Fj – Military Siege 28: 45-57

Military Siege
28: 45-57

Military siege DIG: Who will carry out this judgment? Why would God use the goyim to discipline His people? What will be the net effect of the enemy laying siege to the cities of Isra’el? What does the eagle symbolize? What new perspective is introduced here? What are tongues (foreign languages) a sign of? Why do you think the Ruach Ha’Kodesh saved the two worst curses until the end? How were the horrors of the military siege carried out by the Arameans, the Babylonians, and the Romans?

REFLECT: Do you have an iron yoke around your neck in the affairs of this world? Are you serving yourself? Who are you serving? Do you need a new perspective on your life? Do you feel like you are under siege? From who? Do you need to repent of something? Where do you begin? With Whom do you begin? How can you turn your life into a blessing?

Moshe then elaborated on the specific conditional curses in verses 28:16-19, which were an elaboration of the specific conditional blessings of 28:3-6. In 28:20-68, Moses pronounced eleven curses that Isra’el would suffer if she did not live wholeheartedly in accordance with God’s mitzvot (to see link click Ez – Statutes, Mitzvot, and Ordinances). Each individual judgment essentially had one goal: to turn Isra’el from disobedience.⁶¹³

9. The reason for the curses (28:45-48): All these curses will come upon you and pursue you and overtake you until you are destroyed. The statement until you are destroyed occurs six times in this chapter (here, verses 24, 45, 48, 51, 61) like repeated hammer blows. This experience of covenantal cursing would bring Isra’el to the brink of extinction, and provides a sad contrast to what God intended for His chosen people. The fact that YHVH did not exterminate Isra’el when He drove them out of the Promised Land (covenantal curse) later in her history (see the commentary on Jeremiah Gu – Seventy Years of Imperial Babylonian Rule) indicates that this verb is somewhat overstated. The strength of the language, however, prevents one from minimizing the full extent of this threat.⁶¹⁴

With these verses it is as though Moshe had reached a plateau in his presentation of covenantal curses. He has made it abundantly clear that the experience will be horrific and agonizing. He provides here a summary in the heart of his long presentation of curses. Moses pauses to provide the theological rationale for these terrible curses once again, namely, to punish Isra’el for her disobedience of the agreed-upon covenantal stipulations to serve as a warning to all future generations. He summarizes the impact of the curses, hunger, thirst, nakedness, and poverty, then he describes the gruesome details of the military siege.

These verses also introduce a new perspective. It no longer seems as though the covenantal curses are a mere possibility – now the fate appears to be a foregone conclusion. Not because YHVH wanted it or willed it, but that the people were determined to rebel against Him and so they had brought the destruction down upon their own heads.

The defeat envisioned by these verses is total. Using language similar to that found earlier in 28:2 and 15, Moshe declares that those curses will pursue Isra’el like a relentless predator. You will be destroyed because you did not listen to the voice of ADONAI your God, to keep His mitzvot and statutes that He commanded you. They will be a sign and a wonder on you and your descendants forever. In Isra’el’s exodus experience, the ten plagues had served as exciting signs and wonders. What a reversal in Isra’el’s fate this experience of judgment represents. Instead of serving ADONAI your God with joy and goodness of heart, out of the abundance of everything, you will serve your enemies, whom ADONAI will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness and lacking everything. That service to pagan nations will be like an iron yoke. And YHVH will put an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you (28:45-48). Notice the sad progression from Isra’el’s conduct to her fate. Instead of serving ADONAI . . . they will serve their enemies. This fate represents a reversal of the Exodus, in other words, a return to bondage. One wonders why God’s people, then and now, cannot understand that it is only eternal values that have ultimate worth. As the late missionary Jim Elliot said so powerfully, “He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”⁶¹⁵

Dear Wonderful Heavenly Father, All Your promises are totally trustworthy. They are all “Yes” and “Amen” (Second Corinthians 1:20). It is exciting to think of Your promised blessings; but just as real are Your promised curses. He who trusts in the Son has eternal life. He who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him (John 3:36). Though many point at Isra’el and her sins, it is so much wiser to look inward.

Praise you dear Father that entrance to Your holy heaven is not based on a person’s looks, family line nor on good deeds, but on the heart that loves You as Lord. But ADONAI said to Samuel, “Do not look at his appearance or his stature, because I have already refused him. For He does not see a man as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but Adonai looks into the heart” (First Samuel 16:7). Praise You that You see the heart motives behind the actions. You discern if the action is done out of pride for others to see or out of loving humility in service and honor for You. Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord!” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.  Many will say to Me on that day, “Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in Your name, and drive out demons in Your name, and perform many miracles in Your name?” Then I will declare to them, “I never knew you. Get away from Me, you workers of lawlessness” (Matthew 7:21-23)! I love You and desire to lovingly serve You, no matter what it costs me now, for I will spend all eternity with You in complete peace and great joy.  For I consider the sufferings of this present time not worthy to be compared with the coming glory to be revealed to us (Romans 8:18). In Yeshua’s holy name and power of His resurrection. Amen

10. The horrors of the military siege (28:49-52): The two worst curses were saved until the conclusion of Moshe’s speech, and then specifically illustrated: the military siege and the scattering of the Jews to the Gentile nations (see Fk – The Diaspora). The central concept throughout this inventory of covenantal curses is the catastrophe of serving one’s enemies rather than serving YHVH. The description of military conquest at the hands of a foreign power represents the total reversal of all that God had done for Isra’el: no land, no cities, no possessions, no crops, no herds or flocks, and no loved ones. Ha’Shem will rise up against His chosen people, a fierce enemy who will epitomize covenantal curse.

ADONAI will raise up a nation against you from far away, from the end of the earth, just as the eagle swoops down (28:49a). The comparison of this attacking nation to an eagle’s swooping down signifies the suddenness, speed and power of the attack. In Scripture, the image of the eagle is often used to describe military invasion by different nations, including Babylon (Jeremiah 48:40, 49:22; Ezeki’el 17:3), Egypt (Ezeki’el 28:7); and Assyria (Hosea 8:1). The Assyrians captured the northern kingdom of Isra’el in 722 BC, and the Babylonians invaded the southern kingdom of Judah in 606 BC and destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple in 586 BC (see the commentary on Jeremiah Gb – The Destruction of Solomon’s Temple on Tisha B’Av in 586 BC). Many thousands of Jews were taken captive to Babylon and forced to live in the land of idols. That cured them of idol worship once-and-for-all! Perhaps the image here in Deuteronomy was meant to cover all the invasions that brought chastening to the Jewish people, including the Roman invasion of 70 AD. The things described here in verses 49-57 certainly happened during both the Babylonian and the Roman sieges of Jerusalem.⁶¹⁶

A nation whose language you will not understand (28:49b). Centuries later, Isaiah would declare that the hearing of the Assyrian tongue would be a sign of their own unbelief. Very well then, with foreign lips and strange tongues (Hebrew: uvelashovn, meaning languages) God will speak to this people (Isaiah 28:11). This passage is referred to in the B’rit Chadashah where Paul quotes from Isaiah and says: Tongues (Greek: glossai, meaning languages), then, are a sign, not for believers, but for unbelievers, specifically unbelieving Jews, the unbelievers of this people (First Corinthians 14:21-22). The purpose of tongues, or languages, in a Messianic congregation or church was not to bring unbelievers to faith. It had the same purpose it had in Isaiah 28. It is a sign of Jewish unbelief. It was not to bring them to Messiah, because Paul, quoting from this verse says that even then they will not listen (First Corinthians 14:21b). Therefore, tongues are a sign of cursing because of Jewish unbelief, a sign of blessing because the Church Age had begun, and a sign of authority (from apostles, prophets, or a nation, authenticating that it was God who was speaking). Peter, for example, had the keys to the Kingdom and would be responsible for ushering in the three major ethnic groups to the faith in the first century, Jews, Samaritans, and the Gentiles (Acts 10:44-46).

This sign would be the same for the Babylonians and the Romans as it was for the Assyrians. As a result, just as Isra’el’s disobedience in Deuteronomy led to the use of tongues as a sign of Jewish unbelief in the Land, so Isra’el’s unbelief in the rejection of Messiah led to the use of tongues as a sign of Jewish unbelief in the first century Church.⁶¹⁷

Moses demonstrates how the nation of Isra’el, which had been offered great glory by YHVH will experience the horrors of destruction by military siege. A brazen-faced nation that will not respect the old or be gracious to the young. They will devour the cattle and the crops, leaving nothing behind for Isra’el to eat. It will devour the fruit of your livestock and the fruit of your soil, until you are destroyed. It will not leave behind for you grain, new wine, or oil, the increase of your herds or the young of your flock, until it ruins you. It will besiege you within all your town gates throughout your land, until your high and fortified walls – that you trusted in – come down. It will besiege you within all your gates throughout your land that ADONAI your God has given you (28:50-52).

This last indictment, in fortified walls that you trusted in, was Isra’el’s fundamental problem. YHVH repeatedly demanded that His covenantal nation trust Him, have faith in Him, believe in Him. He demonstrated His stupendous power and willingness to intervene on their behalf numerous times. Nevertheless, on too many occasions the chosen nation turned her back on ADONAI (Numbers 13-14), mistakenly placing her confidence in political alliances or false gods. Their refusal to trust the LORD led to their rebellion, idolatry, and eventually to experiencing these covenantal curses.⁶¹⁸

The horrors of the siege would come to a head in cannibalism. The enemy would devour the fruit of your livestock and the fruit of your soil (28:51), but the Israelites would eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your sons and daughters that ADONAI your God has given you, in the siege and stress with which your enemies will distress you (28:53). The two illustrations that follow make the cannibalism seem even more terrible because it is mentioned almost casually.

The most tender and delicate man among you – his eye will become evil against his brother and the wife of his bosom and the rest of his children that he has left. He will not give to a single one of them from his children’s flesh that he will eat, because nothing else is left for him in the siege and stress with which your enemy will distress you within all your town gates (28:54-55).

The tender and delicate woman among you, who never ventured to set the sole of her foot on the ground out of delicateness and tenderness – her eye will become evil against the husband of her bosom and her son and daughter. For in secret, she will eat her afterbirth that issues from between her legs and the children she bears, for lack of anything else in the siege and stress with which your enemy will distress you within all your gates (28:56-57). This curse was literally fulfilled when the Arameans besieged Samaria (Second Kings 6:24-29), when the Babylonians besieged Jerusalem in 586 BC (Lamentations 2:20 and 4:10),⁶¹⁹ and when the Romans besieged Jerusalem in 70 AD (see the commentary on The Life of Christ Mt – The Destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple on Tisha B’Av in 70 AD: Atrocities in the City).