Bible Strands
Deuteronomy 28:33
A people you do not know will eat the produce of your land and of all your toil. All your days you will be oppressed and crushed.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Moses addresses the Israelites on the plains of Moab, outlining the covenant curses that will follow disobedience before they enter the Promised land.
The words — יֹאכַל (yo.Khal) means "it will eat," and פְּרִי (pe.Ri) denotes "fruit" or "produce," highlighting the forced transfer of agricultural yield to foreign hands.
The thread — The text describes a foreign people consuming the harvest and a state of perpetual oppression, a pattern repeated in Jeremiah 5:17 and Leviticus 26:16. The immediate context in Deuteronomy 28:29 and 28:34 extends this theme by detailing blindness and madness as parallel results of covenant failure.
Why it lands — It requires a reader to recognize that the loss of labor and autonomy is the direct, structural outcome of breaking the covenant, demanding a clear-eyed assessment of obedience and consequence.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
The fruit of thy land, and all thy labours, shall a nation which thou knowest not eat up; and thou shalt be only oppressed and crushed alway:
Cross-references
- Jeremiah 5:17 They will devour your harvest and food; they will consume your sons and daughters; they will eat up your flocks and herds; they will feed on your vines and fig trees. With the sword they will destroy the fortified cities in which you trust.”
- Leviticus 26:16 then this is what I will do to you: I will bring upon you sudden terror, wasting disease, and fever that will destroy your sight and drain your life. You will sow your seed in vain, because your enemies will eat it.
- Deuteronomy 28:29 and at noon you will grope about like a blind man in the darkness. You will not prosper in your ways. Day after day you will be oppressed and plundered, with no one to save you.
- Deuteronomy 28:51 They will eat the offspring of your livestock and the produce of your land until you are destroyed. They will leave you no grain or new wine or oil, no calves of your herds or lambs of your flocks, until they have caused you to perish.
- Nehemiah 9:36 So here we are today as slaves in the land You gave our fathers to enjoy its fruit and goodness—here we are as slaves!
- Isaiah 1:7 Your land is desolate; your cities are burned with fire. Foreigners devour your fields before you—a desolation demolished by strangers.
- Jeremiah 4:17 They surround her like men guarding a field, because she has rebelled against Me,” declares the LORD.
- Jeremiah 5:15 Behold, I am bringing a distant nation against you, O house of Israel,” declares the LORD. “It is an established nation, an ancient nation, a nation whose language you do not know and whose speech you do not understand.
- Jeremiah 8:16 The snorting of enemy horses is heard from Dan. At the sound of the neighing of mighty steeds, the whole land quakes. They come to devour the land and everything in it, the city and all who dwell in it.