Bible Strands
Deuteronomy 32:24
They will be wasted from hunger and ravaged by pestilence and bitter plague; I will send the fangs of wild beasts against them, with the venom of vipers that slither in the dust.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — God speaks through Moses in the Song of Moses, addressing Israel’s future apostasy. The surrounding context in Deuteronomy 32:23–25 frames these judgments as the direct result of covenant unfaithfulness.
The words — The text highlights מְזֵ֥י (me.Zei), meaning weakened or consumed, and בְּהֵמוֹת֙ (be.he.mOt), meaning animals or wild beasts. These terms ground the abstract judgment in physical deprivation and predatory violence.
The thread — This pattern of famine, plague, and wild animals recurs in Leviticus 26:22 and Ezekiel 5:17 as standard covenant curses. The imagery of venomous serpents also echoes the curse pronounced on the serpent in Genesis 3:14.
Why it lands — The passage demands recognition that covenant rebellion triggers tangible, systemic destruction. It requires the reader to see physical suffering not as random misfortune but as the direct outcome of rejecting divine authority.
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
They shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with burning heat, and with bitter destruction: I will also send the teeth of beasts upon them, with the poison of serpents of the dust.
Cross-references
- Leviticus 26:22 I will send wild animals against you to rob you of your children, destroy your livestock, and reduce your numbers, until your roads lie desolate.
- Ezekiel 5:17 I will send famine and wild beasts against you, and they will leave you childless. Plague and bloodshed will sweep through you, and I will bring a sword against you. I, the LORD, have spoken.”
- Genesis 3:14 So the LORD God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and every beast of the field! On your belly will you go, and dust you will eat, all the days of your life.
- Genesis 49:15 He saw that his resting place was good and that his land was pleasant, so he bent his shoulder to the burden and submitted to labor as a servant.
- Deuteronomy 28:22 The LORD will strike you with wasting disease, with fever and inflammation, with scorching heat and drought, and with blight and mildew; these will pursue you until you perish.
- Deuteronomy 28:53 Then you will eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of the sons and daughters whom the LORD your God has given you, in the siege and distress that your enemy will inflict on you.
- Psalms 18:12 From the brightness of His presence His clouds advanced—hailstones and coals of fire.
- Psalms 91:6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the calamity that destroys at noon.
- Psalms 120:4 Sharp arrows will come from the warrior, with burning coals of the broom tree!
- Isaiah 65:25 The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox, but the food of the serpent will be dust. They will neither harm nor destroy on all My holy mountain,” says the LORD.