De 28:12 and that the land yield not her fruit; which is unavoidably the case when rain is withheld:and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the Lord giveth you; for if the land does not yield its fruits sufficient to support the inhabitants of it, they must in course perish.{k} Targum Jon. in Deut. xxviii. 12. Deuteronomy 11:18Ver. 18-20. Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart, and in your soul,.... Treasure up the laws of God delivered to them in their minds, retain them in their memories, and cherish a cordial affection for them; which would be an antidote against apostasy, idolatry, and other sins, Ps 119:11and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes; of this and the two following verses,See Gill on "De 6:7",See Gill on "De 6:8",See Gill on "De 6:9". Deuteronomy 11:19Ver. 19. See Gill on "De 11:18". Deuteronomy 11:20Ver. 20. See Gill on "De 11:18". Deuteronomy 11:21Ver. 21. That your days may be multiplied,.... Long life being a very desirable blessing, and which is promised to those that obey and keep the law; see De 30:19and the days of your children; which are dear to parents, and the continuance of whose lives, next to their own, is most desirable, yea, as desirable as their own; and especially it is desirable that they might have a posterity descending from them, to enjoy for ever their estates and possessions; as it was to the people of Israel, that they might have a seed always to dwellin the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers to give them; the land of Canaan, so often spoken of as the promise, oath, and gift of God:as the days of heaven upon the earth; that is, as long as the heavens and the earth shall be, and the one shall be over the other, as they will be to the end of time. Deuteronomy 11:22Ver. 22. For if ye shall diligently keep all these commandments which I command you to do them,.... Observe and take notice of them, even all of them, and so as not merely to have a theory or notional knowledge of them, but to put them in practice:to love the Lord your God; and show it by obeying his commands, and which is the end of the commandment, and the principle from which all obedience should flow:to walk in all his ways, and to cleave unto him; see De 10:12. Deuteronomy 11:23Ver. 23. Then will the Lord drive out all those nations from before you,.... By little and little, even all the seven nations which then inhabited the land of Canaan; and this he would do to make room for them, that they might inherit the land; see De 7:1and ye shall possess greater nations, and mightier than yourselves; countries whose inhabitants were more in number, and greater in strength, than they; and therefore the conquest of them was not to be ascribed to themselves, but to the Lord; this is often observed; see De 7:1. Deuteronomy 11:24Ver. 24. Every place wherein the soles of your feet shall tread,.... Meaning in the land of Canaan; though the Jews vainly apply this to every land, and country, and place therein, where any of them come; pleasing themselves with this foolish fancy, that all shall be theirs that the foot of any of them have trod upon, or they have dwelt in; but that it respects only the land of Canaan appears by the following description of it and its boundaries:from the wilderness; the wilderness of Paran, which lay to the south of it, where Kadesh was, from whence the spies were sent, and was the southern border of it:and Lebanon; which was a range of mountains to the north of it; and was the northern border of the land:from the river, the river Euphrates; which was the eastern border of it, when it was carried to its utmost extent, as in the days of Solomon, 1Ki 4:21even unto the uttermost sea shall your coast be: the Mediterranean sea, which was the western border of the land of Canaan, or "the hinder sea", and so it is called Zec 14:8, it lay at the back of them; for if a man stands with his face to the east, the south will be on his right hand, and the north on his left, and the west will be behind him, or at the back of him. Deuteronomy 11:25Ver. 25. There shall be no man able to stand before you,.... Meaning not a single man, such an one as Og, or any of the sons of Anak, the giants; because it could never be thought, imagined, or feared, that one man only should be able to stand against 600,000 fighting men, but any people or nation, though greater and mightier than they:for the Lord your God shall lay the fear of you, and the dread of you, upon all the land that ye shall tread upon: that is, upon all the land of Canaan, and the inhabitants of it; who should hear what wonderful things had been done for them in Egypt, and at the Red sea, and in the wilderness; and what they had done to Sihon and Og, and to their countries, and which accordingly was fulfilled, Jos 2:9as he hath said unto you; had promised them, De 2:25 and which was prophesied of in the prophetic song at the Red sea; see Ex 15:14. Deuteronomy 11:26Ver. 26. Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse,.... Meaning the law of God, and the statutes, judgments, and commandments of it; which, if obeyed, blessings would be bestowed upon them; but if disobeyed, they would be liable to the curses of it, as the following words explain it; see De 30:15 everyone of the Israelites were called upon to see and consider this matter, it being an interesting one to them all. Deuteronomy 11:27Ver. 27. A blessing, if ye obey the commandments of the Lord your God,.... That is, a blessing should come upon them, even all temporal blessings they stood in need of; they should be blessed in body and estate, in their families, and in their flocks, in town and country; see De 28:1,which I command you this day; afresh repeated to them, and enjoined them the observation of it in the name of the Lord. Deuteronomy 11:28Ver. 28. And a curse, if ye will not obey the commandments of the Lord your God,.... Accursed in body and estate, in basket and store; in their families, flocks, and herds; within doors and without; in city, and country; going out, or coming in; in this world, and that to come, if divine goodness prevent not; see De 28:15but turn aside out of the way which I command you this day; which the law he gave them, and repeated to them, directed them to walk in:to go after other gods, which ye have not known; to serve and worship the gods of other nations, strange gods, which neither they nor their fathers knew anything of, or ever received any good thing from; and which indeed are no gods, and nothing in the world, as an idol is. Deuteronomy 11:29Ver. 29. And it shall come to pass, when the Lord thy God hath bought thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it,.... Which is often observed, as being near at hand; and when and where many things were to be done, which could not be done in the place and circumstances they now were, particularly what follows:that thou shall put the blessing on Mount Gerizim, and the curse upon Mount Ebal; that is, pronounce the one on one mountain, and the other on the other mountain, or at least towards them, or over against them. The Targum of Jonathan is"ye shall set six tribes on Mount Gerizim, and six tribes on Mount Ebal; (#De 27:12,13) blessing they shall turn their faces against Mount Gerizim, and cursing they shall turn their faces against Mount Ebal;''with which agrees the account given in the Misnah;"six tribes went to the top of Mount Gerizim, and six to the top of Mount Ebal; and the priests and the Levites, and the ark, stood below in the middle; the priests surrounded the ark, and the Levites the priests, and all Israel were on this and on that side of the ark, as in Jos 8:33 then they turned their faces against Gerizim, they opened with the blessing, blessed is he that maketh not any graven or molten image, and both answered "Amen"; then they turned their faces against Mount Ebal, and opened with the curse, De 27:15 and both answered Amen {s};''see the performance of this command in Jos 8:33.{s} Sotah, c. 7. sect. 5. Deuteronomy 11:30Ver. 30. Are they not on the other side Jordan,.... Opposite to that where Moses now was in the plains of Moab, even in Samaria; so in the Misnah {t} it is said,"as soon as Israel passed over Jordan, they came to Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal, which are in Samaria;''but those mountains were not near Jordan nor Jericho, to which the people of Israel came first, but sixty miles from thence; though they were, as Moses says, on the other side from the place they now were:by the way wherewith the sun goeth down; or, as the Targum of Jonathan,"after the way of the sun setting;''following that, or taking their direction from thence, signifying that they lay to the west of Jordan:in the land of the Canaanites; of that particular tribe or nation which were eminently called Canaanites, for these dwelt by the sea by the coast of Jordan, Nu 13:29 or as further described,that dwell in the champaign over against Gilgal; in the plain open champaign country opposite to Gilgal; not that Gilgal Joshua encamped at before he came to Jericho, which in Moses's time was not known by that name, but another, as Dr. Lightfoot {u} observes, and he thinks Galilee is meant:beside the plains of Moreh; near to Shechem, Ge 12:6 and that Gerizim, one of these mountains, was not far from Shechem, is evident from Jud 9:6 and so in the Misnah {w} it is said, that these mountains were on the side of Shechem, which is in the plains of Moreh, as in De 11:30 as the plains of Moreh here denote Shechem, so there: Benjamin of Tudela says {x} there is a valley between them, in which lies Shechem; and in his time there were on Mount Gerizim fountains and orchards, but Mount Ebal was dry like stones and rocks. The Targum of Jonathan here, instead of Moreh, reads Mamre; seeGe 13:18.{t} Sotah, c. 7. sect. 5. {u} Chorograph. Cent. c. 48. {w} Sotah, c. 7. sect. 5. {x} Itinerarium, p. 38, 40. Deuteronomy 11:31Ver. 31. For ye shall pass over Jordan, to go in to possess the land Which the Lord your God giveth you,.... They were now near it, and by this they are assured they should pass over it, in order to take possession of the land God had given them, and which gift of his was a sufficient title to it:and ye shall possess it, and dwell therein: should not only take possession of it, but make their abode in it; they are assured hereby of continuance in it, on condition they obeyed the laws of God, as follows. Deuteronomy 11:32Ver. 32. And ye shall observe to do all the statutes and judgments,.... Take notice of them, and heed unto them, so as to practise them:which I set before you this day; repeated in order to them, on the observance of which depended their continuance in the land of Canaan; and therefore this is so often repeated and urged.
John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible.