it will be appalled. 26:33 I will scatter you among the nations and unsheathe the sword 20 after you, so your land will become desolate and your cities will become a waste.
1 tn Heb “the animal of the field.” This collective singular has been translated as a plural. The expression “animal of the field” refers to a wild (i.e., nondomesticated) animal.
2 tn The words “of your children” are not in the Hebrew text, but are implied.
3 tn Heb “and diminish you.”
4 tn Heb “And if in these.”
5 tn Heb “with me,” but see the added preposition בְּ (bet) on the phrase “in hostility” in vv. 24 and 27.
6 tn Heb “and I myself will also strike you.”
7 tn Heb “vengeance of covenant”; cf. NAB “the avenger of my covenant.”
8 tn Heb “and.” The Hebrew conjunction ו (vav, “and”) has a concessive force in this context.
9 tn Heb “in hand of enemy,” but Tg. Ps.-J. and Tg. Neof. have “in the hands of your enemies” (J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 454).
10 tn Heb “When I break to you staff of bread” (KJV, ASV, and NASB all similar).
11 tn Heb “they will return your bread in weight.”
12 tn Heb “And if in this.”
13 tn Heb “with me.”
14 tn Heb “in rage of hostility with you”; NASB “with wrathful hostility”; NRSV “I will continue hostile to you in fury”; CEV “I’ll get really furious.”
15 tn Heb “and the flesh of your daughters you will eat.” The phrase “you will eat” has not been repeated in the translation for stylistic reasons.
16 sn Regarding these cultic installations, see the remarks in B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 188, and R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:903. The term rendered “incense altars” might better be rendered “sanctuaries [of foreign deities]” or “stelae.”
17 tn The translation reflects the Hebrew wordplay “your corpses…the corpses of your idols.” Since idols, being lifeless, do not really have “corpses,” the translation uses “dead bodies” for people and “lifeless bodies” for the idols.
18 tn Heb “and my soul will abhor you.”
19 tn Heb “And I will give your cities a waste”; NLT “make your cities desolate.”
20 tn Heb “and I will empty sword” (see HALOT 1228 s.v. ריק 3).
