Глава 26

1–2. Confirmation of the commandments of worship. 3–13. Promises for keeping Jehovah's commandments and 14–39. threats for violating them. 40–46. The future of Israel Lev.26:1. You shall not make idols or graven images for yourself, nor shall you set up pillars for yourself, nor shall you place stones with images in your land to bow down to them, for I am the Lord your God. Lev.26:2. You shall keep My Sabbaths and honor My sanctuary: I am the Lord. Briefly, on the negative and positive sides, through Israel’s aversion from idolatry (and in general violation of the first three commandments of the Decalogue) and exhortation to observe Jehovah’s Sabbaths and preserve the holiness of His sanctuary - to the outward expression of the covenant with Jehovah, the essence of God is repeated, on the fulfillment or non-fulfillment of which the prosperity or misfortune of Israel will depend. The use and deification of: 1) idols, Heb. elilim, imaginary, insignificant gods (cf. Lev. 19.4); 2) statues, Heb. pecel, Vulg.: sculptile, cast, chiselled, idols; 3) pillars - mazzebah, wooden and stone steles, which the patriarchs erected in places marked by theophany (Gen. 28:18, 35.14), - in view of the abuse of these monuments by the people, they are now prohibited, and 4) stones with images - eben maskit, Vulg.: insignem lapidem, i.e. images of idols (cf. Ezek. 8.12 ). Lev.26:3. If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments and do them, Lev.26:4. then I will give you rains in due season, and the earth will yield its growth, and the trees of the field will yield their fruit; Lev.26:5. and the threshing of grain will reach your harvest of grapes, and the harvest of grapes will reach your sowing, and you will eat your bread to the full, and you will live in [your] land in safety; Lev.26:6. I will send peace to [your] land, lie down, and no one will bother you, I will drive out fierce beasts from [your] land, and the sword will not pass through your land; Lev.26:7. and you will drive out your enemies, and they will fall before you by the sword; Lev.26:8. five of you will drive out a hundred, and a hundred of you will drive out darkness, and your enemies will fall before you by the sword; Lev.26:9. I will look upon you [and bless you], and I will make you fruitful, and I will multiply you, and I will be steadfast in My covenant with you; Lev.26:10. and you will eat last year’s old things, and throw away the old for the new; Lev.26:11. And I will make My habitation among you, and My soul will not abhor you; Lev.26:12. and I will walk among you and will be your God, and you will be my people. For the exact observance of Jehovah's commandments, Israel is promised: 1) the fertility of the land, and above all, since in Palestine it depended on the timely and abundant rainfall, early (joreh, autumn) and late (malgosch, spring), cf. Deut 11.11.14; Wed Jer 5.24 – timely rains (Lev.26:4); the abundance of the harvest (Lev.26:5) is such that the threshing of bread (usually, together with the harvest, ended at Pentecost, next in May) will last until the autumn (late September - early October) grape harvest, and the harvest of the latter will barely end by the time of sowing (in November, before the onset of early rains); 2) tranquility and peace in the land of Israel from wild animals and from enemies, easy and sure victory over enemies, strength and courage of the people of God (Lev.26.6–8); 3) fertility, multiplication of the population and enrichment (cf. Lev. 25.21–22) (Lev. 26:9–10) - all this in the name of the covenant (see Gen. 17.4–6), and 4) the most important good: Jehovah’s dwelling with His people, his gracious communication with them (cf. 2 Cor. 6.16) and the moral exaltation of the latter among other nations ( Lev.26:11–13). So, nothing that served the material and spiritual good of Israel has been forgotten here! Punishments for failure to fulfill obligations, on the contrary, may follow one another more than once, and more sensitive and severe ones will be sent only when less severe ones do not produce a corrective effect on the people. Lev.26:14. But if you do not listen to Me and do not keep all these commandments, Lev.26:15. and if you despise My statutes, and if your soul abhors My laws, so that you do not keep all My commandments, breaking My covenant, Lev.26:16. then I will do the same to you: I will send upon you horror, stunting and fever, from which your eyes will become weary and your soul will be tormented, and you will sow your seeds in vain, and your enemies will eat them up; Lev.26:17. I will set My face against you, and you will fall before your enemies, and your enemies will rule over you, and you will flee when no one is pursuing you. Lev.26:18. If, despite all this, you do not listen to Me, then I will increase the punishment for your sins sevenfold, Lev.26:19. and I will break your proud stubbornness, and I will make your heaven like iron, and your earth like copper; Lev.26:20. and your strength will fail in vain, and your land will not yield its growth, and the trees of [your] land will not yield their fruit. Lev.26:21. If [after this] you go against Me and do not want to listen to Me, then I will add seven blows to you for your sins: Lev.26:22. I will send wild beasts against you, who will deprive you of your children, destroy your livestock, and diminish you, so that your roads will be desolate. Lev.26:23. If after this you do not correct yourself and go against Me, Lev.26:24. then I will also [in rage] go against you and strike you sevenfold for your sins, Lev.26:25. and I will bring a vengeful sword upon you in vengeance of the covenant; If you hide in your cities, then I will send a plague on you, and you will be delivered into the hands of the enemy; Lev.26:26. the bread that sustains man I will destroy from you; ten women will bake your bread in one oven and will give you the weight of your bread; you will eat and not be full. Lev.26:27. If after this you do not listen to Me and go against Me, Lev.26:28. then I will go against you in rage and will punish you seven times for your sins, Lev.26:29. and you shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters you shall eat; Lev.26:30. I will destroy your high places and break down your pillars, and throw your carcasses over the broken pieces of your idols, and My soul will abhor you. Lev.26:31. I will make your cities desolate, and I will desolate your sanctuaries, and I will not smell the sweet aroma of your [sacrifices]. Lev.26:32. I will devastate [your] land, so that your enemies who have settled in it will be amazed at it; Lev.26:33. But I will scatter you among the nations and draw a sword after you, and your land will be desolate and your cities destroyed. Lev.26:34. Then the earth will satisfy itself for its Sabbaths all the days of [its] desolation; When you are in the land of your enemies, then the land will rest and satisfy itself for its sabbaths; Lev.26:35. all the days of its desolation it will rest, no matter how much it rested on your Sabbaths when you lived on it. Lev.26:36. To those who remain among you, I will send timidity into the hearts of the land of their enemies, and the sound of a wavering leaf will chase them, and they will flee as from a sword, and will fall when no one pursues, Lev.26:37. and you will stumble over each other as if struck by a sword, while no one is pursuing, and you will not have the strength to resist your enemies; Lev.26:38. and you will perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies will devour you; Lev.26:39. and those who are left of you will perish for their iniquities in the lands of your enemies, and for the iniquities of their fathers they will perish; 1) Diseases and defeats from enemies (Lev.26:16–17). Schachepheth – “stunting”, consumption (LXX: ψώρα, Slav.: “krasta”; from Arabic: perhaps exhaustion from hunger). Oaddachath – “fever”, feverish heat (LXX: ἵκτερα, Vulg.: ardor; Syriac: scabies; Slav.: “yellowish woman”). 2) To humble the perseverance, pride and hope of the people for wealth, the barrenness of the soil will be sent to them (Lev.26:18-20): the sky will be like iron (due to the scarcity of rain), the earth will be like copper (due to barrenness), Lev.26:19 (cf. Deut. 28.23, where the comparison is in the opposite form. This terrible word on Israel came true with all accuracy in Palestine, which was once boiling with milk and). honey, and now desolate. 3) The abundance of wild beasts and the desolation of the country (Lev.26:22, cf. Ezekiel 5.17) - a punishment that was exactly fulfilled first in the kingdom of Israel (2 Kings 17.25). (ib.), finally, from hunger: 10 housewives will prepare bread for 10 families in one oven (v. Lev. 26.26), “due to the insufficiency of what is necessary” (Blessed Theodoret, question 36), and hunger will intensify due to the insignificant portions of bread given out by weight. 5) Lev.26:27–33: the final disaster of Israel is famine, which led parents to cannibalism in relation to their own children (Lev.26:29, - this was the case during the siege of Samaria, 2 Kings 6.28, and Jerusalem, Jer 19.9; Lamentations 2.20, especially during its destruction by Titus, Josephus, Jude War 5:1, 4–5); destruction of objects of worship - false (v. 30, “high places”, bamoth; obelisks, chammanin, dedicated to the sun god, at dates, baal-hamman, cf. Isa 17.8; 2 Chr. 34.4, idols, cf. 2 Kings 23.10–16), and then of the true (Lev. 26:31 in contrast Lev.26:11); finally, extreme desolation, amazing for the very enemies of the country of Israel (Lev.26:32) and its dispersion among the nations (Lev.26:33). It is a deep and bitter irony: the people did not keep the law of God regarding the Sabbath year, and now, while they were in captivity of their enemies, the land of Palestine, without the participation of the good will of Israel, will celebrate the Sabbath years. According to Jewish tradition (cf. Blessed Theodoret, question 37), 70 years of captivity were an exact replacement for the 70 Sabbath years released without celebration from the time of Saul (490 years before the captivity). Thus, the earth of God will cast off its unworthy inhabitants (cf. Lev. 18:26–30, 20.22). Lev.26:40. then they will confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers, how they committed crimes against Me and went against Me, Lev.26:41. for which reason also I [in rage] went against them and brought them into the land of their enemies; then their uncircumcised heart will be subdued, and then they will suffer for their iniquities. Disasters and captivities will have a sobering effect on a stubborn people: in them they will see not a matter of chance, but a definition of the hand of Jehovah punishing them for their iniquity, and will bear disasters as atonement for their iniquities. Lev.26:42. And I will remember My covenant with Jacob, and My covenant with Isaac, and My covenant with Abraham I will remember, and I will remember the land; Lev.26:43. while the earth will be abandoned by them and will satisfy itself for its Sabbaths, being empty of them, and they will suffer for their iniquity, because they despised My laws and their soul abhorred My statutes, Lev.26:44. and while they are in the land of their enemies, I will not despise them and will not abhor them to the point of destroying them, so as to destroy My covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God; Lev.26:45. I will remember for them the covenant with the ancestors, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt before the eyes of the nations, to be their God. I am the Lord. Then Jehovah, in all his might, will restore with the chosen people the covenant He established with their forefathers (cf. Blessed Theodos. Question 37), which is significant for all mankind, and therefore indestructible (Lev. 26:44, see Rom. 11.29). Lev.26:46. These are the decrees and decrees and laws that the Lord decreed between Himself and among the children of Israel on Mount Sinai through Moses. The verse, apparently, concludes not only the chapter, but also the entire book of Lev.27 and makes a special appendix to it. You might be interested in: